Skip to main content

In Act II, Scene 4, what do the images in lines 6-19 suggest about the act of killing the king? What do these lines foreshadow about Macbeth's reign?

In Act II, Scene 4, we hear the conversation between Ross and an Old Man. This scene takes place in the morning after King Duncan's murder. The two men are talking about some unusual and dangerous occurrences in nature. Ross is surprised that, although the morning has arrived, it is still very dark outside:



By the clock, 'tis day,
And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp:
Is't night's predominance, or the day's shame.



The Old Man then notes that a mighty falcon was killed by an owl, which is abnormal. Ross mentions Duncan's exquisite horses turned wild and ate one another, which is symbolic of Scotland's aristocracy turning against each other.



And Duncan's horses—a thing most strange and certain—
Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,
Turn'd wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
Contending 'gainst obedience. . . 


'Tis said they eat each other.



All these bizarre occurrences seem to suggest the natural order of things, as established by God, has been disrupted. The world has been thrown into chaos because Macbeth unlawfully and sinfully murdered the king of Scotland, who was kind and acted like a father to Macbeth. Therefore, the previously mentioned lines imply Macbeth's reign will most likely be unnatural, tyrannical, and bloody. This proves to be true as we continue reading the play.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is 'efficate' a word in English?

I routinely hear the word "efficate" being used. For example, "The most powerful way to efficate a change in the system is to participate." I do not find entries for this word in common English dictionaries, but I do not have an unabridged dictionary. I have checked the OED (I'm not sure if it is considered unabridged), and it has no entry for "efficate". It does have an entry for "efficiate", which is used in the same way. Wordnik has an entry for "efficate" with over 1800 hits, thus providing some evidence for the frequency of use. I personally like the word and find the meaning very clear and obvious when others use it. If it's not currently an "officially documented" word, perhaps its continued use will result in it being better documented.
Post a Comment
Read more