Lady Macbeth's Mental Illness Analysis Essay Sample

Macbeth, written by William Shakespeare, is an English playwright based on the concepts of deception, treason, and the lust for power. The main character, Macbeth, goes on an exhausting journey of moral dilemmas, such as murder, to become the king of Scotland. However, it is not necessarily true that Macbeth was the sole perpetrator of these crimes, considering Lady Macbeth, his wife, was the true manipulator. She shamed Macbeth for not wanting to do it to begin with, making Macbeth look as if he is the weak one. Ironically, he is the one having second thoughts about assassinating King Duncan, when in reality, Lady Macbeth is demanding him to do so. Women are considered to be traditionally frail and dainty, and they are not expected to be aggressive. The ideology of women being incapable of committing a heinous crime has been entrenched in our society through historical events of feminine hysteria. In this instance, Lady Macbeth becomes a “supporting character”, and her descent into madness is not taken nearly as seriously as Macbeth’s. She is left with the pressure of having murdered innocent people, and not even being acknowledged for it, up until the point of committing suicide. In William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the hypersexuality and feminization of Lady Macbeth is contrasted with the masculinity of Macbeth, providing an idiosyncratic experience of her further descent into madness.

One of the main reasons for the exaggeration of women and their psychological decline is caused by the historical context of their hysteria. In the Elizabethan era, any women who were considered non-conformative or peculiar were considered witches. Then, during the Renaissance period, it was a popular belief that madness and uncanny evil was created by supernatural forces. As the sixteenth century continued, some of these ideas proved to be untrue. However, the majority of these stereotypes remained, and still affect our society today. In William Shakespeare and the Representation of Female Madness, Maria Isabel Barbudo believes that, “Association of madness with femininity existed prior to the 19th century, but it was in the Victorian era that women were more likely to be incarcerated in asylums, and ‘mad women’ came to dominate representations of madness.” Many women felt it was necessary to be in accordance with the rest of society. Anyone who was seen as an outlier, such as being queer, having a mental illness, or other differences, was shamed and not treated equally to the rest of society. Due to her anxiety of being an outcast, Lady Macbeth plays into these stereotypes, therefore disproving her own circumstances. This can be found when Lady Macbeth pleads for spirits to “unsex” her, and strip her of everything that makes her a woman (Macbeth I.V.47-50). Lady Macbeth wants to destroy her feminine characteristics, therefore giving her an opportunity to be seen as cruel and unusual without being questioned for it. However, this is paradoxical, because Lady Macbeth was far more fearless than Macbeth ever was.

Macbeth is treated as masculine and “ruthless”, majorly due to him being a man, while he was in fact “weaker” than Lady Macbeth. Macbeth, realistically, would not have been able to murder King Duncan do it without his wife. During the entirety of the play, Macbeth was hesitating as to whether or not he should kill him. Then, Lady Macbeth steps forward and scolds him, insulting him and calling him a coward, and as a result, he finally agrees. It is very evident that Macbeth is not as strong as he claims to be:

Madness enacts through the psychopathic behavior of the two main characters—Lady Macbeth and Macbeth himself. With her eyes fixed on the crown, she justifies Macbeth’s claim to it and devises ways to acquire it. [...] She instigates Macbeth into murdering Duncan to realize his long cherished dream of becoming the king. However, once Duncan is heinously murdered, both of them begin to show signs of madness. (Bali)

Lady Macbeth is equally as dedicated to becoming the queen as Macbeth. However, due to the lack of female representation of wickedness, it seems as if she is the issue. It takes an experienced level of coercion to manipulate someone into murdering one who is beloved and worshipped. Lady Macbeth manipulated Macbeth into killing Duncan, however, the rest of his descent into madness was based upon his own decisions (Vince.) As it has been proven, Lady Macbeth is more than capable of being able to murder someone on her own. However, she uses methodical and critical thinking in order to have Macbeth do it for her. The argument that women do not have the capability of being diabolical is unreasonable. The only rationale behind this concept is caused by the stereotypes of women and their “vulnerability.”

Women are often categorized as delicate and fragile, and are not expected to be dastardly or evil. If it were even suggested that a woman could potentially have a mental disorder, it would be automatically assumed that she would be quiet about her struggles. Her feelings would be portrayed through “silence and poetry” (Barbudo), whereas men would more likely have aggressive behavior. This can be conveyed through the contrast between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. When Macbeth is described, he is portrayed as an ambitious and brave warrior who leads the Scottish troops into battle. Although Lady Macbeth can be conveyed as ambitious, her feminity overweighs the majority of her unique characteristics, since she is hypersexualized to an extent. In Mechanics of Madness in Hamlet, Macbeth and King Lear, Shweta Bali claims that “While Macbeth suffers from insomnia, Lady Macbeth starts sleepwalking. With growing signs of insanity, she appears less as an awful instigator of murder and more as a piteous, helpless woman.” This quote provides context behind the institutionalization of women and their descent into madness. When a male character, such as Macbeth, has psychological problems, it is seen as typical. However, when a woman endures the same obstacle, she is treated in an entirely different manner. These social patterns can cause uncertainty for women, and make them feel as if they are inferior to men.

Due to the historical context of women and psychopathy, women are seen as more dainty and soft-spoken than men. This is ironic because, in reality, there are thousands of women who could disprove this theory, Lady Macbeth included. Since Lady Macbeth was the manipulator in the play, Macbeth could not have murdered without her, therefore making her a strong contribution to the plot. When Macbeth was written, women were more susceptible to being admitted into an asylum, considering they were believed to be a witch, or supernaturally inclined. A feminist uprising has subsequently occurred, and there is more demand for women’s rights than ever. Women have been fighting this battle for hundreds of years, and although it does not compare to the thousands of lives that have ended due to mental illness, such as Lady Macbeth’s, it is still considered a new beginning for humanity. Lady Macbeth is treated as if she is inferior to Macbeth, and Shakespeare uses stereotypical strategies to portray her as if she is not capable of murder. Women and their psychological needs have been silenced due to the belief that women are gentle and loving, rather than evil or iniquitous. Even Shakespeare himself wrote, “Why then, alas, do I put up that womanly defence, to say I have done no harm?” (Macbeth IV.II 85-87) Furthermore, considering Macbeth is living in a time in which conveying women in a negative manner is somewhat appropriate, it is truly no surprise that women are considered “less than” men in modern-day society.