Metaphors both of mother-like nurturing and of being "unsexed" have been used by Lady Macbeth and by Macbeth about her. Find these and comment on their paradoxical nature.

Lady Macbeth asks to be "unsexed here" so that she can have no compunction about planning, participating in, or encouraging her husband to commit the murder.  she also says she would not change her mind about something such as murder "she would dash his brains" on the ground of the nursing babe rather than go back on her word.  Macbeth says, "Bring forth men children only" because he thinks she is acting more like a man than anything else.  What is going to be most paradoxical is that by the end of the play she will have collapsed into extreme feminine reaction as Macbeth only becomes harder and more uncaring.