Macbeth

In Shakespeare’s era, women possessed few political and private rights. Renaissance women were expected to remain silent, avoid political discussions, and stick to the duties of their husbands’ households. Men were considered higher morally, intellectually, and physically, and women were subjugated to the will of men. Men were also considered more ambitious, firm, decisive, lucid, and refined than women of the time. In Macbeth, this world of male-dominance is both displayed and challenged through the characters of Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Macduff, and Lady Macduff—the text introduces two opposite realities which lead to the question of what it means to be a man.
In the beginning of the play, before Duncan’s murder, Macbeth is portrayed as a very masculine character—at least by the soldiers from the battlefield. Duncan refers to him as a “valiant cousin” and “worthy gentleman” (1.2.24) who, according to the Captain, “with his brandished steel/Which smoked wi...