act 2

• dark and night time associates with evil and danger
• lady macbeth and macbeth call for darkness to hide their treason / murder from God
• Banquo has trouble sleeping as he's plagued by 'cursed thoughts' which is implied about the witches
• when Macbeth arrives, Banquo mistakes him for an intruder - dramatic irony as Macbeth actually is a threat
• Macbeth sees a dagger before him floating in the air and tried to grasp onto it but fails
• "a dagger of the mind, a false creation"
• "proceeding from the heart-oppressed brain"
• Lady Macbeth drugged the king's bodyguards and placed their daggers ready for Macbeth
• Macbeth is deeply troubled and haunted by his past actions, Lady Macbeth tells him off and smears blood on the guards to make them seem more guilty.
• "infirm of purpose! give me the daggers. the sleeping and the dead are but as pictures"
• • Macbeth is consumed with remorse - can't bring himself to say Amen - suggests that he now fears his actions have caused an irrevocable break with God.
• Macbeth claims to be hearing voices - "Macbeth shall sleep no more"
• Lady Macbeth is more pragmatic (practical)
• "these deeds must not be thought. After these ways, so it make us mad" - LM
• Shakespeare deliberately juxtaposes the two characters ; Macbeth is distressed and guilt ridden and Lady Macbeth seems to have no conscience - lack of remorse seems worse next to Macbeth's apparent deep regret
• "Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?"
• in scene 3, there's a brief comic interlude as the drunken porter bumbles about
• references to hell and Beelzebub doesn't allow us to forget what has happened
• Shakespeare uses Lennox to introduce a note of uncertainty and the idea that the natural order has been disturbed
• dramatic irony is played here as characters don't know yet that Duncan is dead - "the obscure bird clamored the live long night" - nature reacts to such an unnatural act as killing the anointed king
• "most sacrilegious murder hath broke open the lords anointed temple" - metapor for Duncan reveals Macduffs absolute belief in Divine rights of King's.
• "What's the business?" - Macbeth appears innocent of Duncan's death
• Lady Macbeth and Macbeth and convincing "innocent flowers" until Macbeth goes over the top and against the plan by killing the grooms and Lady Macbeth has to fail to draw attention away from him
• Malcom and Donalbain are obvious culprits, so they flee as they're afraid of being attacked next - "there's daggers in men's smiles, the near in blood, the nearer bloody"
• in scene 4, Ross talks to an old man outside the castle
• idea of supernatural and disorder is evident through the way the old man talks about last night's event'S
• Macbeth's deeds have upset the balance of nature - "darkness does the face of earth entomb"
• idea of natural order decreed by God was particularly important when Shakespeare wrote Macbeth ; Guy Fawkes - gunpowder plot had only been a year before