Questions and Answers

ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 5 Summary

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 1 Summary

This is the famous sleep-walking scene. There is no hint of it in Holinshed. Lady Macbeth suffers from somnambulism (sleeplessness). She walks as she sleeps. She sleeps and keeps awake at sametime. It is a strange illness. Every night she gets up from her bed, dresses herself in a night-gown, and with a lighted taper in her hand passing from room to room, muttering strange fancies to herself. In this scene we have a vivid representation of the sleep-walking Lady.

In Dunsinane castle a doctor and Lady Macbeth’s waiting gentlewoman are discussing Lady Macbeth’s sleepwalking. While they talk Lady Macbeth enters, carrying a candle. She tries to get rid of the oppression of her secret by committing it to paper. The doctor explains it as the agitation of the mind. Lady Macbeth enters with a taper. She has light by her continually. Darkness frightens her. She rubs her hand continually in an attempt to wipe away the stain of blood. (Washing mania) Old memories come in a disorderly fashion.

She taunts her husband. She recalls her old words to her husband before the murder. “Who dares receive it?” The sight of Duncan lying in a pool of blood has been a persistent memory with her. She recalls the horror of it even in sleep. She questions her husband about the Wife of Macduff. His hands are always red with blood. Lady Macbeth gives out the secret here.

The same old persistent spot in the hand comes back to her mind. She feels now that the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten the damned spot. She remembers the Banquet scene. She exhorts her husband. The knocking of Act II Scene ii comes back to her mind. She is filled with consternation. She goes back to bed.

The sleepwalking scene shows the broken, shattered lady. She is a shadow of her former self. The resolute, ruthless, fiend-like Lady has been reduced to a pale woman creeping from bed and mumbling incoherently, throwing up dreadful memories. There are however indications of this development of this Lady. Her fierce exterior conceals a soft core.

The sleep walking scene is filled with ironical overtone. It is an ironical travesty by Lady Macbeth of the heroic Lady of the first act. After the murder of Duncan, Macbeth says, “Macbeth doth murder sleep”. Lady Macbeth cannot understand what he says. She too murdered sleep. This scene is indeed an ironic commentary on her complacency after the murder.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 2 Summary

This scene tells about the rebel Scottish Lords who prepare to join with Malcolm’s English forces near Birnam wood for a united attack against Macbeth. Malcolm and with English Siward to help them are now on the March towards Scotland; the Scottish nobles are also coming out to join gorges with them. There is significant departure from Holinshed. Shakespeare would have believe us that yhr thanes deserted Macbeth. But this is not what Holinshed tells us. We learn that no one any longer serves Macbeth from a sense of love and loyalty and that Macbeth is finding it difficult to keep his men under control. This scene is purely informative and it emphases Macbeth’s gradual isolation.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 3 Summary

Macbeth is in the castle of Dunsinane.He hears the reports of the thanes falling away from him more and more everyday. But Macbeth is determined to meet the situation bravely because of his strong faith in the prophecies of the witches – that he will have no cause for fear till Birnam wood comes to Dunsinane and that no one “born of woman” will have power to hurt him. In his castle Macbeth, deserted by his former supporters, puts a desperate trust in the prophecies of the witches and apparitions.

A servant, who tries to report the proximity and size of the enemy armies, warns of violent reproof from Macbeth for his pains. Macbeth orders his one remaining officer, Seyton, to scour the countryside and hang all those who take of fear or desertion. He finds no solace in the doctor’s diagnosis of Lady Macbeth’s condition and asks him to diagnose and cure Scotland’s illness.

The materials of the scene are taken from Holinshed. Holinshed tells that Macbeth’s friends asked him to take the help of foreigners, but Macbeth is so confident of his security that he did not do anything. He was sure that he would not be vanquished. Shakespeare however emphasises his mental insecurity and restlessness. He is not at peace with himself. He feels sick and tired, and again he is lashed into fury and desperation.

His language is violent and again there is a tender note when he pines for the loss of ‘honour, love, obedience and troops of friends’. His moods give rise to an ambivalent attitude- even in our disgust and horror, we feel a movement of compassion for the tyrant. Even in adversity he shows his practicality and brutality in having people put to death, but his questioning of the doctor strikes a pathetic note, for his own mind is “diseased” and the care he urges fr Lady Macbeth applies most terribly so himself.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 4 Summary

The English Force led by Malcolm, Macduff and Siward has now reached Scotland, and has advanced as far as Birnam wood. The combined forces against Macbeth is ordered by Malcolm to cut boughs from the trees of Birnam wood to use as camouflage during their movement towards Dunsinane. Malcolm assures Siward that those who remain with Macbeth are acting under duress and have no loyalty to their master.

Imminent battle is the keynote. Tension is mounting with the dramatic and ironic fulfilment of the prophecy brought nearer by Malcolm’s instructions to his soldiers. “The toils of retribution close quickly around him”.

When Malcolm gives order that every soldier shall “hew him down a bough and bear’t before hom”, we are at once aware how the witches’ promise, that Macbeth will not be defeated until Birnam Wood moves to Dunsinane, is open to a different meaning, and how Macbeth has been beguiled.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 5 Summary

Macbeth is waiting in Dunsinane Castle; his castle can endure a seizure. He hears the cry of a woman which announces the fact that Lady Macbeth has taken her own life. He ponders on the nature of existence- everything leads to death. Then a messenger enters to tell him that he has seen Birnam wood move. Macbeth prepares himself for fight. Macbeth can now forder his approaching doom, but with a desperate courage he decides to die fighting.

Macbeth’s mental defence against the odds is now almost shattered. His bravado in the openings of the scene is reduced to emptiness when he is told of his wife’s death. Life does not signify anything to him now. The report of Birnam Wood’s movement confirms to him the deceptiveness of the Witches’ promise. Aware now of the futility of the struggle, he becomes desperate and raises himself to fight to his death. The scene also brings out Macbeth in all glory of his pride and brooding self-analysis. The scene shows the regeneration of Macbeth in his self recovery from delusion and audacity of follies.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 6 Summary

It shows the progress of the battle. The English Force has come close up to Macbeth’s castle. Malcolm, Macduff and old Siward on a plain before the castle, preparing to shed their boughs and fight. Malcolm asks his soldiers to throw down their “leave screens” and gives battle-orders to his commanders. It is a short scene conveying the activity prior to battle.

Macbeth is on the battlefield. He finds himself surrounded by the enemies. Macbeth kills young Siward in a single combat. Evidently, there is no heart for fight among Macbeth’s followers, and the castle is surrendered almost without resistance.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 7 Summary

Macbeth finds consolation in the prophecy that no one born of a woman can defeat him. Macbeth’s bravery is still evident. He will not surrender inside of all the odds against him. But he is no longer Bellona’s bridegroom. Now he fights from instinct, like a wild animal clinging to life. He compares himself to a bear tied to a post and baited with dogs. He cannot fight but still he tries to fight. He still has hopes of success, for he cannot be killed except by a person not born of woman. But there can be no such person.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 8 Summary

There is no scene division in the Folio.at this point. Most editors follow Pope and Johnson in beginning a new scene. Macbeth will not play the Roman fool (like Cato and Brutus) and commit suicide. Macduff meets Macbeth, and Macduff reveals that he was “from his mother’s womb untimely ripped off. He now realises that the witches are in reality” equivocating fiends”, and none should trust them.

Macduff calls uponMacbeth to surrender and prepare for the humiliation that will be heaped upon him. Macbeth, refusing to suffer such degradation, puts up a fight and is slain in the encounter. They fight, and Macbeth is killed, but not before he has denounced the witches for their double sense’. Thus the prophecy has come true.

Macbeth Act 5 Scene 9 Summary

There is jubilation in the English camp, as Macduff comes from the field with Macbeth’s head held high on a pole for all to see. Their victory has been complete, though they have also suffered heavy losses. Malcolm is hailed by all as the king of Scotland. He makes his trusted Thanes, ‘Earls’, the first-ever in Scotland.

He also promises to reward them all suitably after his coronation at Scone, to which he invites all of them. Thus disorder represented by Macbeth is put down and replaced by order, symbolised by Malcolm, the new king of the country. His victory is the victory of good over evil. The play ends with the re-assertion of legitimate kingship at Scotland and of the normal order of the universe. Scotland is now restored “to a sound of pristine health”.

ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers

ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 4 Summary

Macbeth Act 4 Scene 1 Summary

The scene occurs on the morrow of the banquet. The banquet scene concludes with Macbeth’s resolution to meet the witches “I will tomorrow, and betimes I will the Weird Sisters”.

This is the third and last witch-scene in the play. It is laid in a dark cave on a desolate heath and the weather is foul and Marky as usual. In the beginning of the scene three witches are seen dancing round a cauldron, and casting their magic spells. They throw all sorts of loathsome ingredients into the cauldron and the refrain of their wicked song is :

Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and cauldron bubbles

Soon their Queen Hecate also joined them. They wait for Macbeth who soon arrives to consult them and seek guidance as to his future course of action. They now his thoughts, and conjure up apparitions who are to tell him what he wants to know. The first apparition which rises out of the cauldron has an armed head. It warns Macbeth that he must fear Macduff, the thane of Fife. The apparition then goes down. It does not yell anything further.

The next apparition is a bloody child. The strange direction which Macbeth gers from this apparition is that he should be “Bloody, bold and resolute” and that, “none of the women born shall harm Macbeth”. The third apparition is a child wearing a crown. It bears a tree in its hand, just as Macduff’s soldiers will do towards the end of the play.

It tells Macbeth that he will not be defeated until Birnam wood moves to Dunsinane Hill. Then arises before him a procession of eight apparitions (all of them Scottish Kings) followed by the ghost of Banquo. This means that Banquo’s sons would be the future kings of Scotland.

The witches deal with vulgar things; they are vulgar and ugly, so their activities and methods are vulgar. They reveal in gross things because their values are opposite to those cherished by men. Macbeth is further tempted and trapped by the witches and prepares him for his damnation. Macbeth walks easily into their tap; he is taken in by their juggling with words.

Macbeth Act 4 Scene 2 Summary

This is a scene of relief from tension and horrors of murder and supernatural manifestations. It is a sweet domestic scene. Macduff has fled to England to join Malcolm there and plan out the strategy for the overthrow of Macbeth. Lady Macbeth is alone with her child in the castle. Lady Macbeth is angry with her husband for his rash action and complains that he lacks the natural touch.

Ross knows the purpose of Macbeth’s flight, but he cannot divulge it for fear of spies of Macbeth. He tries to assuage the wronged feelings of Lady Macbeth by saying that her husband is wise, and knows well. Lady Macbeth is not assured.

Ross leaves lest he will give out his mind. Lady Macduff tells her little son that he has lost his father. The son who is precocious says that he will live as birds do. He asks his mother about the meaning of traitor and says wisely that there are few honest men in the world, and so traitors are not hanged. A messenger comes and asks Lady Macduff to fly away.

Lady Macduff is puzzled because she has done no wrong. Murderers come to ask her about her husband. She says boldly that he cannot be found in any place made unholy by their presence. The son reacts sharply when they call his father traitor. The murderers kill her son, and chase Lady Macduff to slay her. The child’s prattle before the murder, and Lady Macduff’s sense of loneliness caused by her husband’s desertion of her offer a pathetic impression of innocence and helplessness.

Macbeth Act 4 Scene 3 Summary

Macduff has arrived in England, and in this scene we have an interview between him and Malcolm, Duncan’s eldest son. In England, Malcolm and Macduff discuss the horror of Macbeth’s despotic reign in Scotland. To test Macduff’s political integrity and patriotism, Malcolm tells him that if he is ever made the king, he will prove far more tyrannical than Macbeth.

Malcolm is at first suspicious and does not trust Macduff, he wants to be satisfied that Macduff is not the enemy’s spy. He wants to test the sincerity of Macduff’s patriotism and loyalty to the throne. He attributes all kinds of vices to himself-lecherous, greed and cruelties.

He tells Macduff that he has no ‘king-becoming graces’. Thus, Macduff feels despondent and completely frustrated. He makes an outburst of his passionate grief. Macduff’s holy anger disarms all suspicions and withdraws all his allegations against himself and places himself unreservedly in Macduff ‘s hands for his country’s service.

Convinced of his honesty and patriotism, Malcolm accepts him and declares his intention to lead an attack on Macbeth. This happy hour is further enhanced by the news that Old Siward with ten thousand English soldiers was already setting forth for Scotland. This leads to the contrast between England holy king with his power of healing and the tyrant of Scotland with his mistake and outrages.

When public affairs for Scotland seem propitious, there comes a private grievance for a man who is to play a leading role in public life. Rosser comes and after initial hesitations breaks the news of the slaughter of the Macduff family by the tyrant. Macduff is at first overwhelmed with grief but gradually grief is turned to anger and resolve to avenge the killing of his wife and his sons. Thus Macduff, who is to play the keynote in the retribution, is inspired by a personal motive for revenge.

Macduff becomes the agent not only of the grand Nemesis which constitutes the whole plot, but also a nemesis upon a private wrong which occupies the latter half of the play. Macduff’s expected reaction to the news of the brutal slaughter of his family creates the right emotional intensity and a sense of urgency for retaliation necessary for advancing the action of the play to the climax.

ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers

ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 3 Summary

Macbeth Act 3 Scene 1 Summary

The scene begins with Banquo’s soliloquies. Banquo in this soliloquy suggests his susceptibility to temptation. Macbeth has got what the witches had promised. Macbeth has been crowned as the king of Scotland, and the scene is laid in the hall of his palace at Forres, Scotland. The scene opens with a soliloquy of Banquo which reveals that the poison of the witches is working on him too.

Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, now arrayed as king and queen. Macbeth makes some enquiry about Banquo’s movements before Banquo leaves to go riding. Macbeth, who fears Banquo for his integrity and noble qualities, arranges for his murder, and the murder of Fleance by two murderers whose minds he poisons against Banquo.

All go away, and Macbeth is left alone on the stage. He has already hired two murderers and now he calls them. He instigated them against Banquo and his son tells them that, if they murder the two, they will only get his friendship, love and affection, but would also be suitably rewarded. They can easily do the deed: as Banquo and Fleance return to the castle by nightfall. The murderers promise to do so.

The scene marks the turning point in the development of the plot. Macbeth launches on a career of murder. His degeneration is suggested. He has developed vices like hypocrisy, falsehood and criminality. He is becoming a villain. The hero is turned into villain. Banquo is also tempted. His degeneration is also shown. He gives way to temptation.

Secondly, he meekly offers loyalty to Macbeth. He becomes an accessory after the murder. He forgets his earlier promise to expose the undivulged pretence of treasonous malice. He forgers his boasts that he will not lose his sense of honour in augmenting it. Macbeth, however exalts him as a man. This characterisation of Banquo is baffling.

Macbeth Act 3 Scene 2 Summary

In another room in the royal palace, Lady Macbeth, aware of her husband’s obsessive involvement with the murder of Duncan, tries to restore his assurance and cheerfulness. Lady Macbeth and Macbeth are seen together after the crime of Duncan’s murder. Lady Macbeth is in despair – she knows that they have satisfied their desire without contentment.

They are doomed to live in ‘doubtful joy’. When Macbeth appears, Lady advises him to give up his sorry fancies and not to consider deeply. But she herself cannot get rid of his thoughts. Macbeth shows his desperate mood of destroying the universal order before he eats his meal and sleeps in fear. This shows that he, like Lady Macbeth, lives in doubtful joy. His desperate mood is followed by despondency. He like Lady Macbeth feels that Duncan in his grave sleeps without fear of treason and enmity.

He envies Duncan’s condition because he is living in fear and doubt. Lady Macbeth asks her husband to be jovial among the guests in the banquet. Macbeth wants his wife to pay particular attention to Banquo. He has planned the murder of Duncan but has kept it from his wife. Husband and wife are drifting apart…. The scene is important for psychological reactions of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth after the murder of Duncan.

Both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are distracted by fear and remorse. Macbeth is oscillating between a mood of despair and that of desperation. Lady Macbeth’s misery is gnawing at her heart and making her more and more listless. The easy familiarity and intimacy of man and wife has gone. The troubled soul of Lady Macbeth is revealed by the following words of hers;

Nought’s had, all’s spent,
Where our desire is got without content
‘Tis safer to be that which we destroy
Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy
Macbeth’s soul is equally tortured :
O, full of scorpion is my mind, dear wife :
Thou know’st that Banquo and Fleance, live

But nature’s “copy in them is not eternal”, and before nightfall a dreadful deed would be done which would bring relief to his tortured soul. Of course, he refers to the murder of Banquo and Fleance, though he does not tell so to Kady Macbeth.

Macbeth Act 3 Scene 3 Summary

It is now sunset. The two murderers joined by a third one whom Macbeth has sent on order to see if things are well done take their station little outside the castle where Banquo might be expected to get down in order to follow a footpath across the path across the park. Banquo arrives shortly accompanied by Fleance and a servant carrying a torch. The murderers set upon the party at once and Banquo is slain, but Fleance flies in darkness.

This melodramatic scene in which the murder, unlike Duncan’s is commonly on the stage, is theatrically very effective. The scene also confirms the growing suspicion and insecurity in Macbeth’s mind. Macbeth is getting to trust no one. So, he sends a third murderer to make sure the job is done. Though Banquo is brutally murdered, Fleance escapes. So the task is half done and the escape of Fleance will continue to torture Macbeth.

Macbeth Act 3 Scene 4 Summary

The scene is laid in the banquet hall of Macbeth’s palace at Forces. It is already dinner time, the dinner is sweet, and the guests are all assembled. Only Banquo and Fleance have not yet arrived. One of the murderers arrives to tell him that Banquo is dead, but Fleancw has escaped. Only half of what he had ordered has been done. Macbeth is much agitated and he asks the murderer to go away at the time, but meet him again the next day.

As the banquet proceeds, the murderers come and inform Macbeth of the killing of Banquo and escape of Fleance. Macbeth comes back to the hall and cheers the guests. As he goes to occupy his chair, he finds to his surprise and dismay the ghost of Banquo. He is startled and frightened, and begins his ravings. Lady Macbeth has to use all her energies to save the situation. The ghost disappears for a time and Macbeth regains his composure.

But the ghost reappears, and Macbeth relapses into distraction, and begins his delirium. Lady Macbeth tries hard to compose him, but fails. She at last dismisses the party, saying that Macbeth is not well. The delirious talks of Macbeth disclose his crime. Lady Macbeth requests the guests not to talk to Macbeth but leave them at once without any formality. Thus she saves the situation, though the guests have their own doubts and some idea of the crimes that Macbeth has committed.

The ghost disappears and Macbeth again regains a measure of self control. Macbeth now believes that Macduff is his worst enemy because he stays away from the banquet. He resolves to meet the witches to know the worst means. Now he comes a confirmed criminal.The following speech of his reveals his future plans;

There’s not one of them but I his house
I keep a servant feed. I will to-morrow
(And betimes I will) to the weird Sisters :
More shall they speak; for now I am bent to know,
By the worst means, the worst. For mine own good.
All causes shall give way; I am in blood
Steep’d in so far, that should I wade no more,
Returning were as tedious as go o er:
Strange things I have in head. that will to hand;
Which must be acted. even they may be scanned

Thus he prophesied to launch a career of crimes and murders. The curtain falls as they retire for the night. The ghost in this scene is entirely subjective, for it is seen only by Macbeth, and by none else. He is in a state of extreme agitation and so he has hallucinations. The ghost is as much a subjective phenomenon as the “air borne dagger” which he had seen on the eve of the murder of Duncan. It is a product of Macbeth’s excitable imagination and heated brain.

The scene is laid on a desolate heath. There is thunder and lightning and the witches with their Queen Hecate cast their wicked spells. The witches have made prophecies in Macbeth without consulting her. She rebukes the Witches for not consulting her in their dealings with Macbeth. She takes them to task for their audacity to meddle in such matters, and then departs asking them to meet her again next morning “at the pit of Acheron”, where Macbeth will again come to interview them and where they must be ready with the Chief ingredients of their charm. Their magic,

Shall raise such artificial sprites
As, by the strength of their illusion,
Shall drawcord on to his confusion;
He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear
His hopes, above wisdom, grace and fear;
And you all know, security
Is mortals chiefest enemy

Security is mortals chieftest enemy, and they would make Macbeth feel secure and so hasten his downfall. In the ‘witches’ silent submission to Hecate’s reproof, there is an image of unquestioned authority, which stands in sharp contrast to the proceeding disordered banquet. The last scene of Act III is a choice commentary. The scene is laid outside the palace of Macbeth in Forres, Scotland. It is a “Chorus scene”; it does not further the action of the play, but provides much useful information.

At Forres, Lenox, conversing with another Lord, tells him that all who have contorted closely with Macbeth have suffered for it. People have begun to see through Macbeth, and there are ironic references to his actions. Macduff did not come to his coronation and so Macbeth is angry with him. He may be the next to be taken off. Macbeth has grown a tyrant. and dissatisfaction and revolt against him are mounting.

His Lords have begun to suspect him and Macduff is fled to England. Nemesis will soon overtake Macbeth. The people of Scotland cannot eat and sleep in peace. A king creates a kingdom in his own image and Macbeth, unable to eat and sleep in quiet. has caused the same to be true of his country.

Macbeth’s companion informs him that Macduff has gone to England to enlist the English King’s support for Malcolm against Macbeth. The scene shows how the opposition to Macbeth is steadily building up. His evil deeds are revealing upon him and his downfall is now only a matter of time.

ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers

ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 2 Summary

Macbeth Act 2 Scene 1 Summary

It is the continuation of the previous scene. Supper is over and it is midnight; the hour of murder is approaching. As Banquo is crossing the courtyard of the castle in order to proceed to his chamber, he is met by Macbeth. Banquo thinks of the witches, but he restraints his ‘cursed thoughts’. Macbeth prepares himself for his terrible feat.

Banquo admits that he feels uneasy over the thought of the witch’s prophesies, but when Macbeth joins them he talks to him politely and conveys to him Duncan’s compliments. He also passes on to him a diamond, a gift for Lady Macbeth from the king. Macbeth urges Banquo to side with him in future. This contrast between the two is kept up throughout the play. Macbeth, however, adds that they would talk further regarding the matter when they have more leisure. If he acts according to his wishes, adds Macbeth, it shall make honour for him. But Banquo, the honest man, replies ;

So I lose none
In seeking to augment it, but still keep
My blossoms franchis’d and allegiance clear,
I shall be counsell’d

Macbeth then sends away his servant to tell his mistress to ring the bell when his ‘drunk is ready’ Left alone, Macbeth’s heated imagination makes him see a bloodstained dagger, which points to the room where Duncan is sleeping. It is merely a hallucination, but it is so real that Macbeth tries to clutch “the aur- borne dagger”. Macbeth’s soliloquy shows that he has the imagination of a poet, that he is suffering from prices of conscience. It is an indication of the disintegration which will overtake his soul, as soon as the murder is done. The ringing of a bell is now heard and the soliloquy and the scene end with the words;

I go, and it is done: the bell invites me.
Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven, or to hell

The atmosphere of horror and Macbeth’s imaginative convulsion are Shakespeare’s own.

Macbeth Act 2 Scene 2 Summary

The scene is the same, and it follows the previous one. Lady Macbeth is alone on the stage. Her soliloquy tells us that she has taken wine which has “given her fire” and which will enable him to face the foul deed that is seen to be committed. The two grooms sleep soundly, as she had drugged their wine and so they would not come in the way. But she is afraid of the weakness of her husband, and says she would have herself murdered him, “if he had not resembled her father” in his sleep.

She is startled by the faintest noise. Her nerves are in jitters; her mind in wandering. Macbeth has done the deed in a state of frenzy. He is convulsed. He hears voices, he raves. He stares at herbhand and looks aghast. He cannot say ‘Amen’, he regrets he has murdered when he was asleep. Lady Macbeth tries to soothe his mind, but Macbeth does not heed her. He hears the knocking, hebwishesv that Duncin would awake. The repinings and repentance show the panged of his conscience.

Macbeth has murdered the king and his hands are soaked with blood. He tells his Queen that while the two grooms the attendants of the king – could pray and say ‘Amen’ he could not do so. The word stuck his throat. Lady Macbeth advises him not to think of these things in such a way, otherwise, it will make them mad. Lady Macbeth advises him to place the daggers in the hands of the grooms, and smear them with blood.

But Macbeth does not have the courage to donso, so Lady Macbeth herself goes onto the room, and does the needful. On return. she tells Macbeth that a, “little water clears them of the deed”, and so he must not be afraidaof it. The words are ironical, for no amount of water will ever be able to clear them of ghe deed, and it would spell ruin for them.

Loud knocking is now heard at the door, and they go in to put on their night gowns, lest their present dress should show the to be watchers, and create doubts. This is the famous murder-scene, and it seems to be have been written with a pen of fire.

The murder seems to be mirrored in the souls of the two agents – through them it seems to be visible to us. His conscience tells him that he will sleep no more and he wishes that the deed had never been done. But Lady Macbeth is calm and self – controlled and manages the affair with great skill.

Macbeth Act 2 Scene 3 Summary

The scene is divided into two parts – i. Porter’s speech, ii. Discovery of the murder of Duncan. The scene ii ends with the knocking at the door, so there must beba porter to answer the call. The porter has carousel til midnight and he is under the influence of wine. In the drunken state, he sees visions. He admits a farmer, an equivocation and a tailor to his he’ll.

They have committed sins. But as morning air blows and drunkenness passes, the porter comes to his real self and opens the door and Macduff and Lenox enter to awaken the king quite early according to his instructions. Macbeth also arrives, as if awakened by yhr knocking. They go into the room often king to carry out their mission.

They soon return horrified, for ghey have found the king murdered and lying in his own blood. Alarm bell is rung and a hue and cry raised. Macbeth goes into the room to see things for himself and murders the two grooms, as if in great anger. Lady Macbeth faints and has to be taken away. Banquo suggest that they should dress themselves properly, and then assemble to examine the matter in deed.

All go away and Malcolm and Donalbain, the two sons of the king, are left alone on the stage. They are quick to understand the situation and have some inkling of the truth. They realize that it is not safe for them to remain there any longer. They, therefore, decide to flee from the country at once. Malcolm is to go to England and Donalbain to Ireland. There they would able to plan out their future strategy in safety.

The contrast between the porter’s drunken, grumbling return to his normal workday routine after a night’s carousing and the pretence of Macbeth of awakening to ordinary, everyday reality, after his unknown night of horror, is ironic. Even more ironic isthmus fact that the porter ‘s whimsy of being keeper of Hell – gate is more true than he realizes: it is indeed a hell into which the castle of Macbeth has been transformed by his awful deed. His jesting acts as a relief from extreme tension, but it is thematically significant.

The second part of the scene is devoted to the discovery of the murder by Macduff, Macbeth’s gradual degeneration, his acting and his sense of guilty. Malcolm and Donalbain fearing that they also may get killed, decide to run away, Malcolm to England and his younger brother to Ireland.

Macbeth Act 2 Scene 4 Summary

Shakespeare interposes a quiet scene to relieve the tension of the previous scene. The scene is laid just outside Macbeth’s castle. Ross and an old Macbeth, and recount to each other the horrors and unnatural events that they have witnessed during the night. They speak about unnatural Tempest and irrational behavior of the animals.

The unnatural manifestations and behavior indicate the unnatural deed that is done. Macduff enters and reports that it has been accepted that the two guards killed Duncan on the orders of Malcolm and Donalbain who have run away. He also says that, Macbeth has gone to be crowned in Scone.

The oldman represents the common man and the murder is made more macabre by its uniqueness in his experience. The confusion in the natural world magnifies the crime committed by Macbeth. There is disorder in nature and strange and unnatural things take place. This is symbolic of the disorder in the state of Scotland, and the unnatural murder that has been committed during the night.

ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers

ISC Class 12 Macbeth – Characterisation by Shakespeare

Macbeth:

Macbeth is a brave soldier, a cousin of King Duncan of Scotland. He is also a brave ambitious General and a man of action. He suppresses the revolt of the treacherous Macdonwald, the Thane of Cawdor and the King of Norway. Shakespeare concentrates on Macbeth’s courage in order to contrasting later with his terror and anguish. He is given many epithet like Valour’s minion’, “Bellona’s bridegroom’ and the King, himself calls him a ‘peerless kinsman’.

He is the first character introduced in the play and at the end of the play he is referred to as the dead butcher by Malcolm. All actions in the play revolve around him, so the play after him. His first engagement in the battle is represented as having been won by his personal powers and generalship.

In Act 1 Scene 2, for example both the sergeant and Duncan praise Macbeth for his courage stressing that he carved out his passage” until he was face to face with the enemy General. He is courageous during the new threat posed by the army of the rebel forces reinforced with terrible numbers by the King of Norway, assisted by the most disloyal traitor, The Thane of Cawdor. Macbeth accepts her challenge.

According to his wife, Macbeth is full of milk of human kindness’ and she sets on to attack this aspect of his character. There is evil within him as he echoes the words of the witches. So fair and foul a day, I have never seen. He is a valiant but he fights Luke a frenzied man. This evil in him comes to the fore with every advance he makes in his bloody career. Halfway, through the play, he gains the title of “tyrant” and “butcher”.

Ambition is the key note of character. He is too ambitious to get the kingship for himself as well as for his progeny. The inordinate ambition turns him from a noble hero to a usurper and murderer of the worst kind. Lady Macbeth uses psychology to tempt her husband to kill Duncan; she dares him to do all that may become a man. Macbeth emerges victorious in the battle. Whenever the prospect of action appears, Macbeth’s courage never fails him. Even after his degradation, he is fears. During the apparition of a bloody child he says,

Then live, Macduff, what need I fear of thee?
But yet I’ll make assurance double sure
And take a bond of fate; thou shalt not live
And sleep in spite of thunder
Macbeth shows his courage till the end against all odds.
He says;
They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly
But bear-like I must fight the course

Macbeth’s ambition, in collusion with other circumstances brings about his ruin. Lady Macbeth is aware of her husband’s ambitious nature.

Thou would be great,
Art flot without ambition, but without
Tite illness should attend it.

His ambition is stimulated by circumstances – by his remarkable success and by being conscious of her own powers. The witches choose Macbeth to be the victim of their deceit because of the over whelming ambition in him. His reaction to their prophecies. his rapt behaviour, his brooding over the prophecy leading to the thought of murdering Duncan are prompted by ambition.

His vaulting ambition turns him into a tyrant. He grows bold and bloody. He dies not hesitate to kill the innocent wife and children of Macduff. Macbeth’s passion for power is so strong that no inward misery could persuade him to relinquish the fruits of crime, or to advance from remorse to repentance.

There is another side to the witches prophecy. According to them Banquo would father a dynasty of kings. Macbeth could not bear this. He decodes to have Banquo and Fleance murdered. But as luck would have it Fleance escapes. The ambition to be the founder of a dynasty of kings goods him to hurry along the career of crime. The nobles and the people are antagonised. Ultimately he meets his doom at the hands of Macduff.

Macbeth is endowed with the gift of imagination which often torments him with honid images. His imagination, controlled neither by moral considerations nor by education made him a ready victim to the tempting voices of superstitions. His poetic imagination makes him have hallucinations. It makes him see the dagger and the ghost. of Banquo. It also tells him that he would sleep no more.

His imagination is easily thrilled by the unknown and the supernatural. What terrifies him is always the image of his guilty heart or bloody deed. The imagination is his finest part. It is his imagination which makes visualise his guilt. It is believed that neither his ambition nor the prophecy of the witches would have made Macbeth critics the murder without the chastisement of his wife’s tongue. Macbeth’s inner suffering continues to be prompted by his fertile imagination throughout the play. In his soliloquy Act II. Scene 2 with his hands that have killed Duncan he says —

No, this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine
Making the green one red.

It was his superstition that led him to believe in the promises of the apparitions. He was convinced that he was invincible because no man born of woman would eliminate him. Furthermore, he would not be defeated until the Birnam Wood would come to Dunsinane. However, the event proved how equivocal and misleading the prediction of the witches were.

Macbeth confided in his wife. He shared his joys with her — sent her a letter describing the witches’ prophesies. Accepts her guidance and advice and consulted concerning his plans. Even he keeps to himself when planning the murder of Banquo and Fleance so that she will not have to share the strain. His nobility is visible in his character throughout the play.

Though he yields to the evil forces his submission to them takes place always after a conflict with his conscience. After murdering Duncan, he is overwhelmed by fear of the consequences of the murder; he cannot return to the place of murder;

I’ll go no more
I am afraid to think what I have done
Look on’t again I dare not.

Despite his being a brave, heroic soldier, Macbeth is weak of will and is easily carried away by the suggestions and persuasion of others, and acts against his own better judgment. He suffers from a sense of insecurity and fear of retaliation. He is afraid of Banquo for he knows his secret. So Banquo is murdered. But thr murder brings him no peace. Macduff is still alive, but out of his reach. So he wreaks vengeance on his wife and child. Still there is no sleep, no peace. He thinks that he is still ‘young in deed’ and so his fears are the initial fears of a novice.

Macbeth follows the advice of the witches and travelsthe bloody path of crime. He descends lower and lower into the very depths of hell. He becomes a tyrant. But he fights like a hero and dies like a soldier. He fights like a cornered animal. He knows that his life is useless and so worth living.

Actually his life became pointless when he murdered Duncan, when he ceased Tobe a loyal subject. In the banquet scene, Macbeth is led by terror caused by his guilty conscience. The sight of Banquo’s ghost blows away caution from Macbeth and reveals the crimes he has committed. He feels that a friendless man like him who has no honour or love is like a dead leaf. This deep pessimism is revealed when he is told of his wife’s death.

Rather than passively waiting to die. Macbeth had cut off traitor’s head. at the end, his own head is cut off as a symbol that evil has been destroyed.

Lady Macbeth

Lady Macbeth has been referred to as the fourth witch and she is called the fiend-like Queen by Malcolm. She is the moving force behind Macbeth’s deeds. She chastised Macbeth by the valour of her tongue. overcomes his hesitation and drives him to commit the murder to enable him to become the king. i.e the throne of Scotland. She is ruthless, shows iron will to overcome all the obstacles in the way. Had she not been like this. Duncan would never have been murdered.

When Lady Macbeth makes her first appearance in the play. she is seen reading the letter from her husband. In the letter he calls her as his dearest partner of greatness. and informs her of his success in the battle, the prediction of the witches and their partial fulfillment. She is aware of his weaknesses and uses her strong will to keep him from slipping away from the course he has planned for himself.

She says:
Hie thee hither
That I may pour my spirits in thine ear.
And chastise with the valour of my longue
All that impedes thee from the golden round,
To have thee crown’d withal

Lady Macbeth manipulates her husband with remarkable effectiveness overriding all his objections when he hesitates to murder, she repeatedly questions his manhood util he feels that he must commit murder to prove himself. Lady Macbeth remarkable strength of will persists through the murder of the king – it is she who steadies her husband’s nerves immediately after the crime has been perpetrated. She calls upon the superior powers to unsex her, to take away all womanly nature and to fill her from top to bottom with direct cruelty. She seems to be a monster. But as the action develops, it becomes clear that in reality she is a woman with usual feminine weaknesses.

Afterwards, however, Lady Macbeth begins a slow slide into madness – just as ambition affects her more strongly than Macbeth before the crime, so does guilt plague her more strongly afterwards. By the close of the play, she has been reduced to sleepwalking through the castle, desperately trying to wash away an invisible bloodstain.

In spite of her apparent cruel nature, Lady Macbeth has many feminine qualities. She is a devoted wife and a gracious hostess. As a mother she knows how tender ’tis to love the baby that milked her. She is a loving wife. Her motive for the crime was her love for her husband whom she would like to get the throne so that he might achieve his highest ambition. Macbeth is aware of her feminine qualities. So in Act III, Scene 2, he does not disclose to her his plans to murder Banquo and Fleance. He tells her.

Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck. Her fainting spell and the sleep-walking scene bear ample witness to her feminine qualities. Lady Macbeth shows her will power in planning and execution of the scheme to make her husband thr king. With the strength of her will, she influences her husband, guides his action and helps him out of difficult situations. Her will power is shown during her first appearance in the play, when she reacts to her husband’s letter. Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be What thou art promis’d She does not have the brooding imagination like that of Macbeth.

She is determined for the action. She urges Macbeth to murder Duncan with a singleness of purpose. She takes upon herself the direction of affairs, and arranges all the details of the murder. She makes the grooms drunk and suggests that the crime must be ascribed to them.

She tells her husband to was the blood off his hands and then, seeing he has brought out the daggers, she herself takes them back to the chamber. When she returns to hear the knocking at the gate, she has the presence of mind. She decides that they must put on their night clothes so that it will seem that they have been in bed;

She tells him :
Get on your night-gown, lest occasion calls us.
And show us to be watchers – Be not lost
So poorly in your thoughts …………..

Lady Macbeth is very resourceful in a crisis situation. Unlike her husband, she does not depend on her imagination but shows her presence of mind to solve a problem. Lady Macbeth has a leading role in the play. After the murder, she recedes to the background. She has behaved in an unnatural way which stifled her conscience and strained her nerves.

She had no emotional relief by expressing outwardly her remorse. In the sleep-walking scene, her mind cannot bear the strain of revealing her true which she had tried to conceal. Disillusionment and despair prey upon her more. Lady Macbeth’s iron will and ruthless determination make her look fiendish.

She instigated her husband to kill the old and gentle king who was their ends. Banquo is basically jonest, while guest for the night. But she also has femininity and, therefore, she takes wines to make herself bold. She succeeds in repressing her womanliness only for some time but when the deed has been done, she gradually breaks down and ultimately becomes pathetic in the sleep-walking scene.

Lady Macbeth has no imagination, therefore she neither understands her husband’s nature nor the consequences of the crime. As soon as the hideousness of their crime comes to her, she begins to sink. She is disillusioned and so full of despair. She becomes a broken and frustrated woman. At the close of the play, we learn that she has probably committed suicide. The strain of keeping up appearances has been too much for her. Lady Macbeth is the most fascinating female character of Shakespeare.

Banquo

Banquo is a thane in Duncan’s army, and at first a friend of Macbeth. Banquo, like Macbeth, is a brave general and heroic general and heroic warrior. Duncan considers both of them equally worthy of love and regard. But here the similarity ends. Banquo is basically honest, whole there is a germ of evil in Macbeth. He is not startled when it is predicted that his sons will be the future kings of Scotland. He is far more suspicious of the witches than Macbeth is.

Banquo is ambitious but dies not adopt crooked means to realise his ambition. He is essentially a noble man but the prophecy of the witches affects him to corrupt his nature. He knows of the prophecy, suspects Macbeth but does not disclose the secret.

Rather, he accepts Macbeth’s accession, goes to Scone for his coronation and even accepts the theory that the princes have murdered their father. This is so because he has yielded to evil. He fears that Macbeth has “played most foully” for the throne, but still does not speak a word against him.

In Act III murderers kill Banquo at Macbeth’s command and try to kill his young son Fleance, who manages to get away. Soon after his death Banquo redeem his oath. He is also a frank, honest, straightforward man. However his dying words “oh slave! are a condemnation of Macbeth as he realises in his last moment that he has been betrayed by his friend.

As he does, he calls his son, running away from the murderers, to avenge his murder. Banquo throughout the play was well known for his friendship with Macbeth rather than his courageous efforts during the battle he had won alongside Macbeth.

Macduff

Macduff is a loyal Thane in Duncan’s service (Thane of Fife) and the one not born of woman. Unlike the treasonous Macbeth, Macduff is completely loyal to Duncan and his son Malcolm. He is the most selfless person who is known for his nobility, loyalty and patriotism. He is respected among his countrymen and remains the good Macduff through out the action of the play.

He is hated and feared by Macbeth because Macbeth is aware of his superior nobility and high morality. He suspects Macbeth from the very beginning and so disobeys his command to be present at Scone. He does not attend the banquet hosted by the tyrant.

His behavior is is in sharp contrast to that of Banquo. When Macbeth kills Duncan’s chamberlains. Macduff instinctively begins to suspect foul play and so sternly asks him: Wherefore did you so? Macbeth is annoyed with him and his doubts and fears are confirmed when the witches tell him

Beware Macduff
Beware The Thaize of Fife

Macduff is loyal and patriotic. When he is convinced of Macbeth’s treachery, he sets himself up as an uncompromising enemy to the usurper. Macduff flees to England not out of fear but to help the rightful king of Scotland to free his country of tyranny, leaving his family at the mercy of Macbeth.

He had never imagined that Macbeth would be so cruel to butcher even innocent women and children. This calamity along with his sense of patriotism fires him with a desire for revenge. He convinces Malcolm of his loyalty by the sincerity of his grief when he feels he can no longer condone Malcolm’s confession of faults. Malcolm cannot help being touched by the sincerity with which Macduff expresses his love for his country.

Macduff is a man of action. His secret departure to England and his preoccupation with enlisting aid for the purpose of overthrowing Macbeth points to the immense store of energy in him. Fie is a man of few words. He is shocked and stunned at the news of the mass murder. The reader feels for him deeply. Macduff gives the order for battle. He fights with Macbeth and becomes the most telling cause for the latter’s despair. when he meets Macbeth on the field of battle, he wastes no time in giving empty threats:

I have no words. My voice is in my sword; thou bloodied villain Than terms can give thee out. His actions have origin in his emotions. His emotional nature does not allow him to lose his humanity. In Act IV scene 3, when he is told of the massacre of his wife and children, deep grief interrupts his desire for revenge and reveals a tenderness beneath his violence. It is throug’ him that poetic justice has been meted out to the hero – turned villain.

Banquo keeps his suspicion of Macbeth to himself while Macduff expresses his suspicion and becomes an enemy of Macbeth. Banquo attended the coronation ceremony and the banquet given by Macbeth. Macduff was conspicuous by his absence at both the functions. His absence at banquet made Macbeth turn his anger directly upon Macduff. Banquo is passive against Macbeth’s crimes and is indirectly disloyal to Dunan. Macduff remains loyal to his king and his heirs.

Macduff explains the nature of his birth; a Caesarean operation. This destroys Macbeth’s last hope. Macduff takes over the role played by Macbeth at the start of the play, when he had cut off Macdonwald’s head. He is the trusted man of action. It is through him that poetic justice has been meted out to Macbeth. His intense burning patriotism is above all reproach.

His country is a greater stake to him than his wife and children whom he loves nonetheless as much as anybody can love his wife and children. He loved to see his country free again and his share in the liberation of his country is not an inconsiderable one, for he brings Malcolm from England and kills Macbeth with his own hands, having thus the satisfaction of avenging his family.

King Duncan

Duncan is a dignified, gentle and benevolent king. He is the father of two youthful sons Malcolm and Donalbain, and the victim of well-plotted regicide in a power grab by his trusted captain Macbeth. Macbeth is aware of Duncan’s virtues and understands the enmity of his proposed murder of him :

This Duncan
Hath born his facuties so meek, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angles, trumpet-tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking off.

He is always ready to recognise merit in others and reward those who have shown great courage and heroism in winning the battle against the rebels. Duncan praises Macbeth highly and rewards him with the thaneship of Cawdor. He further shows his appreciation of his services by becoming his guest for the night. Duncan has the qualities of a good king.

He has holiness, generosity and sense of justice. He orders the execution of the Thane of Cawdor for his treachery and rewards Macbeth by declaring him to be the new Thane of Cawdor. It is saintly which makes his murder so very heinous and revolting. Duncan keeps his royal dignity and behaves like an ideal guest in Macbeth’s castle.

Give me your hand-
Conducted to mine host; we love him highly
And shall continue our graces towards him,
By your leave, hostess

Duncan’s concern for his people is seen in his first appearance in the play. The reports of his general’s valour do not make him blind to the needs of the bleeding captain. So he commands; Go, get him surgeons,

Dunan is generously in showering praise and rewarding people. He recognises merit in others and rewards the generals who have shown great courage in putting down the revolt of Macdonwald, and in repelling the attack of the king of Norway. Duncan’s welcome to Macbeth and Banquo in Act I, Scene 4, shows his generosity and his awareness of royal responsibility. His decision visit castle as a guest is a proof of his genuine appreciation for Macbeth.

The importance of royal blood that is the inheritance of the divine right to rule, is emphasized when in the final scene, Duncan’s son Malcolm takes the title of king with the words, by the grace of God/ we will perform.

Malcolm

Malcolm is the legal heir to the throne of Scotland. Being practical, he can make quick decisions. It is he who decides that he and his younger brother Donalbain should separate after their father’s murder. It is a wise decision. Malcolm is realistic which is obvious in his handling of Macduff.

He is not to be easily deceived. Then he appears as a shrewd young man when he gently but persistently tries to convert Macduff’s grief into positive revenge. In the beginning of the play Duncan nominated him as his successor.

This fact hastened the resolve of Macbeth to get rid of Duncan and occupy his throne. Malcolm is cautious and practical. When his father is murdered, he is quick to suspect the murderer, and at once decides on leaving for England. He knows fully well that he as well as his brother will share the fate of their father, if they waste a minute in Macbeth’s residence.

This murderous shaft that’s shot
Hath not yet lighted; and our safest way
Is to avoid the aim

If anything, Malcolm is particularly shrewd and intelligent; so he is able to escape all the wiles of Macbeth, for it appears that Macbeth’s custody he declares to Macduff;

Devilish Macbeth
By many of these trains hath sought to win me

Into his power, and modest wisdom plucks me From over-credulous haste Here is the reason why he cannot at first trust Macduff, and why he tries him by self-disparagement, but at last Macduff ‘s passionate wail for the fate of his country wins his confidence and it is then only that he declares that he has none of the vices which a little while ago he has imputed to himself.

Natural goodness alone is not sufficient for a king: he must be realistic. In his handling of Macduff Malcolm shows himself as a realist. Malcolm is not really deceived. He uses his resourcefulness. When, for the good of Scotland, he gently but persistently tries to convert Macduff’s grief into positive revenge, we see Malcolm as a wise, able and shrewd young man.

Malcolm is an intelligent soldier. He orders his soldiers to camouflage themselves with the boughs from Birnam Wood; he thereby fulfils the prophecy and so shakes Macbeth’s confidence in the witches. Malcolm forms a contrast to his father who has been trustful and unsuspecting.

Malcolm is so suspicious that he distrust Macduff and only satisfies himself of the noble Thane’s loyalty after having spoken of his own detracting in detail. Malcolm symbolises basic goodness in man. His religious spirit spirit helps him to keep away from the superstition in the play. While talking to Macduff in Act IV, Scene 3, he describes his religious fervor.

After the victory is won, Malcolm confers new honours on his thanes and kinsmen, and promises to recall those who are in exile and bring to book that accomplices of Macbeth. He has been portrayed as an ideal king in contrast to the tyrannical Macbeth. His coronation restores peace and legitimate kingship to Scotland. His last words in the play show yhe destruction of evil and disorder, and restoration of order, harmony and peace by young and rightful king of the country.

Ross And Angus

Ross and Angus are minor characters. They are known as chorus or mechanical characters, who give general information or comment or things in the play. It is through their comments that the audience comes to know the impact of the tyranny of Macbeth on the people of Scotland.

We know through them that Macbeth is hated, the people have no love for him and in case of Malcolm’s return they would gladly welcome him. They are two honest Thanes of Scotland. They create a larger life of Scotland. It is through their comments that we learn of Macbeth’s tyranny and it’s impact on the common people.

They make their appearance at the beginning and end of the play. They bring the news of victory to Duncan which has been won by Macbeth and they also convey the news to to Macbeth that Duncan has conferred the title of the Thane of Cawdor upon him. They also accompany Duncan to Inverness.

Ross gives in his talk with the oldman, an account of the portents which were witnessed during the night of Duncan’s murder. His account and the oldman’s remarks contribute to the atmosphere of terror in the play. It is Ross again who informs Malcolm and Macduff of the distressing conditions prevailing in Scotland.

He also breaks to Macduff the painful news of the slaughter of his family under Macbeth’s orders. This news makes Macduff more determined to avenge himself upon that man. It also Ross who breaks to Old Siward the tragic news of the death of his son in the battlefield.

ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers

ISC Class 12 Macbeth – Introduction to William Shakespeare

Shakespeare’s Life (1564-1616)

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely recognized as the greatest writer in the English language and the world greatest pre-eminent dramatist. He is called England’s national poet and the Bard of Avon Shakespeare was a prolific writer during the Elizabethan and Jacobean ages of British theatre (sometimes called the English Renaissance or the Early Modern Period) Shakespeare’s plays are his most enduring legacy but they are not all he wrote. Shakespeare’s poems also remain popular to this day.

His success as a playwright seems to have been almost phenomenal; by 1592 he was already regarded with envy by the older playwrights who had the advantage of a university education. Shakespeare, however, forged blithely a head, and acquired a patron, the Earl of Southampton, to whom he dedicated some of his most popular poems, achieving a reputation reputation both as an actor and a playwright and becoming a part owner of Globe and Blackfriars theaters. Sharing the social and economic aspirations of his class, he hobnobbed with nobility, got himself a coat of arms, acquired a real estate in London, and bought the largest house in Stratford, where he settled down to a gentleman’s life in 1611.

Chart of Shakespeare’s Works:

An Introduction to the Play – Macbeth

Macbeth : A Play for the king

When Elizabeth I of England was dying, childless, she named James VI of Scotland as her successor. He became James I of England. In August 1606, while James was entertaining some people, Macbeth was staged for them. James knew the story because it was about his ancestors, Banquet and Fleance.

This story was in ‘The History of Scotland’ by Holinshed, but this play is much more than a dramatic re-writing of the historical facts. Shakespeare made many changes. In the true story, Banquet was Macbeth’s accomplice in the regicide; but since it would be tactless to suggest that James descended from such an ancestor. Shakespeare’s Banquo is innocent. James also believed that he had inherited the power of healing that Edward the Confessor possessed.

Therefore, to please him, Shakespeare included the description of this power in his play. Another inclusion was witchcraft because James was interested in it, too. But there is more to ‘Macbeth’ than this. There is a moral lesson in it. Murdering a king was considered to be the greatest of all crimes because kings were appointed by God, to rule as His deputies.

So rebellion against a king was rebellion against God. By murdering Duncan, Macbeth gains his crown; but he loses love, friendship, respect and his life. He is rightly punished. Thus, on one level, it is a murder story and on another level, it teaches us that crime does not pay.

Let us look at the character of Macbeth. Except for his inordinate ambition, he is noble in nature. Despite having full knowledge of right and wrong, he murders Duncan. Although he becomes a hardened criminal, yet he suffers from fears, created by himself.

There is another level-that is of rich poetry. The language is meaningful, picturesque and varied. When Macbeth says, that his blood-smeared hands will make “the multitudinous seas incarnadine” we get a picture of vastness. The two words are more Latin than English. Shakespeare used ghem first and showed his skill in the use of language.

Abridgement of Macbeth:

When Duncan the Meeknreigned king of Scotland, there lived a great thane, or lord, called Macbeth. This Macbeth was a near kinsman to the king, and in great esteem at court for his valour and conduct in the wars ; an example of which he had lately given, in defeating a rebel army assisted by the troops of Norway in terrible numbers.

The two Scottish generals, Macbeth and Banquo, returning victorious from his great battle, their way lay over a blasted health, where they were stopped by the strange appearance by three figures like women, except that they beards, and their withered skins and wild attire made them look nor like any earthly creatures. Macbeth first addressed them, when they seemingly offended, laid each one hervchoppy finger upon her skinnyblips, in token of silence; and the first of them saluted Macbeth with the title of thane of Glamis.

The general was not a little startled to find himself known by such creatures; but how much more, when the second of them followed up that salute by giving him the title of thane of Cawdor, to which honour he had no pretensions; and again the third bid him ‘All hail! King that shalt be hereafter! ’ Such a prophetic greeting might well amaze him, who knew that while the king’s sins lived he could not hope to succeed to the throne.

Then turning to Banquo, they pronounced him, in a sort of ridding terms, to be lesser than Macbeth and greater! Not so happy, but much happier! And prophesied that though he should never reign, yet his sons after him should be kings in Scotland. They then turned into air and vanished; by which the generals knew them to be the weird sisters, or witches.

While they stood pondering on the strangeness of the adventure, there arrived certain messengers from the king, who were empowered by him to confer upon Macbeth the dignity of thane of Cawdor; an event so miraculously corresponding with the prediction of the witches astonished Macbeth, and he stood wrapped in amazement, unable to make reply to the messengers; and in that point of time swelling hopes arose in his mind that the prediction of the third witch might in like manner have its accomplishment, and that he should one day reign king in Scotland.

Turning to Banquo, he said; ‘Do you not hope that your children shall be kings, when what the witches promised to me has so wonderfully come to pass?’ ‘That hope’, answered the general, ‘might enkindle you to aim at the throne; but often times these ministers of darkness tell us truths in little things, to betray us into deeds of greatest consequence. But the wicked suggestions of the witches had sunk too deep into the industry of Macbeth to allow him to attend to the warnings of the good Banquo. From that time he bent all his thoughts how to compass the throne of Scotland.

Macbeth had a wife, to whom he communicated the strange prediction of the weird sisters, and it’s partial accomplishments. She was a bad, ambitious woman, and so as her husband and herself could arrive at greatness, she cared not much by what means. She purred on the reluctant purpose of Macbeth, who who felt compunction at the thoughts of blood, and did not cease to represent the murder of the king as a step absolutely necessary to the fulfillment of the flattering prophecy.

It happened at this time that the king, who out of his royal condescension would oftentimes visit his principal nobility upon gracious terms, came to Macbeth’s house, attended by his two sons, Malcolm, and Donalbain, and a numerous train of thanks and attendants, the more to honour Macbeth for the triumphal success of his wars.

The castle of Macbeth was pleasantly situated, and the air about it was sweet and wholesome, which appeared by the nests which the martlet, or swallow, had built under all the jutting friezes and buttresses of the building, wherever it found a place of advantage; for where those birds most breed and haunt, the air is observed to be delicate.

The king entered well-pleased with the place, and not less so with the attentions and respect of his honoured hostess, lady Macbeth, who had the art of covering treacherous purposes with smes; and could look like the innocent flower, while she was indeed the serpent under it.

The king being tired with his journey, went early to bed, and in his state-room two grooms of his chamber (as was the custom) slept beside him. He had been unusually pleased with his reception, and had made presents before he retired to his principal officers; and among the rest, had sent a rich diamond to lady Macbeth, greeting her by the name of his most kind hostess.

Now was the middle of night, when over half the world nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse men’s minds asleep, and none but the wolf and the murderer is abroad. This was the time when Lady Macbeth waked to plot the murder of the king.

She would not have undertaken a deed so abhorrent to her sex, but that she feared her husband’s nature, that it was too full of the milk of human kindness, to do a contrived murder. She knew him to be ambitious, but withal to be scrupulous, and not yet prepared for that height of crime which commonly in the end accompanies inordinate ambition.

She had won him to consent to the murder, but she doubted his resolution; and she feared that the natural tenderness of his disposition (more humane than her own) would come between, and defeat the purpose. So with her own hands armed with a dagger, she approached the king’s bed; having take care to ply the grooms of his chamber so with wine, that they slept antoxicated, and careless of their charge. There lay Duncan in a sound sleep after the fatigues of his journey; and as she viewed him earnestly, there was something in his face, as he slept, which resembled her own father; and she had not the courage to proceed.

She returned to confer with her husband. His resolution had begun to stagger. He considered that there were strong reasons against the deed. In the first place, he was not only a subject, but a near kinsman to the king; and he had been his host and entertainer that day, whose duty, by he laws of hospitality, it was to shut the door against his murderers, not bear the knife himself. Then he considered how just and merciful a king this Duncan had been, how clear of offence to his subjects, how loving to his nobility, and in particular to him; that such kings are the peculiar care of Heaven, and their subjects doubly bound to revenge then- deaths.

Besides, by the favors of the king, Macbeth stood high in the opinion of all sorts of men, and how would those honours be stained by the reputation of so foul amurder! In these conflicts of the mind lady Macbeth found her husband in lining to the better part, and resolving to proceed no further.

But she being a woman not easily shaken from her evil purpose, began to pour in at his earswords which infused a portion of her own spirit into his mind, assigning reason upon reason why he should not shrink from what he had undertaken, how easy the deed was, how soon it would be over; and how the action of one short night would give to all nights and days to come sovereign sway and Royalton!

Then she threw contempt on his change of purpose, and accused of fickleness and cowardice; and declared that she had given such, and knew how tender it was to love the baby that milked her; but she would, while it was smiling in her face, have plucked it from her breast, and dashed it’s brains out, if she had so sworn to do it, as he had sworn to perform that murder. Then she added, how practicable it was to lay the guilt of the deed upon the drunken sleepy groom. And with the valour of her tongue she so chastised his sluggish resolutions, that he once more summoned up courage to the bloody business.

So, taking the dagger in his hand, he softly stole in the dark to the room when Duncan lay; and as he went, he thought he saw another dagger in the air, with the handle towards him, and on thr blade and the point of it drops of blood; but when he tried to grasp at it, it was nothing but air, a mere phantasm proceeding from his own hot and oppressed brain and the business he had in hand.

Getting rid of this fear, he entered the king’s room, whom he despatched with one stroke of his dagger. Just as he had done the murder, one of the grooms, who slept in the chamber, laughed in his sleep, and the other cried ‘Murder,’ which woke them both, but they said a short prayer, one of them said; “God bless us’! and the other answered ‘Amen’; and addtessed themselves to sleep again. Macbeth, who stood listening to them, tried to say “Amen’, when the fellow said ‘God bless us”! but, though he had most need of a blessing, the word stuck in his throat, and he could not pronounce it.

Again he thought he heard a voice which cried; ‘Sleep no more: Macbeth doth murder sleep, the innocent sleep, that nourishes life’. Still it cried ‘Sleep no more’, to all the house. ‘Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor shall sleep no more. Macbeth shall sleep no more.

With such horrible imaginations Macbeth returned to his listening wife, who began to think he had failed of his purpose, and that the deed was somehow frustrated. He came in so distracted a state, that she reproached him with his want of firmness, and sent him to wash his hands of the blood which stained them, while she took the dagger, with purpose to stain the cheeks of the grooms with blood, to make it seem their guilt.

Morning came, and with it the discovery of the murder, which could not be concealed; and though Macbeth and his lady made great show of grief, and the proofs against the grooms (the dagger being produced against them and their faces smeared with blood) were sufficiently strong, yet the entire suspicion fell upon Macbeth, whose inducements to such a deed were adopteduch more forcible than such poor silly grooms could be supposed to have; and Dunan’s two sons fled.

Malcolm, the eldest, sought for refuge in the English Court; and the youngest, Donalbain, made his escape to Ireland. The king’s sons, who should have succeeded him, having thus vacated the throne, Macbeth as next heir was crowned king, and thus the prediction of the weird sisters was literally accomplished.

Though placed so high, Macbeth and his queen could not forget the prophecy of the weird sisters, that, though Macbeth should be the king, yet nor his children, but the children of Banquo, should be kings after him. The thought of this, and that they had defiled their hands with blood, and done so great crimes, only to place the posterity of Banquo upon the throne, so ranked with them, that they determined to put to death both Banquo and his son, 5o make void the predictions of the weird sisters, which in their own case had been so remarkably brought to pass.

For this purpose they made a great supper, to which they invited all the chief Thanes; and among the rest, with marks of particular respect, Banquo and his son Fleance were invited. The way by which Banquo was to pass to the palace at night was beset by murderers appointed by Macbeth, who stabbed Banquo, but in the scuffle, Fleance escaped. From that Fleance descended a race of monarchs who afterwards filled the Scottish throne, ending with James the Sixth of Scotland and the First of England, under whom the crowns of England and Scotland were united.

At supper, the queen, whose manners were in the highest degree affable and royal, played the hostess with a gratefulness and attention which conciliated everyone present, and Macbeth discourses freely with his thanes and nobles saying, that all that was honorable in the country was under his roof, if he had but his good friend Banquo present, whom yet he hoped he should rather have to chide for neglect, than to lament for any mischance. Just at these words the ghost of Banquo, whom he had caused to be murdered, entered the room and placed himself on the chair which Macbeth was about to occupy.

Though Macbeth was a bold man, and one that could have faced the devil without trembling, at this horrible sight his his cheeks turned white with fear, and he stood quite unmanned with his eyes fixed upon the ghost. His queen and ail the nobles, who saw nothing, but perceived him gazing (as they thought), upon an empty chair, took it for a fit distraction, and reproached him, whispering that it was but the same fancy which made him see dagger in the air, when he was about to kill Dunan.

But Macbeth continued to see the ghost, and gave no heed to all they could say, while he addressed it with distracted words, yet so significant, that his queen, fearing the dreadful secret would be disclosed, in great haste dismissed the guests, excusing the infirmity of Macbeth as a disorder he was often troubled them not more than the escape of Fleance, whom now they looked upon as father to a line of kings who should keep their posterity out of the throne. With these miserable thoughts they found no peace, and Macbeth determined once more to seek out the weird sisters, and know from them the worst.

He sought them in a cave upon the heath, where they, who knew by foresight of his coming, were engaged in preparing their dreadful charms, by which they conjured up infernal spirits to reveal to futurity. Their horrid ingredients were toads, bats and serpents, the eye of a newt, and the tongue of a dog, the leg of a lizard, and the wing of the night-owl, the scale of a dragon, the tooth of a wolf, the maw of the ravenous salt-sea, the mummy of a witch, the root of the poisonous hemlock (this to have effect must be digged in the dark), the gall of a goat, and the liver of a Jew, with the slips of the yew tree that roots itself in Graves, and the finger of a dead child; all these were set on, to boil in a great kettle, or cauldron, which, as fast as it grew too hit, was cooled with a baboons blood: to these they poured in the blood of a sow that had eaten her young, and they threw into the flame the grease that had sweater from a murderer’s gibbet. By these charms they bound the infernal spirits to answer their questions.

It was demanded of Macbeth, whether he would have his doubts resolved by them, or by their masters, the spirits. He nothing daunted by the dreadful ceremonies which he saw, boldly answered; ‘Where are they? Let me see them’. And they called the spirits, which were three. And the first arose in the likeness of an armed head, and he called Macbeth by name, and bid him beware of the thane of Fife; for which caution Macbeth thanked him; for Macbeth had entertained a jealousy of Macduff, the thane of Fife.

And the second spirit arose the likeness of a bloody child, and he called Macbeth by name, and bid him have no fear, but laugh to scorn the power of man, for none of woman born should have power to hurt him; and he advised him to be bloody, bold and resolute. “Then live, Macduff!” cried the king; What need I fear of thee? But yet I will make assurance doubly sure. Thou shalt not live; that I may tell pale-hearted Fear it lies, and sleep in spite of thunder’.

That spirit being dismissed, a third arose in the form of a child crowned, with a tree in his hand. He called Macbeth by name, and comforted him against conspiracies, saying, that he should never be vanquished, until the wood of Bimam to Dunsinane Hill should come against him. “Sweet bodements ! Good !” cried Macbeth; “Who can unfixed the forest, and move it from its earth-bound roots? I see I shall live the usual period of man’s life, and not be cut off by a violent death. Nut my heart not be cut off by a violent death.

But my heart throbs to know one thing. Tell me, if your art cam tell so much, if Banquo’s issue shall ever reign in this kingdom?’ Here the cauldron sank into the ground, and a noise of music was heard, and eight shadows, like kings, passed by Macbeth, and Banquo last, who bore a glass which showed the figures of many more, and pointed to them; by which Macbeth knew that these were the posterity of Banquo, who should reign after him in Scotland; and the witches, with a sound of soft music, and with dancing, making a show of duty and welcome to Macbeth, vanished. And from this time the thoughts of Macbeth were all bloody and dreadful.

The first thing he heard when he got out of the witches’ cave, was that Macduff, thane of Fife, had fled to England, to join the army which was forming against him under Malcolm, the eldest son of the late king, with intent to displace Macbeth, and set Malcolm, the right heir, upon the throne. Macbeth, stung with rage set upon the castle of Macduff, and put his wife and children, whom the thane had left behind, to the sword, and extended the slaughter to all who claimed the least relationship to Macduff.

These and such-like deeds alienated the minds solved. When the besieging army marched through the wood of Birnam, Malcolm, like a skilful general, instructed his soldiers to hew down everyone a bough and bear it before him, by way of concealing the true numbers of his host. This marching of soldiers with boughs had at a distance the appearance which had frightened the messenger. Thus were the words of the spirit brought to pass, in a sense different from that in which Macbeth had understood them, and one great of his confidence was gone.

And now a severe skirmishing took place, in which Macbeth, though feebly supported by those who called themselves his friends, but in reality hated the tyrant and inclined to the party of Malcolm and Macduff, yet fought with the extreme of rage and valour, cutting to pieces all who were opposed to him, till he came to where Macduff was fighting.

Seeing Macduff, and remembering the caution of the spirit who had counselled him to avoid Macduff, above all men, he would have turned, but Macduff, who had been seeking him through the whole fight, opened opposed his turning, and a fierce contest ensued; Macduff giving him many foul reproaches for the murder of his wife and children Macbeth, whose soul was charged enough with blood of that family already, would still have declined the combat: but Macduff still urged him to it, calling him tyrant, murderer, he’ll-hound, and villain.

Then Macbeth remembered the words of the spirits, how none of woman born should hurt him; and smiling confidently he said to Macduff: “Thou losest thy labour, Macduff. As easily thou mayest impress the air with thy sword, as make me vulnerable. I bear a charmed life, which must not yield to one of woman born’.

‘Despair thy charm, ‘said Macduff,’ and let that lying spirit whom thou hast served, tell thee, that Macduff was never born of woman, never as the ordinary manner of men is to be born, but was untimely taken from his mother.

‘Accursed be the tongue which tells me so”, said the trembling Macbeth, who felt his last hold of confidence give way; ‘and let never man in future believe the lying equivocation of witches and juggling spirits, who deceive us in words which have double senses, and while they keep their promise literally, disappoint our hopes with a different meaning. I will not fight with thee’. “Then live!” said the scornful Macduff; ‘We will have a show of thee, as men show monsters, and a painted board, on which shall be written, ‘Here men may see the tyrant!’

‘Never,’ said Macbeth, whose courage returned with despair; ‘I will not live to kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet, and to be baited with the curses of the rabble. Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane, and thou opposed to me, who was never born of woman, yet will I try the last.’

With these frantic words he threw himself upon Macduff, who, after a severe struggle, in the end of overcame him, and cutting off his head, made a present of it to the young and lawful king. Malcom; who took upon him the gover which, by the machinations of the usurper, he had so long been deprived of, and ascended the throne of Duncan the Meek, amid the acclamation of the nobles and the people.

ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers

The ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers for Class 11 & 12 is a valuable resource for students studying Shakespeare’s renowned tragedy, Macbeth. Designed to enhance comprehension and critical analysis, the Macbeth Student Workbook Answers provides a comprehensive set of questions and answers. It serves as a guide for students, helping them to find the complex themes, characters, and language employed by Shakespeare.

ISC Macbeth Student Workbook Answers for Class 11 & 12 – Macbeth Short & Essay Questions and Answers

• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Introduction to William Shakespeare
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Characterisation
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 1 Summary
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 2 Summary
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 3 Summary
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 4 Summary
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Act 5 Summary
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Short Questions and Answers
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Essay Questions and Answers
• ISC Class 12 Macbeth Assignment Questions

The ISC Macbeth Workbook Answers offer insightful interpretations and explanations, shedding light on the intricacies of Macbeth’s plot, characterization, and language. Students can benefit from the thorough analysis provided in the Short and Essay Questions and Answers, which assist in deepening their understanding of the chapter. The comprehensive nature of the ISC Macbeth Workbook ensures that students can engage with Macbeth on a deeper level, encouraging critical thinking and interpretation.

With the ISC Macbeth Workbook answers, students can effectively go through Shakespearean literature and develop a deeper appreciation for Macbeth. The Macbeth Student Workbook serves as a valuable tool for teachers as well.