Macbeth and great expectations

Shakespeare and dickens are very effective at presenting the flaws and weaknesses of key characters in both Macbeth and great expectations. Using different techniques, miss havisham and lady macbeth and lady macbeth both impact others characters and events in a negative way. Females would have been seen during that time period as passive, gentle and weak therefore the characters would be appealing to and acceptable to the audience to have a common stereotype of a women presented to them. However, Miss Havisham and lady Macbeth were portray in a way that would be seen as ruthless, abnormal and powerful female characters; almost the opposite of what you might expected. Miss Havisham is a frightful old women who about nothing but herself and is determined to live her life in self-pity while seeking revenge on all men.

On the other hand, Lady Macbeth shown as a evil villain, showing no remorse in her uncontrolled ambition for power. Both take advantage of other people to carry out their negative motives to get what they want which eventually impact other characters and themselves; makes them feel guilty and delusional and lead them to their downfall. Firstly, one of the flaws and weaknesses of Miss Havisham is experiencing a major conflict with her internal self. Being emotionally broken from being jilted on her weeding day impacts her hugely, physically and mentally. After she becomes emotionless, suffering in her anger and sadness. The abandonment is even worst when show was at the peak of her happiness ~“head over heels” for compeyson which show has to live through. When pip first arrives at her house, you can see her weaknesses revealed when she says “broken” and “what do I touch?”.

This is a metaphor/adjective to describing her heart and that it is lasting damage on one horrible tragic incident. Despite her sadness, she recognises he own physical weakness yet she is somewhat proud of what she is in and what she has been through. This links to her hatred of men “what is real love? It is blind devotion, unquestioning self humiliation” this suggests that her love for compeyson was so strong therefore makes her untrustworthy of men. Believing men are all rotten, even more rotten than the two who deceived her. Furthermore, “giving up your whole heart and soul to the smiter” shows she loved him so more that he had hurt her and left ; impacts her in the strongest way possible. This is a flaw/weakness of miss havisham because she is left crushed in her own depression, completely heartbroken and soon makes her feel guilty for not moving on. The audience slowly sees the reason behind her madness and might feel sympathy for her however, wouldn’t understand how she is unhappy with being wealthy. One way Shakespeare portrays a flaw and weakness of Lady Macbeth is her hatred of women hood which holds her down until her death.

The dissatisfaction of her own gender makes her act with cruelty she ignorantly and perversely identified with male strength “unsex me here” implies she is trying to get rid of her feminine feelings inside in order to carry out the murder. Also, this links to the supernatural and how there are two people inside her that she can change into; talking to the evil spirits around her “o gentle lady, tis not for you to hear what I can speak in women’s ear. Would murder fell” this is deliberate dramatic irony, she hardly would murder king Duncan but that she, no “gentle lady” had just taken part in. instead, and she uses Macbeth in a cunning way as a tool to carry out the murder. She becomes more brutal in her pursuit to do whatever she has to do to get what she wants. “Plucked my nipple from his bonless guns and dash’d the brains out” this reveals her greed for the crown, the choice of a clean conscience or her greed which makes her emotionless, bloodless, and heartless and has savage strength.

This is a weakness because it blocks off her morality to think clearly in what she is doing. After a while when Macbeth is king, her feminist come back which consumes her with guilt and eventually drives her insane and delusional where she commits suicide. This could suggest that there is a limit in what she can do because of her gender. Also, there is morality in every human and her lack of contentment and reason to doing what she has done. The Shakespearean audience would not really care for Lady Macbeth as she has brought this on herself and will suffer more of a stronger guilt than Macbeth. Dickens is able to use negative imagery to present a flaw and weakness of Miss Havisham by making her completely isolating herself from the external world rather than to seek help through her relations.

This makes her unsociable and paranoid. This makes her unsociable and paranoid, bring cautious of everything because she was betrayed by the person she trusted the most. For example, dickens uses the setting of miss havisham house to show one of her flaws/weakness “had a great many bars to it, some of the windows have been walled up, all the lower were rustily burred” first impressions of this house is dark and gothic, that it is unwelcoming to any visitors and to society. Also, it may reflect on her personality on how “rustily burred” suggests that she is old and out of touch from everyone else. This links to her being frozen in time “no glimpse of daylight to be seen in” all love and kindness of Miss Havisham has escaped outside and she is trapped in her own misery and depression. This is a weakness because its stops her from moving on from her wedding day, still wearing the wedding dress and stopping the clock implies that she is keeping the memory of her dead relationship alive.

Furthermore, this shows her decaying personality as a person “I had been shut up in theses rooms a long time (I don’t know how long; you know what time the clocks keep here” her weakness here is being afraid of trusting someone after her tragic incident at the wedding. Also, being heartbroken, she forgets how to act and behave normally because she was abandoned. She becomes senile because of the most tragic and heart shattering event of her life. The audience would be puzzle at a wealthy person being depressed because her money can make her more on and marry another man. Yet it has affected her emotionally that she lives on her own, having no and leads her to her downfall. In comparison, Lady Macbeth is isolated by her own guilt after macbeth leaves her to suffer in her despair. For example,””””””””””””””””””””””” Shakespeare portrays Lady Macbeth further with being manipulative and controlling over Macbeth; taking advantage of Macbeth’s weaker side which actually makes him stronger as a person after the murder.

One type of way that is used to control Macbeth is questioning and interrogating Macbeth’s manhood. As shown here “you’d do it if you love me!” this shows that he will look like a coward in his and her eyes, and he will lose her love if he doesn’t do the bad deed. That s all the encouraging and support Macbeth needs to kill King Duncan. This is a weakness and flaw because it shows her ruthless side of Lady Macbeth, how it is her that really wants to murder but she is limited of what she can do and instead uses Macbeth’s stronger, soldier skill to overpower how he actually feels about it. This links to ambition for power and the crown over Scotland. Lady Macbeth is more bright and superior than Macbeth therefore thinks more in considering to murder, and then assures Macbeth that it is what they had to do was inevitable. She becomes stronger and in control “art not without ambition” and “what thou promised; yet do I fear thy nature” an accusation of cowardice to Macbeth which is ironic because he is very brave and powerful on the battlefield.

This exploitation of his flaws to prove himself as a warrior is done long enough to make him commit the murder. Consequently, this causes him to overcome his good sense and caution. Ultimately destroys Macbeth, driven by his own guilt to go on a killing spree because he becomes paranoid in losing his crown. This is a flaw/weakness of Lady Macbeth because she influences Macbeth to be emotionless which ends up leading to both of their downfall. Trying to get the best for Macbeth and herself horribly backfires and Macbeth is truly “too full of the milk of human”. The audience would be shocked to see her curing act on Macbeth and expect her to be gentle and not think in such a way, yet she is actually completely villainess Moving on, another was Miss Havisham effects and impacts other characters because of her flaws and weakness as a person is being sick minded and abusive towards pip and Estella as well as ruining and taking advantage of them at a young age where they are vulnerable. As shown here “with this boy? Why, he is a common labouring-boy” and “well?

You can break his heart” this intent of bring pip over to her house just to get Estella to practice on pip like a test dummy is sick minded and shows her quest of heartbreak. “Common labouring boy” suggests that pip lower classis terrible capered to Miss Havisham, rich and wealthy high class. Putting pip down as a male gender and saying pip needs to be in a higher class to enjoy life is irony because pip is the one who is happy lifestyle and Miss Havisham is actually the one who is depressed and heartbroken. “Break his heart” shows her vengeful disposition, using Estella to fulfil the duties to mess with pips emotions. This links to being manipulative over pip and Estella; she wants to control everything in her life because she was unable to control what happened on her wedding day. This leads to cause misery to pip and the male gender; still is very determined in seeking vengeance over men .after, she pretends to be his benefactor when pip comes over to thank her. This suggests that she thinks it is a game to toy with pip while not caring at all about his feelings.

This later on makes her feel guilty near the end because pip reminds her of how she gave false hopes of a future with Estella. Furthermore, she regrets how she has transformed with Estella into a cruel, cold hearted human being. The audience reaction to this is slowing understandings miss havisham madness as well as feel sympathy when she dies. On the other hand, Lady Macbeth is very clever in scheming plans when she immediately reacts with a plan to kill King Duncan when Macbeth sends her a letter “his spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt of our great quell” this implies that the officers will sunk up the guilt and move on without consequences. The problem here is what happens after the coup-the whole, being-damned-to-hell-for-the-sin-of murder thing. This links to her being stubborn and naïve on how it may affect Macbeth and herself mentally and physically afterwards. Macbeth is supposed to protect the king not murder him. Heaven is bound to frown upon murdering such a decent person.

Soon, Lady Macbeth more confident and gets what she craves “tis the eye of childhood that fears a painted devil” this hints that she has supernatural quality’s like the witches, a parallel coexisting within her-self where she is able to change who she is. She can become either a weak, gentle women or a strong, powerful like-male. If her husband’s going to be the powerful figure she wants him to be, lady Macbeths got to take things into her own hands. However, Macbeth suffers from the guilt that he can’t hide from as well as lady Macbeth later on. Also, Macbeth starts to plan on his own because he thought he was unable to kill King Duncan as he was very loyal to him. After the murder, Macbeth feels capable of doing anything. However, this means that when Macbeth leaves Lady Macbeth alone with her own guilt, she becomes delusional and commits suicide. Finally, both texts use an important flaw and weakness of guilt to display how the characters eventually feel.

Lady macbeth starts to feel guilty about what she has done towards the end of her life; still seeing blood on her hands “out damn spot, out I say!” the guilt that she tried to avoid and the sight of true state cannot be easily removed. Her hands are shown as religious imagery and a symbol of both life and death upon her hands. This links to her feminine and weaker side. This happens when lady Macbeth encouragement and participation are no longer needed and she is forced to be feminine and inactivate. This weakness and flaw because she overestimates how unfeeling she can be which later makes her depressed, disturbed in sleep and have OCD. As a result of this, she commits suicide from her madness. The story draws towards Macbeth after the murder; therefore lady macbeth becomes unimportant to the Shakespearean audiences. However, they will start to feel sympathy as she is more feminine; her softer side is shown and she has morals as a person to be either good or bad. Likewise, miss havisham guilty is develop throughout great expectations.

Since she adopted Estella, her raising Estella in a way where she is almost creating herself which is a weakness because she is unable to fulfil the duties on her vengeance for men; therefore ruining Estella’s life by using her as a tool to breaks people’s hearts although she’s wants the best for Estella. Her vengeance over men makes her sick minded to use Estella’s beaut to break people’s hearts so they won’t break hers. Miss Havisham becomes cruel and heartless in the things she does “coarse hands and common boots” and “how does she use you” taunting pip because he is a boy of lower class in order to confuse and make pip hate who he is. Eventually, Estella rejects Miss Havisham for the wronging of what she was trying to do to Estella “you are tired of me” shows Miss Havisham knows her flaws yet still hides the fact that she feels guilty in using Estella.

The Victorian audience knows clearly now why she has become insane because she realises what she has done to other people without thinking about it. Overall, the flaws and weaknesses of miss havisham and lady macbeth shows imagery when the both are completely in control, however, guilt drives them to lose control of themselves and spiral into insanity. They were never thinking clearly; only negative motives which always have some sort of justification despite being vague or simply implied. Their deaths would have only been seen as gods doing or punishment for their actions. Also shows just how irrelevant they become when they’re weak