Act II: Scene 3
Summary
The knocking
continues, but the porter does not immediately open the door. Instead, he plays
a game with himself in which he imagines himself as the porter of hell and
jokes about the kind of sinners he might let in. Eventually, however, he opens
the door to Lennox and Macduff, who have been commanded to call upon the king
to arrange the royal departure. It is early morning, and most of those in the
castle are still asleep. One who is not is Macbeth, and he directs Macduff to
the king's chamber. Only a moment passes before the news breaks: King Duncan
has been murdered.
On hearing
the terrible revelation, the Macbeths' acts are beyond suspicion, but Macbeth
admits to having killed the guards of the King's chamber — not part of the
original plan — and Lady Macbeth faints. The assembled thanes of Scotland
resolve to avenge the act of treason. Duncan's sons, Malcolm and Donalbain,
thinking themselves open to the charge of murdering their father, plan to flee
to England and Ireland.
Analysis
This busy
scene begins with a moment of light comedy, which serves to heighten the
suspense. The porter of Macbeth's castle, drunk from the previous night's
revels, complains that his job is worse than that of the porter of hell. In a
private game with the audience, he engages in a piece of stand-up comedy in
which he imagines himself as that beleaguered servant, opening and closing the
gate on the damned. The first two examples he uses (that of a farmer and an
equivocator) have specific religious and historical connotations. A few months
before Macbeth was performed at court in front of the Protestant King James I,
the infamous Gunpowder Plot (the aim of which was to murder the English king)
took place. The conspirators, including Guy Fawkes, may have been encouraged by
a Catholic convert called John Garnett, whose nickname was "farmer."
The practice of lying in court about one's religion by employing confusing or
ambiguous language was known as equivocation. Many examples of ambiguous
language are heard throughout Macbeth, and of course the words of the Witches
themselves are not entirely clear. So the porter's examples are not entirely
without significance, even though they may be unintentional.
The humor
continues when the porter unbolts the door to Macduff and Lennox and offers a
series of bawdy jokes, momentarily distracting the audience from the fact that
Macbeth must at this very moment be washing his hands of the blood of the
previous scene. Then Macbeth enters, apparently at ease, to direct Macduff to
the king's room.
While Macduff
goes to wake the king, Lennox remarks upon the extraordinary weather of the
previous night. His catalogue of unnatural events — high winds, screaming and
wailing voices, the calling of birds, and tremors in the earth — is apocalyptic
in character and suggests a direct connection between the events of the
universe at large and the events within the castle. Macbeth's response —
"@'Twas a rough night" — is so anticlimactic as to provoke incredulity.
Is Lennox's subsequent line — "My young remembrance cannot parallel / A
fellow to it" (64-65) — intended to be spoken with puzzlement at Macbeth's
reaction?
At this
moment, the dam breaks. Note that the literal truth of Macduff's announcement —
"Our royal master's murdered" — is preceded by several lines in which
the murder is depicted in a figurative or metaphorical fashion, almost as if
Macduff dare not name the deed: "Murther hath broke ope / The Lord's
anointed Temple," "destroy your sight / With a new Gorgon," and
"see / The great doom's image!" It's interesting to compare these
lines of Macduff's, spoken in all innocence, with those of the all-too-guilty
Macbeth, who also approaches the matter metaphorically: "The wine of life
is drawn . . . " and "The spring, the head, the fountain of your
blood / Is stopp'd . . . ."
Excusing his
own outburst of passion in killing the guards of the king's chamber, Macbeth
explains that he could not act otherwise when he saw the king: "Here lay
Duncan, / His silver skin laced with his golden blood; / And his gashed stabs
looked like a breach in nature / For ruin's wasteful entrance" (113-116).
That Macbeth cannot refrain from the use of metaphor may be an indication that
he, too, cannot bear to consider the bloody truth. His words are at once highly
poetic and, at the same time, enormously revealing of the deep ironies of which
Macbeth must be aware. Not only has he "murdered sleep," but he has
destroyed the actual fabric of nature.
For whatever
reason — perhaps because Lady Macbeth thinks that Macbeth's powerfully
rhetorical speech is the precursor to an admission of their combined guilt —
she suddenly faints. Certainly, as soon as she is carried from the stage, the
pace changes. There is no more time for speculation: Macbeth and the other
thanes rapidly swear to meet "in manly readiness" to avenge this act
of "treasonous malice." Malcolm and Donalbain alone remain to voice
their understandable concerns: Their semi-proverbial sentences "To show an
unfelt sorrow is an office / Which the false man does easy" (138-139) and
"Where we are / There's daggers in men's smiles" (141-142) both
uncomfortably recall the language of earlier scenes.
Glossary
old (2)
frequent
napkins (6)
handkerchiefs
equivocator
(9) liar
hose (14)
trousers
made a shift
to cast him (40) with effort I overpowered the drink
Gorgon (71)
hideous monster than turns beholders to stone
lees (93)
dregs
vault (94)
wine cellar, punning on grave
pauser (109)
restraining force of
auger-hole
(120) the tiniest crevice
scruples
(127) doubts
undivulg'd
pretence (129) undisclosed plot of treason
the near in
blood . . . bloody (142) close relations are more likely to be suspected of
murder
warrant in
that theft (143) this kind of stealing (away) is justified
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