Spot Remover
What is the iconic image that comes to mind when you think of Lady Macbeth? A woman driven half-mad by guilt and half-mad by recognition of her own darkness desperately trying to was blood off her hands which isn’t even really there. This novel is not really a rebooting of Shakespeare’s tragic play as it is the telling of a story that people only think they know. But imagery that calls to mind the Bard’s portrait of the Lady does occasionally pop up:
“I rinsed my hands clean of Duncan’s blood, and stayed close by him. Macbeth did the same, and we stood with the king’s closest retainers. Those men were nameless to me, but they were quiet and concerned, and seemed accepting of Duncan’s defeat.”
Prologue
The story begins with a Prologue which is set after the death of Macbeth, but the current situation here is not how Shakespeare’s tells us. Macduff may have hailed Malcom the new King, but as yet, he is not there. Instead, it is the Lady’s son, whose name is not Macbeth. She brought into the marriage a stepson for the late King and now the son himself is King, but not a regent recognized by everyone. In first person perspective, the thoughts of the recently widowed Lady Macbeth is made metaphorical through imagery:
“Snowflakes dazzle against the evening sky and fall gentle around this stark tower. The false King of Scots expects us to trudge our ponies through that cold deep, so that I may tuck myself away in some Lowland monastery. Malcolm Canmore, he who murdered my husband and now calls himself king, would prefer I went even farther south into England, where they have priories just for women. There his allies would lock me away, as the Scots will not.”
Externalizing Emotions
The son is named Lulach and during that time in which Duncan is leading Scotland into the wars which will raise Macbeth’s stakes and ambitions, things are mostly good for the Lady. Except for two things: her husband is away too often and her son is too much the man in a boy’s body. Our narrator is finely attuned to her interior moods, thought and anxiety and one of her few authentic expressions of pure femininity is her desire to express unspoken thoughts externally through the display (and the recorded thoughts) of imagery:
“New wool came to us from our tenants, and Bethoc and Aella dyed it in great tubs of boiling water with colors from herbs and plants, mixed with salt or apple vinegar. When the yarns were dried and spun fine, I chose colors to suit my mood and thoughts: the blood reds of sorrel and the blacks and browns of walnut and alder. Embroidered onto pale or dun-colored linen, the contrasts were striking. I covered curtain panels and seat covers with images of armored men, horses, ships on the sea. Lulach was fascinated with yarn or wooden warriors, and I wished he was not. Books and monkishness might save his life in future”
Birnam Wood
Another use of imagery for the purpose of alluding to Shakespeare’s play occurs when the Lady is recalling the movement of Malcolm’s troops into Dunsinnan. She compares his strategic tactics to the battle of Birnam Wood with which she is familiar because of Macbeth’s description:
“I heard of this battle from my husband himself, who survived, praise heaven…The forestland is so dense there that, between water and wood, the sounds of sly men cannot easily be heard. And so Malcolm’s men fooled Macbeth’s guard by devious means when they approached Macbeth’s own encampment between Dunkeld and Dunsinnan. In the darkness before dawn, the Saxons disguised themselves by draping branches and leaves to cover heads and shoulders as they hunched along like foxes and weasels to ambush the Scottish guard, bringing on a swift surprise attack.”
