Discussion Topic
Figures of Speech and Hyperbole in Macbeth
Summary:
Macbeth employs various figures of speech, notably in Acts 1-4. Malcolm’s equivocal speech about the Thane of Cawdor reveals irony and foreshadowing, while Macbeth and others use metaphors, personification, and similes to enhance themes like appearance versus reality. Hyperbole is prevalent, such as Macbeth's exaggerated guilt in Act 2, Scene 2, claiming Neptune’s ocean couldn’t wash his hands clean. Act 3 features Macbeth’s soliloquy with metaphors about his barren legacy, and Act 4 uses hyperbole to illustrate Macbeth's desperation for prophecy.
Identify the figures of speech used in Acts 1 to 4 of Macbeth.
That's a tall order. How about Act I, scene 4?
Speaking of the late traitor, the Thane of Cawdor, Malcolm says:
nothing in his life
Became him like the leaving it; he died
As one that had been studied in his death
To throw away the dearest thing he owed,
As 'twere a careless trifle.
Like the witches, his language is equivocal, "nothing in his life / Became him like the leaving it." Such an equivocation reveals paradox and irony, as it juxtaposes life and death. It also foreshadows what will happen to Macbeth, the next traitorous Thane of Cawdor, at the end of the play. The next line is a metaphor, "He died as one who had been studied in his death," which is again is paradoxical.
There's no art
To find the mind's construction in the face:
He was a gentleman on whom I built An absolute trust.
It is, of course, ironic that Duncan was gullible enough to trust Cawdor; he fails to study the death of a traitor as an omen. The speech also reveals the theme of appearance versus reality using face (mask) imagery.
Duncan continues:
The sin of my ingratitude even now
Was heavy on me: thou art so far before
That swiftest wing of recompense is slow
To overtake thee.
He uses understatement and metaphor here to bestow blessings on Macbeth. Notice the weight imagery: "heavy" juxtaposed with "wing." Also, the time motif: "slow."
Macbeth responds:
Are to your throne and state children and servants,
Which do but what they should, by doing every thing
Safe toward your love and honour.
Shakespeare threads child imagery throughout the play. The "throne" is a metonomic synonym for "the king." He ends with irony: "safe," "love," "honor."
Banquo has the best line of the scene, using more child imagery:
It's irony and metaphor also, in that the "harvest" stands for Fleance, who will beget kings.
Duncan uses light / heavenly imagery after announcing his son as Prince of Cumberland:
But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine
On all deservers.
Macbeth will echo this line in his famous "stars hide your fires" aside later. Macbeth also echoes Banquo's child imagery when he says, "The rest is labour," a pun.
The rest of Macbeth's aside uses more light/dark and body imagery:
Let not light see my black and deep desires:
The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be,
Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.
The eye / hand juxtaposition is the big one: does the eye know what the hand will do? Later, Lady Macbeth will continually wring her hands while the doctor curiously eyes her.
What are examples of hyperbole in Macbeth, act 1, scenes 3 and 5?
Hyperbole is intentional exaggeration to make something seem worse or better than it actually is. Its purpose is to emphasise as in, for example, the sentence, I told you a thousand times, no! This emphasises the speaker's refusal or insistence although he or she may have said 'no' only a few times.
There are a number of examples of this figure of speech in scenes 3 and 5 of Act One in Macbeth. In scene 3, when Macbeth and Banquo encounter the witches, Macbeth says the following:
... you should be women,
And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
That you are so.
Macbeth exaggerates the fact that the witches have beards - it makes it difficult to distinguish them from men. They are supposed to be women, but their beards are so long that they appear like men. This might have given the audience during Shakespeare's time great mirth, since the meaning can also be seen as ambiguous. Women were not allowed on stage and female roles were played by men, dressed as women.
When the two men later meet Ross and Angus, Ross partly says the following:
...Nothing afeard of what thyself didst make,
Strange images of death. As thick as hail
Came post with post; and every one did bear
Thy praises in his kingdom's great defence,
And pour'd them down before him.
Ross exaggerates reports of Macbeth's bravery in battle and the many accolades he had received for his courage. Saying that Macbeth's blows came 'as thick as hail' and that he fought non-stop are exaggerations to emphasise his courage and commitment. 'Every one did bear thy praises' is an obvious exaggeration, since it would have been improbable that Ross could have heard what every soldier had to say about Macbeth in battle. The purpose here is to emphasise the great admiration that was felt for Macbeth's unstinted dedication to defend his kingdom.
In scene five, the messenger on reporting Macbeth's imminent arrival at the castle, tells Lady Macbeth:
... One of my fellows had the speed of him,
Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more
Than would make up his message.
The statement exaggerates the exhaustion of the messenger who came to deliver the news. He was so tired that he hardly had enough breath to deliver his directive. He was utterly exhausted - close to death. The emphasis is to indicate how urgent and important the message was and also to illustrate the messenger's loyalty to his master, Macbeth.
After receiving this great news, Lady Macbeth comments:
The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements.
Lady Macbeth exaggerates the image of a raven that has crowed so insistently that it has lost its voice. Ravens were seen as omens of death and their arrival and croaking were deemed to predict doom. The purpose of Lady Macbeth's exaggeration is to emphasise the fact that Duncan's time as king has been long gone and that the raven which has predicted his death at their castle has been doing so at length.
Duncan's date with death has come.
What figures of speech are used in Macbeth, act 3?
In the first scene, the three witches use a euphemism when they say they'll meet again "when the hurlyburly's done." There is also the use of apostrophe when the first witch calls "I come, Graymalkin!" There are two paradoxes when they declare, "when the battle's lost and won" and, "fair is foul and foul is fair."
The second scene includes a simile as the captain describes a battle "as two spent swimmers, that do cling together and choke their art." Personification is present in the expression, "And fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling." Two more similes are found in the phrases "like a rebel's whore" and "like valor's minion."
Irony is employed in the expression "as sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion," to describe how unafraid Macbeth and Banquo were in their most recent battle with Norway, and these men are also described metaphorically as "cannons overcharged with double cracks."
There is an allusion to the Bible with the reference to "another Golgotha." Hyperbole is found in the description that Norway's flags "fan our people cold." An allusion to Roman mythology is found in the comparison to "Bellona's bridegroom."
More of these same figures of speech are found throughout the remaining scenes in act 3.
The act opens with an important metaphor inspired by the witches' prediction in Act 1. Banquo, by this point in the play, has begun to believe Macbeth has achieved his kingship wrongfully, and he is still trying to understand the implications of the witches' prediction that he, not Macbeth, will father Scotland's future kings:
But that myself should be the/root and father/Of many kings. (III:4-6)
Banquo, still puzzled by the witches' comments, refers to himself as the "root" of Scotland's future kings--Banquo compares himself to the root of a tree, a common, but appropriate, metaphor for the foundation of a dynasty.
Throughout the opening lines of Act 3, Scene 1, the witches' predictions continue to bother Macbeth, in part because they imply Macbeth will die childless, and he frames this problem in a subtle metaphor:
Upon my head they placed a/fruitless crown/And put a barren sceptre in my/ gripe,/Thence to be wrench'd with an/unlineal hand. . . . (III.1:64-69)
The controlling metaphor uses the language of childlessness: the "fruitless crown" signifies Macbeth's kingship, but with no children to inherit his kingdom, and a "barren sceptre" continues the theme of Macbeth's inability to create a dynasty. Both crown and sceptre are symbols of kingship and power, but they are meaningless if there are no children to carry the dynasty forward. Macbeth's last comment encapsulates his greatest fear--that his kingship will be usurped by an unlineal hand, that is, by someone not related to Macbeth. Unlineal hand is a good example of the rhetorical device known as synecdoche, that is, using a part to represent the whole. In this case, the hand represents the person who will take Macbeth's kingship by force.
Macbeth concludes this interior monologue with a metaphor symbolizing the inevitable struggle he sees with Banquo:
Rather than so, come, Fate, into/the list,/And champion me to the/utterance!
During the period in which the play takes place, everyone, especially royalty, would understand this metaphor to be based on jousting--an activity that was both practical as preparation for war and recreational. Macbeth here envisions himself jousting with Banquo, or Banquo's heirs, with Fate as his lady-luck. Macbeth also uses a word--utterance--that means, in this context, the bitter end, so he does not expect this struggle for his kingship to be easy or, more important, necessarily successful.
Shakespeare's metaphorical language in the opening of Act III, which centers on dynastic concerns for both Banquo and Macbeth, allows us to understand what is uppermost in their minds. More important, the metaphorical language points to the way in which the characters look at their world. In Macbeth's case, he perceives the violence with which he will defend his kingship and, equally important, the enemies he faces--his inability to produce heirs and Banquo.
What figures of speech are used in Macbeth's soliloquy in act 3, scene 1?
At the beginning of act 3, scene 1, Banquo recalls that the witches predicted that his descendants, and not Macbeth's, would be kings. He thus refers to himself metaphorically as "the root and father / Of many kings." This is significant because it is one of the reasons behind Macbeth's growing anger and savagery. Macbeth wants to tear "the root," namely Banquo, out of the earth, and thinks that he does so when he has Banquo murdered in act 3, scene 3. Macbeth soon realizes, however, that the root can't be so easily uprooted. Indeed, Banquo's ghost comes back to taunt Macbeth and remind him of this.
Later in the scene, when Macbeth is talking about the prophecies that the witches made about Banquo, he states that "upon [Macbeth's] head they placed a fruitless crown." The metaphor of the crown as "fruitless" alludes to the fact that Macbeth's reign on the throne shall not be the beginning of a dynasty, but merely a stop-gap between Duncan and the reign of Banquo's descendants. In the same speech, or soliloquy, Macbeth refers to his scepter as metaphorically "barren."
When Macbeth converses with the two murderers, Shakespeare uses dramatic irony. Dramatic irony is when the audience know something that one or more of the characters on stage do not. Macbeth tells the murderers that Banquo has held them "under fortune," meaning that Banquo is responsible for some harm that has been previously done to the murderers. Previously, the murderers had thought Macbeth himself ("our innocent self") responsible. By this point in the play we, the audience, know that Macbeth is not innocent, and so the dramatic irony here serves to emphasize just how mendacious and immoral he has become. Macbeth really hammers home the idea that Banquo has been their enemy when he says that Banquo's "heavy hand hath bowed you to the grave." This metaphor implies that Banquo has somehow injured the two murderers to the extent that they are now closer to death, symbolized by the grave, than they were before.
Since the focus of figurative speech will be on Macbeth's soliloquy of Act III, scene i, that will narrow it down immensely.
The first figure of speech used by Macbeth is irony, for he fears Banquo, a countryman who fought alongside Macbeth in war and a man who is extremely trustworthy. The irony is found when Macbeth says "Our fears in Banquo / Stick deep."
Another noteworthy bit of figurative speech is the personification Macbeth uses in describing Banquo's "valor" which he says will "act in safety."
Macbeth also uses an allusion to Mark Antony and Caesar as a reference to Banquo and himself .
Macbeth uses a siimile when he compares the witches as "prophetlike."
Then he uses metaphors when he describes his lineage as a "fruitless crown" and a "barren scepter." He continues to use a metaphor when he compares his soul as a "vessel of my peace" and "mine eternal jewel."
Then he personifies "fate" by challenging it.
What are the different forms of hyperbole in Macbeth, Act 4, Scene 1?
Hyperbole is intended exaggeration or over-emphasis, usually to make a point or to signify the importance of something. It is not meant to be understood literally. A good example would be,"I told you a thousand times to do your homework," when the speaker has only mentioned it a few times. The speaker either wants to stress the fact that the issue had been brought up many times or to convey how important doing homework is.
In this scene, Macbeth returns to the witches so that they can further predict his future. He uses hyperbole to indicate how determined he is to hear their prognostications.
I conjure you, by that which you profess,
Howe'er you come to know it, answer me:...Even till destruction sicken; answer me
To what I ask you.
He insists that he does not care about the consequences or circumstances, no matter how desperate they may be, the witches have to answer him and inform him about what and how they know about his destiny. The witches comply and call up several apparitions which each either predict or warn Macbeth. The first apparition cries out that he should be wary of Macduff. The second apparition states:
Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn
The power of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth.
The apparition encourages him to be just as ruthless, determined and courageous as he had been thus far for nothing which is given birth to by a woman will harm Macbeth. Macbeth is obviously thrilled by this advice, for he believes that it guarantees his invincibility. What he does not realize though, is that the witches are masters of paradox and equivocation and do not always mean what they say, either directly or indirectly.
This prediction exaggerates Macbeth's power and the expression 'none of woman born' should not be interpreted literally. He discovers the folly of his belief later in Act 5, scene 8, when he faces the angry and vengeful Macduff in battle and tells him that he does not wish to engage him in a fight for he is 'charmed.'
I bear a charmed life, which must not yield,
To one of woman born.
Macduff rejects his assertion with contempt and tells the gullible tyrant:
Despair thy charm;
And let the angel whom thou still hast served
Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb
Untimely ripp'd.
Macbeth is shocked at this, for it means that Macduff was not naturally born but had been cut out of his mother's womb prematurely. The tyrant then concludes that he had been misled.
The third apparition informs Macbeth:
Be lion-mettled, proud; and take no care
Who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are:
Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be until
Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill
Shall come against him.
The statement here is just as hyperbolic as the previous one and Macbeth, once again, interprets the apparition's words literally. He believes that this confirms his invincibility since it is impossible for Great Birnam wood to march up the hill towards his castle. He finds out later, though, that that is exactly what happens since Malcolm had instructed his troops to each cut a bough from trees in Birnam wood and hold it in front of them to camouflage their numbers. It does then seem as if the wood is marching up the hill. When Macbeth is informed of this fact in Act 5, scene 5, he is quite angry. A messenger tells him:
As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
I look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought,
The wood began to move.
He realizes that the witches had tricked him and he states:
...I pull in resolution, and begin
To doubt the equivocation of the fiend
That lies like truth: 'Fear not, till Birnam wood
Do come to Dunsinane:...
In the end, Macbeth is a victim of his own gullible foolishness. Macduff kills him in battle and beheads the tyrant, thus concluding a period of bloodthirsty and tyrannical rule.
What are five examples of hyperbole in Macbeth?
As the other educator pointed out, there are many examples of hyperbole in Macbeth you could cite. Malcolm and Macduff's conversation in act 4, scene 3 is full of hyperbole. Here are some other ones from elsewhere in the play that you can consider.
One place that sticks out in my mind is Macbeth's reaction to having killed Duncan. In act 2, scene 2, he looks at his hands which he just used to kill his king and exclaims, "Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood / Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather / The multitudinous seas incarnadine, / Making the green one red" (57-61). It is certainly a great exaggeration, hence hyperbole, to state that even the ocean does not have enough water in it to wash his hands clean and would itself be colored red by all the blood that is on him.
Lady Macbeth employs a similar use of hyperbole to describe her own feelings of guilt. She laments in act 5, scene 1 that "Here’s the smell of the blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, Oh, Oh!" (4-6). This certainly is an exaggerated statement.
When the Witches show Macbeth a vision of kings he cries out about the one that looks like Banquo. He says that "Thy crown does sear mine eyeballs." (113) The sight of a crown can't literally burn one's eyes. Macbeth is using hyperbole here to say he hates to see what he is looking at.
Early on, in scene 1, act 5, Lady Macbeth uses hyperbole to describe omens of King Duncan's death. She says that his death has been predicted so many times that "the raven himself is hoarse" (38). Ravens were seen as the messengers of bad omens. In this case, so many bad omens have been made that a raven would have lost its voice announcing them all.
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