Hello everyone and welcome back to our weekly revision videos. I just want to make sure that you've got your pen and paper handy and I really would urge you to listen to the voiceover as I often explain things in a little bit more detail and I might cover some challenging vocabulary that you might see on the slide but you might miss if you just pause the video and making your notes. Today we're looking at the motif of darkness in the play Macbeth. Okay so let's start with Shakespeare's intentions. and we need to look at sort of why has Shakespeare included the motif of darkness, how does it link to our characters and what might we analyse within our essays.
So the motif of darkness in the play Macbeth is to enhance the theme of corruption and deterioration. From the very beginning of the play the darkness is associated with the prophecies of the witches and it creates this sense of foreboding that they themselves bring that therefore Macbeth takes on. Now Shakespeare uses this tragedy to warn the audience of the dangers of regicide, okay so regicide is the act of killing the king or the queen, and it looks at how this act of regicide will only cause a descent into corruption and evil and therefore is punishable by death. Okay, so the first character I want to look at is Macbeth.
And we're going to look at how Macbeth throughout the play links to the motif of darkness. Now, there are a multitude of quotations you could use to support your analysis looking at Macbeth and this link to darkness. However, I've picked a specific one that's really easy to talk about in any of your essays.
And that quotation is, stars hide your fires, let not light see my black and deep desires. Now here in this moment of the play Macbeth has just witnessed King Duncan tell everybody that Malcolm is to be the Prince of Cumberland which literally means that he is next in line to the throne. And what you have to remember is that Macbeth has already been given the prophecies by the witches that he is to become king. So in Macbeth's mind he's witnessing.
his route to the throne being closed off and instead of accepting his prophecies and accepting the fate that the witches have delivered him Macbeth immediately leans into this violent savage nature that he is obviously so used to as we've seen in act one scene two Obviously, you can look at the adjectives black and dark and these intensify the depravity of Macbeth's thoughts. Now, the word depravity just means how evil he is. But what we see here as well is Shakespeare is highlighting Macbeth's savagery and how his instinct has been immediately prompted as he's considering these sinful thoughts of regicide.
And we can also link in sort of the theme of appearance versus reality because we've got this reference to darkness, which, you know, indicates Macbeth's duplicitous nature. OK, so on the outside, King Duncan trusts him and he's honoured by King Duncan. But we can see that underneath he is so quick to betray him due to his hamartia, his unchecked ambition. Now, if you were to track the motif of darkness throughout the play, the first thing that we see and the first thing an audience witness is the witches discussing where they're going to meet. And they say that they're going to meet at the set of the sun, which literally means they are going to meet when the sun has set, which therefore means they're going to meet under the cover of darkness.
We've also got Banquo describing the witches as being. instruments of darkness and this link between Macbeth and the witches is what is so crucial because both sets of characters the witches and Macbeth are using darkness as an asset to complete their deeds which obviously means that Shakespeare's trying to prove how these characters are inherently evil. Okay, so the next character that we need to look at is how Lady Macbeth links to the motif of darkness.
Now, we see that once Lady Macbeth receives the news that Macbeth has had these prophecies delivered by the witches, we see that sort of soliloquy of hers where she calls upon the supernatural to unsex her and stop up the passage to remorse. But we also see throughout that soliloquy her calling upon the supernatural more specifically when she says, like, come thick night and pour thee in the dunnest smoke of hell and obviously we can see that the reason why Shakespeare shows us Lady Macbeth calling upon the supernatural is so that we see sort of again her mirroring Macbeth's language therefore proving to the audience that both of these characters are completely evil and are on a path to destruction. It also intensifies how dangerous they are and what a threat they are to morality.
And not only this, it's this idea that they've got a joint desire to use the darkness to cover up their sinful deeds or to assist their sinful deeds. And this is what accelerates the bloodshed that's committed in the play because they are both working. unanimously together to encourage the sinful behaviours that are to continue. Now, we also have to look at sort of the development of Lady Macbeth's character and where we are left with her character in the final scenes.
Now, in Act 5, she's described by the doctor and the gentlewoman who are observing her. sleepwalking and trying to remove the blood from her hands. And here we see in the stage directions, Shakespeare's described Lady Macbeth as having a taper. OK, the doctor then goes on to describe the fact that Lady Macbeth has a light by her continually and it is her command. Now, a taper is a very small candle.
And this is what shows the audience Lady Macbeth's desperation and her true decline from power. In this final scene, the audience truly witness her demise. This light is symbolising the limited hope and redemption for Lady Macbeth. And obviously, because it's so small, Shakespeare's proving to his audience that no matter maybe how Regretful you are over the actions you commit, committing or dealing with regicide is so sinful that it is completely punishable and seeking redemption is just truly not possible. In this final scene, we can see that Shakespeare is showing that the horror of Lady Macbeth's deeds have completely possessed her.
Okay, and therefore showing her childlike fears, her fear of the dark and ultimately her punishment for her actions. Okay, so we have looked at Macbeth, Lady Macbeth and the witches and how they all link to the motif of darkness. But what we should touch on is the reference to the light within the play. Now.
There are very few references to light within the play and obviously that is to prove how nihilistic Macbeth becomes which just means that it's against religion, his actions, but there are three key moments that we could explore with the reference of light and how that shows light is equaling to virtue and honour. Now we're going to go back to the beginning of the play that moment i was describing when king duncan announces to all the noblemen that malcolm will succeed the throne once he passes he declares that like stars shall shine on all deservers okay so the idea that king duncan is pledging his throne to his son this for the audience would be viewed as being compatible and supportive of the belief of the great chain of being okay And it's this idea that we've got that reference to light, the use of the word stars shows that this was. orderly okay this was would be approved by the audience because we've got to acknowledge that um kings there was the belief that they had the divine there was the divine right of kings okay which therefore meant that they were the mouthpiece to god they were put on the throne by god they were to deliver um the decisions and they were basically authorized by god if you will okay now What we have here is through the decree of King Duncan that Malcolm will succeed him, we have got an orderly world.
That is how the world should be because no one had the right to question the motives of a king. Therefore, what we've got here is Shakespeare supporting the existence of the belief of the great chain of being. Then we have to address what happens when that great chain of being is disrupted and the order of the world is thrown into chaos.
So when King Duncan is murdered by Macbeth, we have that conversation between Ross and the old man, that little scene between the two of them where they talk about the horses going wild. And we can see those references to them recognising that. through the murder of their king chaos has ensued because the great chain of being has been disrupted. Ross states to the old man he says yet dark night strangles the traveling lamp and all that means is that the lamp equals the sunshine the sun and we've got this darkness that has enshrouded the daytime therefore showing us that chaos you will now erupt within Scotland because of the committed act of regicide.
Ross is reporting on the eclipse of darkness and the covering of the light. And this is obviously symbolic and a sign of the unnatural occurrences. You could also link this idea that the lamp could In turn, symbolise the great chain of being and this God's order and that harmony has been completely disrupted because the source of light has been eradicated. It's been distinguished. No, not distinguished, extinguished, sorry.
Macbeth's act of regicide, therefore, has disturbed the natural order of things and therefore has completely. eliminated any sort of light within Scotland. And finally just to emphasise that this darkness is representative of the chaos and the evil that has resulted from the broken great chain of being. Okay and finally we've got one more character to consider when we think about the virtuous within the play and how they are symbolic of light.
Banquo. This is the moment where Banquo is murdered by the murderers, obviously, that have been ordered by Macbeth. Now, Banquo and Fleance are carrying torches. Obviously, you could analyse the use of the torches in the stage directions, which symbolises the fact that both of these characters are honourable and virtuous.
We then have the murderer through the chaos. of the attack on Banquo the torch goes out and the murderer says who did strike out the light so what we have here is that Banquo himself is representative of light and virtue and because he has been murdered by Macbeth it's this idea that the torch has extinguished and therefore it shows Banquo has lost his life and that goodness and morality has therefore perished due to Macbeth's evil nature. So to summarise, looking at these three characters we can see that the presence of light, although limited within the play, that is to therefore intensify Macbeth's depravity, his sinful nature, His nihilistic attitude.
He's completely and utterly debased within the play. And that is Shakespeare proving to his audience that the act of regicide is inherently evil and will be punished. And that is us for this week, year 10. I hope you enjoyed the fact that this video was a lot shorter than Sybil Burling's. I tried to really sort of limit it this week and I hope it was really helpful and I shall see you next week for your next slot of revision videos.