11/20/19 Nataly Dubovskaya

11/20/19
Nataly Dubovskaya
Period 5
Blogger #4

Aim: How does Shakespeare employ the use of "comic relief" to simultaneously lighten and darken the play?

Today for the Do Now we discussed the phrases "Is this a dagger I see before me..." and " Macbeth does murder sleep" from Act II of Macbeth. It seems as Macbeth is talking to himself full of guilt saying that he murdered both his own rest and the put the king to sleep metaphorically. Sleep is a constant theme in Macbeth showing both vulnerability and "death" at the end of eeach day. This act committed by Macbeth revealed how cowardly he was because he murdered an innocent man when he was at rest and couldn't defend himself, after listening to his wife.

After so many heavy events such as King Duncan's death, Macbeth potentially losing his soul, and seeing lady Macbeth in her true form, Shapespeare uses comic relief with the Porter in Act II scene III to pick up the mood. In groups we had to deconstruct the Porters soliloquy in the beginning of scene III.  He was drunk and uneducated so his words weren't very clear. The phrase from his speech," Here's a farmer that hanged himslef on the expectation of plenty" actually reveals how wise this character was. This phrase foreshadows how Macbeth was dreaming of being high and mighty but actually figuratively killed himself in the process. This guilt he will have to live with along with the consequences he will face was not worth the dreams.