Women's Role Of Women In Shakespeare And Lady Macbeth

During the Renaissance, values, social expectations, legal status, and rights of citizenship differed greatly between the sexes as well as among the classes. Women had little freedom. By contrast, men were free to do what they pleased. Men basically functioned as the ruling voice of society; they had the authority to vest themselves in politics, a reputation and have a free will to do anything. Women had virtually no control over their role in society. Women were excluded from any position of meaningful authority in any realm of society. Women were expected to serve men by any means necessary without participating in any outside activity that may render a man from feeling in control. Lady Macbeth deviates from the gender roles placed during the Renaissance. She defied the rules placed on women, she was not oppressed and her opinion mattered. Women played several roles in their families depending on their age and marital status. First a woman was a daughter and then a wife, mother, or widow. Women were used for …show more content…
“Are you afraid to be the same man in reality as the one you wish to be? Would you have the crown which you believe to be the ornament of life, and yet live like a coward in your own self-esteem…?” Lady Macbeth uses terms such as “then you were a man” to try to get Macbeth focusing on his manhood. Lady Macbeth is very clever. She is used to getting what she wants and is determined to rule as the queen of Scotland. She describes her husband as “too full o’ the milk of human kindness/to catch the nearest way,” meaning he is too kind to become king the quickest way, which is killing Duncan. He is not ruthless or malicious at the beginning. But, since she pushed her husband so far of the edge, she made Macbeth into a demon. All of this could have been avoided if she did not make any remarks and letting her husband earn the crown instead of taking