PREMIÈRE · UPPER SECONDARY · B1+ towards B2

Session 3: Act II: the dagger, the murder and the knocking

Part 3. How does Shakespeare make the murder of Duncan terrifying without showing it?

Objectives

Warm-up

Image analysis. Look at the painting for one minute in silence.
Henry Fuseli, Lady Macbeth Seizing the Daggers, exhibited 1812, Tate, London
Henry Fuseli, Lady Macbeth Seizing the Daggers, exhibited 1812, Tate, London. Public domain, Wikimedia Commons.
  1. Describe Lady Macbeth's body and Macbeth's body. What is the contrast?
  2. Where does the light come from? What is hidden in the shadows?
  3. Why might Fuseli have chosen this moment rather than the murder itself?

Documents

Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act II, Scene 1, Macbeth
Glossary: clutch: hold tightly · thee: you
Methought I heard a voice cry 'Sleep no more! Macbeth does murder sleep', the innocent sleep
William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act II, Scene 2, Macbeth
Glossary: methought: I thought
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather The multitudinous seas in incarnadine, Making the green one red.
William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act II, Scene 2, Macbeth
Glossary: Neptune: Roman god of the sea · multitudinous: countless · incarnadine: turn red
A little water clears us of this deed: How easy is it, then!
William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act II, Scene 2, Lady Macbeth
Glossary: deed: act, here the murder
Faith, here's an equivocator, that could swear in both the scales against either scale
William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act II, Scene 3, the Porter
Glossary: equivocator: a person who uses ambiguous words to hide the truth
Document 3: a critical view. In his essay On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth (1823), Thomas De Quincey argues that the knocking which follows the murder brings back the ordinary human world, and makes the audience feel the horror of what has just happened.

Activities

  1. The dagger soliloquy: real or "a dagger of the mind"? Find the questions and the verbs of perception.
  2. Scansion of "Is this a dagger which I see before me": count the syllables. What is unusual about the ending?
  3. Blood and water: compare Macbeth's "Neptune's ocean" with Lady Macbeth's "A little water". Which one is correct in the end?
  4. Equivocation: why would the Porter's joke make the 1606 audience think of the Gunpowder Plot?
  5. Intermediary task (oral): perform the opening of the dagger soliloquy, then explain your choices of rhythm and tone.

Sentence starters

Role play

Pairs: two servants of the castle the morning after the murder. They heard knocking and voices in the night. They try to understand without accusing anyone directly, using equivocal answers.

Gap-fill worksheet

QR code to this worksheet
Word bank: hallucination, hyperbole, perception, guilt, incarnadine, equivocator, offstage, feminine ending
  1. The dagger may be a ______ caused by guilt.
  2. "All great Neptune's ocean" is a ______.
  3. Verbs of ______ (see, feel) show Macbeth's confusion.
  4. The murder of Duncan happens ______.
  5. "To ______" means to turn red.
  6. The Porter imagines an ______ at hell's gate.
  7. An extra unstressed syllable at the end of a line is a ______.
  8. Macbeth's ______ prevents him from sleeping.
Answer key
  1. hallucination
  2. hyperbole
  3. perception
  4. offstage
  5. incarnadine
  6. equivocator
  7. feminine ending
  8. guilt

Homework

Learn and record the first three lines of the dagger soliloquy. Write 150 words on the blood imagery of Act II.

Watch the film at home

  1. The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021), directed by Joel Coen, with Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand, in black and white. Where to watch: JustWatch France.
  2. Macbeth (2015), directed by Justin Kurzel, with Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard. Where to watch: JustWatch France.
  3. DVD: ask at your local library or médiathèque.
  4. Scenes to watch: the witches on the heath (Act I), the dagger and the murder of Duncan (Act II), the banquet and Banquo's ghost (Act III), the sleepwalking scene (Act V).

Watch with English subtitles if you can. The films contain violence.

Assessment grid

CriteriaLevel 1Level 2Level 3Level 4
PerformanceFlat readingSome expressionExpressiveExpressive, with rhythm and pauses
Analysis of imageryAbsentBasicClearSubtle and well supported
Use of critical documentNoneMentionedUsedDiscussed with own view
LanguageMany errorsSome errorsFew errorsAccurate and varied

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