Macbeth - Act 1 Questions
1. What are the witches planning at the beginning of the act?
2. What does the Captain report about the battle to Duncan?
3. What title is given to Macbeth for bravery in the battle?
4. What happened to the original Thane of Cawdor and why did he lose his title?
5. How do the witches greet Macbeth after the battle?
6. What do the witches mean when they say, 'Lesser than Macbeth, and greater. Not so
happy, yet much happier. Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none'?
7. What news is brought by Ross and Angus?
8. What happens that causes Macbeth to recalculate his ease of becoming king?
9. Banquo warns Macbeth to be cautious of the witches’ prophecies. What are his
concerns?
10. Lady Macbeth anticipates what problem in regards to Macbeth’s nature?
11. What is the signifigance of Lady Macbeth's "unsex me" scene?
12. What has Lady Macbeth schemed to do to the King?
13. Why does the King come to Macbeth's castle?
14. How sure is Lady Macbeth that this plot will succeed?
15. What do the witches symbolize?
16. What reasons does Macbeth give Lady Macbeth for not murdering Duncan?
17. How does Lady Macbeth ultimately convince Macbeth to murder Duncan?
18. Outline Lady Macbeth’s plan.
19. Is Duncan a good judge of character? Support your answer with evidence from the text.
Act I Quotations
Identify the following quotations by stating who is speaking, who is being spoken to, and how
the quotation is of importance.
1.
“What are these
So withered and so wild in their attire,
That look not like inhabitants of the earth,
And yet are on’t? Live you, or are you aught
That man may question? You seem to understand me,
By each at once her choppy finger laying upon skinny lips. You should be women,
And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
That you are so.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
2.
“He’s here in double trust:
First, as I am his kinsmen and his subject,
Strong both against the deed. Then, as his host,
Who should against his murderer shut the door,
Not bear the knife myself.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
3.
“Whether he was combined with those of Norway.
Or did line the rebel with hidden help
And vantage, or that with both he labored
In his country’s wreck, I know not,
But treasons capital, confessed and proved,
Have overthrown him.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
4. “The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me, from crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty!”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
5. “We will proceed no further in this business.
He hath honour’dd me of late, and I have bought
Golden opinions from all sorts of people,
Which would be worn now in their newest gloss,
Not cast aside so soon.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
6. “For brave Macbeth - well he deserves that name Disdaining Fortune, with his brandish’dd steel,
Which smoked with bloody execution,
Like valour’s minion carved out his passage,
Till he faced the slave;
Which ne’er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,
Till he unseamed him from the knave to the chaps,
And fix’dd his head upon our battlements.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
7. “What beast was’t then
That made you break this enterprise to me?
When you durst do it, then you were a man;
And, to be more than you were, you would
Be so much more the man.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
8. “There’s no art
To find the mind’s construction in the face:
He was a gentleman on whom I built
An absolute trust.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
9.
“When Duncan is asleep
-Whereto the rather shall his hard day’s journey
Soundly invite him - his two chamberlains
Will I with wine and wassail so convince
That memory, the warder of the brain,
Shall be a fume and the receipt of reason
A limbeck only. When in swinish sleep
Their drenched natures lie as in a death,
What cannot you and I perform upon
The unguarded Duncan?”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
10.
“To beguile the time,
Look like the time, bear welcome in your eye,
Your hand, your tongue. Look like the innocent flower,
But be the serpent under it.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
11. “Stars, hide your fires;
Let not light see my black and deep desires”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
12. “But ‘tis strange:
And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,
The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
Win us with honest trifles, to betray us
In deepest consequence.”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance:
13. “False face must hide what the false heart doth know”
Speaker:
Listener:
Significance: