Classical monologue - Macbeth; Lady Macbeth

In today's lesson we started off by moving around the space to get into our neutral stance and be aware of our bodies. This helps me to ground myself and be prepared and open as an actor to all the tasks ahead.

We were handed out the classical monologue 'Macbeth' by William Shakespeare and it was Lady Macbeth's monologue. Lady Macbeth is one of the most powerful female characters in literature. The fact that we meet her alone on stage means that we are privy to her innermost thoughts, which are filled with the imagery of death and destruction. And when she speaks, in her next soliloquy, of her "fell purpose," her intentions are described in the most grotesque and frightening terms. First she bids the spirits to literally deprive her of her femininity, to thicken her blood, and to stop her ability to weep. Next, she prays that those same evil spirits should suckle her, converting what should be her nourishing mother's milk to "gall" (bitterness). Lastly, she calls upon the night itself to hide her actions in a "blanket" of darkness.

We learnt that it is important when reading Shakespeare to always pause when there is punctuation and to keep the energy levels high until the end of the sentence.

To get familiar with the soliloquy, we each started off by reading out a word that stood out to us, then to build up our vocabulary we said two words which stood out, followed by a sentence which was repeated back by the rest of the class. This helped to get my articulation warmed up and to get used to the language being used. We then walked around the room saying the monologue, which improved my understanding of the monologue and this then helped with my confidence and increased my energy levels as I was aware of what I was saying. Moreover, we analysed the words that we still didn't understand such as 'direst' which means of very poor quality, 'compunctious' which means a feeling of guilt that follows the doing of something bad.
Next, we added three gestures to the piece and the gestures I added were opening of the arms on the words 'unsex me here', holding a fake knife whilst saying 'murdering ministers' and touching my chest whilst saying 'Come to my woman's breasts'. The gestures added more life and energy to the words which also explained the story more clearly. We then chose 3 key words to emphasise whilst saying the monologue and I chose 'sightless', 'direst' and 'remorse which varied the tone and added more interest and attracted the audience's attention.

To conclude, we got into pairs and added in each others gestures and key words to make a complete monologue with a beginng gesture, middle gesture and ending gesture. This gave the monologue structure and explained the story using body language, tone and facial expressions.


Spoken by Lady Macbeth, Macbeth Act 1 Scene 5 The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,    -open arms-
And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;  *emphasise*
Stop up the access and passage to remorse,  *emphasise*
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it! Come to my woman’s breasts,   -touch chest and beckoning-
And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,  -holding knife in hand and stabbing air-
Wherever in your sightless substances   *emphasise*
You wait on nature’s mischief! Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,  *emphasise*
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry ‘Hold, hold!’