Cassidy Warner

Macbeth Creative Oral

Mr Boyle

Character: Macbeth Time: End of Scene 5, Act 3. This is after the banquet before he visits the witches for the second time. This point in the play is a turning point for Macbeth, a lull in the action before the storm of the second half. The insight into Macbeths character here is significant as it allows us to see his conflicting emotions and thoughts and how these have influenced his decisions thus far, as well as a small prelude to his future decisions. I desire, I yearn and I hunger. But purpose, firm purpose, do I lack. If only I had been left to my own devices, my conscience would now be clear. Fool that I was to give reign to my vaulting ambition! I had been greatly honoured; revered. Valiant, worthy, noble Macbeth! Trusted and brave. Heroic. Would that I were he! Poor host, subject and kinsman that I am! Gold opinions did people once have of me! I am tormented, wracked, anguished. Young in deed I may be, but the deeds already done have aged me countless years. I fear that my venerable self has slipped away to be replaced by a hollow shell of deceit and infidelity. The night has penetrated every corner of the day and the sun no longer smiles on me. The stars have hidden their fires as I asked, but now no warmth can penetrate the chill that dampens my chest. I am betrayed by fate; doomed to walk this tragic path. My hands, my hangmans hands, drip with guilt that no multitude of oceans will wash away. The blood is spreading like a disease. It will not be denied. Everywhere I turn. On Banquo, at the banquet, on my lady, in the basins, on my hands! Bloody evidence where it has no business to be. Sleep is murdered, so the nightmares invade wakefulness; my eyes are haunted by spectres of the night. Visions plague my senses; so solid before me that I might reach out and grasp their essence. For one fleeting, blessed moment Banquo was with me again, but I called and he stirred not. His sunken eyes reflected naught but the blackness in my own soul. And the blessing turned to a curse. His eyes were the very gateway to the pits of hell. I am so lost in darkness that my very thoughts betray me. I fear that an evil vassal of fate has corrupted my mind! Some compulsion has been laid upon my soul and I cannot breathe but to succumb to the heinousness within. Where will I end? Who called to the evil forces that pollute my soul? What witchcraft has been practiced on me to shake the goodness from its foundation within? Did I not decide? No further in this business will we proceed. And again: betrayal. My beautiful, dutiful wife vanished, and in her place was the foremost temptress of the devil. She caressed my evil desires and stroked my ambition to violent need. She taunted and mocked. She has twisted me with her conniving. Screw your courage to the sticking place! But the place to which I should have stuck it was not where it landed. What vain kind of man am I to be thus weak before a woman? And how can I still trust the woman that has made me so?

Cassidy Warner

Macbeth Creative Oral

Mr Boyle

No further shall my Lady be privy to my exploits. Once was enough to sink us below reproach; into what mires will her iniquity lead us if I do not stop up her influence? My God-given, gracious King! Honest Banquo! She has sullied my hands for foolish ambition. No more shall she dictate to me. But the damage is done. I have waded so far in blood that it would be easier to forge onwards than return. If only my desires had never come to fruition, I could sleep through the nights! Rest eludes me; I feel beset on all sides. The storms rage a vendetta against what peace remains to me. The wind sounds as a man dying and the rain pounds like a cudgel on flesh. If only I could have ignored the heathen stirring in my breast! The vile ambition the witches evoked. Ah yes, the Weird Sisters. Those unearthly beings that tread upon it still. So witherd and wild in their attire! They have played me like a fiddle that bends under the sway of a bow. I rose like a fish to the anglers lure of power. All Hail Macbeth! Straight to my black and deep desires. And yet still I think, and I pace. My desire will not be satisfied. They have yet spoken sooth. Oh yes, Banquo, the devil spoke true indeed! Time flits through their fingers as easily as sand through a childs. And if the midnight hags have been right thus far, surely must I learn more of the fates design to plot the futu re. Some sense of purport must I exhort from their unholy knowledge. Already, I am surrounded by enemies. What suspicions have my actions caused even now? The air is pregnant with treason! They cast their eyes over my person and linger on my hands that do tremble, laden with grime that seems never far from the skin. Who threatens me? Who plots? Some defence must I prepare for my throne and for that I need the witches divination. Yet the very thought strikes fear into my heart. Away then cowardice! for travel there with the morrow, I must.