“MACBETH
She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”

In this passage Macbeth’s wife has just committed suicide , there’s an army of ten thousand men outside to kill him made up of his former friends and his subjects. And the only people that’ll fight for him have to be forced with the threat of death.

Macbeth started out as a powerful , respected character. He is established early on as a brave man “For brave Macbeth—well he deserves that name— Disdaining fortune, with his brandished steel.” Shakespeare has made the painted Macbeth as a hero. We can see how corrupt Macbeth has become by this quote. “(aside) If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me.Without my stir.” This quote from Macbeth says that he will not do anything to become King and let what happens happens. Macbeth’s mental state has always been in question. After winning the battle he wouldn’t allow the enemies to bury their dead until they him. And when he told Lady Macbeth about the witches and she was trying to persuade him to kill Duncan , He kept flipping from killing Duncan to not. No one with a strong mental state is able to switch between two extremes so quickly. Macbeth has killed his best friend and another good friend for lady Macbeth and now she’s gone so now he completely alone. He has made life decisions from what a power obsessed wife and a couple of witches have told him. He thinks his life is unimportant and worthless and this can be gathered from his speech. “Life’s but a walking shadow a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.” This is a metaphor for life and Macbeth is talking about his life signifying nothing. But there is more to this quote. This can also be seen as Shakespeare speaking through Macbeth. The people who hear this back when it was first performed would be very fascinated by this as characters on stage never refer to actors on stage it would’ve got them thinking about the playwright and his message. There are earlier examples of Macbeth loosing his mind. After learning that his murder has  successfully killed Banquo he sees his ghost. This is Macbeth’s mind deteriorating. In this passage Macbeth doesn’t speak with the iambic pentameter. The loss of Macbeth’s iambic pentameter is a sign of Macbeth’s deteriorating state of mind. A loss of the iambic pentameter can be a sign of Macbeth loosing his mind. If we look at Lady Macbeth before she died she had also lost her iambic pentameter, she was babbling about everything. The doctor told Macbeth that it’s a problem of the mind not the body. Back in those times you’d be able to hear the iambic pentameter but people these days won’t notice it. Iambic pentameter is a line of verse with five metrical feet, each consisting of one short (or unstressed) syllable followed by one long (or stressed) syllable. Early in the play Macbeth speaks with Iambic pentameter “Henceforth be earls, the first that ever Scotland. In such an honor named. What’s more to do, Which would be planted newly with the time.” If you try you can hear the iambic pentameter but try yo hear it in this part of the speech  “She should have died hereafter; There would have been a time for such a word.” You can also do this with Lady Macbeth before she went crazy and after. Before : “That’s the business, That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley The sleepers of the house? speak, speak!” After : “To bed, to bed! there’s knocking at the gate: come, come, come, come, give me your hand. What’s done cannot be undone.–To bed, to bed, to bed!” There’s been a lot of talk of paradoxes in Macbeth. “Lesser than Macbeth, and greater. Not so happy, yet much happier So foul and fair a day I have not seen“. Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none. So from that spring whence comfort seemed to come, discomfort swells. Fathered he is, and yet he’s fatherless. There’s a lot of dramatic irony in Macbeth. Dramatic irony is where the audience know something that a character in the play doesn’t for example when Duncan says he trusts Macbeth. There are many instances in this play where dramatic irony is used. There’s also a lot if times when Macbeth talks in an “aside” this means no one else on stage can hear what he’s saying. Dramatic irony can be an important tool to show Macbeth’s deteriorating state of mind. After the witches told Macbeth that he was going to be king he said “(aside) If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me.Without my stir.” This shows Macbeth’s true motives before Lady Macbeth had influenced him and it also shows how much she’s changed him.

This essay is about answering the question how does Shakespeare present Macbeth deteriorating state of mind? There are many points in the play where Macbeth’s mental state has been in questions. Some people understand the witches as a figment of Macbeth’s imagination. But this quote shows that Macbeth has truly deteriorated and we know this because of his words and his loss of Iambic pentameter.