What I am about to say may be a 'hot take', but I stand by it: examiners are swayed by expression. I have been frustrated on many an occasion by model answers provided by the exam board which are just 'this makes the reader want to read on' expressed in sophisticated language. Now, I am not trying to add to the problem here - this video is not about teaching you empty language that sounds fancy but adds nothing.
In fact, this video is the opposite. In righteous defiance of the empty sophistication, my video aims to show that you can learn sophisticated vocabulary which actually adds insight to your essay. How does it do that? Often, it is the specificity of the words. Think about it this way - calling Macbeth 'bad' may have an accuracy to it, but it is such a simple and vague word that it isn't showing a deep insight. Now take one of the words from my list - coercive is a super specific word which shows a deep level of insight into someone's (you'll have to watch to find out who!) behaviour. With these words you will be able to elevate both the insight and the eloquence of your essays.
Timestamp
0.55 Full vocabulary list
1.37 Enigmatic
4.05 Coercive
5.23 Domineering
6.35 Malevolent
9.35 Dauntless
13.00 Nascent
14.38 Iniquitous
16.45 Ontological crisis
17.55 Turmoil
19.49 Usurp
21.25 Existential crisis
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There are also multiple resources to help you in the Study Materials section:
Unlocking Shakespeare Study Guide
This is the perfect accompaniment to my video on how to read Shakespeare's language. It goes back over the strategies with more examples and - most importantly - more opportunities for you to practice putting those strategies to use.
Macbeth Wide Margin Textbook
If you don't have a copy of the play to annotate, then this is a must, must, MUST have. If you do have a copy of the play, but it's one of those editions where they have filled every inch of the page with only slightly useful information and have left practically no space for your notes, then my version is also going to be ideal. The wide margins of this version mean that there is plenty of space for your notes. I have still provided translations for lots of the archaic language, and I've provided a list of characters at the start too. It is basically everything I always wished was in the copies of Macbeth I had to use to teach! If you are from a school and would like to order physical copies of the textbook, you can find it on Amazon too.
Macbeth Hexagons Game
If you are studying Macbeth for the purposes of an exam, then this is a fantastic, quick and easy revision game (dare I call it 'fun'?). The basic idea is that every hexagon has a character, theme or some sort of important technique on it. You have to join the hexagons up by connecting the things that link. It's a great way to practice making links and also revise what you know about every important aspect of this play.
If there are any videos or resources you'd like to help you with the study of this play, then please do leave a comment and let me know. I know that my videos only scratch the surface at the moment and you can rest assured that I fully intend to release videos on all the other characters, themes and key techniques. I'm also planning to release model essays so that you can spot the patterns of approach across top grade essays.
Lesson Transcript:
Your vocabulary doesn't just enhance your Macbeth essays because you sound more posh; it's actually because sophisticated vocabulary is more specific than vague vocabulary. And by being more specific, you're showing a deeper and more specific understanding of the play. So the vocabulary I'm going to go through in this video is really going to help you with enhancing your understanding of the play by enhancing the specificity of words that you know to talk about it.
Now, I'm going to be talking through each word, explaining how you can use it to analyze the play and looking at a key quote to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. But if you're feeling like, "I don't want to get through all that," then here's just a list of the vocab that I'm going to be going through in this video.
As for the rest of us, let's start going through these vocab words that are going to enhance our Macbeth essays. Now, I can't take credit for any of the definitions of the words—for that, I recommend Collins Dictionary. These are their definitions of all the words, and in my opinion, it is the best dictionary for students because the way it explains words is so much more accessible than Google, and Cambridge Dictionary, and Oxford Dictionary, and all that kind of stuff. They're not endorsing this video, but I am endorsing them!
Our first word is enigmatic. Someone or something that is enigmatic is mysterious and difficult to understand. Now, you'll probably hear that and immediately there's a particular character that comes to mind: the witches. Just look at this quote from Act 1, Scene 3 of how Banquo describes them:
"What are these,
So withered and so wild in their attire,
That look not like th’ inhabitants o’ th’ earth,
And yet are on ’t?..."
The witches are mysterious and difficult to understand for a few reasons. The first reason: they're supernatural. There's supposed to be something mysterious and difficult to understand about the supernatural; specifically, we're supposed to fear that. We're supposed to fear how mysterious and unnatural they are.
Their enigmatic nature is also essential to the plot of the play. If the witches had just been straightforward with Macbeth—"Yeah mate, at the end of the day, when all's said and done, you're gonna be king, he's not; you're gonna have to kill someone to do it, just do it"—if the witches had been like that, Macbeth would have behaved very differently. But the whole reason that he behaves as he does is because he is essentially interpreting what the witches say to him. He is interpreting the extent to which he's supposed to be king; he's interpreting what Banquo is supposed to be; he's interpreting his own invincibility with the whole "no man born of woman can kill you." And it's his interpretations—his incorrect interpretations—of their prophecies that lead him down the path he ends up on.
So the witches being enigmatic is an important plot device ensuring that our Macbeth falls down all these holes. It's also important, though, because it means that we cannot place all of the blame for the consequences, the events of the play, on the witches. They just said some prophecies; Macbeth is the one who went and killed people over it. They never said "Go kill King Duncan," "Go kill Banquo," "You can't be killed." It's Macbeth who chose to take those decisions. So the theme of fate versus free will—where our witches are more like fate and Macbeth's actions are more free will—what we see is how there is that kind of clash between them, where Macbeth thinks fate is telling him to do something, but ultimately it's his own choices that lead him down that path.
Coercive measures are intended to force people to do something that they do not want to do. Can you guess who this one's about? Yep, it's Lady Macbeth. She is very clear about her intentions to coerce Macbeth. Just look at this quote:
"Hie thee hither,
That I may pour my spirits in thine ear,
And chastise with the valor of my tongue
All that impedes thee from the golden round,
Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem
To have thee crowned withal."
At this point, she's basically saying: "Macbeth, get your butt home so that I can make you go for this, that I can make you go and take that crown." Because earlier in this soliloquy, she was talking about how she thinks that Macbeth is too full of the milk of human kindness to do it: he hasn't got the guts to do it, he's too sweet and gentle to do it. So she has got to pour her spirits in his ear; she's got to convince him, she's got to make him do it. And we see her do that later on in the play: she belittles him, she gets really angry at him, she guilt-trips him, she colossally coerces him into doing what she wants him to do. Because Macbeth himself told her he didn't want to kill King Duncan, and she has made him go for it anyway.
And that is why another way that you can describe Lady Macbeth is as being domineering. If you say that someone is domineering, you disapprove of them because you feel they are trying to control other people without any consideration for their feelings or opinions. So you can see the key distinction between coerce and domineering: they're both similar in that they're about making somebody do something, they're about controlling someone; but domineering specifically has that element of without any consideration for their feelings or opinions.
So where's our evidence that Lady Macbeth has no consideration for feelings or opinions? Well, when Macbeth has just gotten back from killing King Duncan, he's looking at his bloody hands and he says, "This is a sorry sight." And his loving wife's response is: "A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight." At that point in the play, Macbeth is feeling all kinds of emotions; he's incredibly troubled, and his wife could not give less of a damn. "I'm here to tell you right now: we don't care." That's pretty domineering. She's controlling him, she's getting him to do what she wants, and she doesn't really care how he feels about it, either.
In many ways, it's that behavior of Lady Macbeth that leads to her being viewed as a malevolent character by the audience. A malevolent person is someone who deliberately tries to cause harm or evil. Now, she's not necessarily malevolent towards Macbeth, but she's absolutely malevolent towards King Duncan. She clearly wants to take that crown; she doesn't care how it's achieved, she doesn't care if King Duncan has to die to make it happen, and she will coerce her husband, she will be domineering towards her husband in order to make that happen.
It's worth noting that her being coercive and domineering would also, for our Shakespearean audience, make her seem malevolent because of their gender expectations: women should not be controlling, women should not be forcing men to do anything. So that power that she's got to control and force makes her seem malevolent to our Shakespearean audience.
For this quote, though, this is taken from her "unsex me here" soliloquy, and I could have quoted that entire soliloquy as evidence for this word, but I just focused on this one little bit:
"Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry 'Hold, hold!'"
Now, what we can see here is that key factor of the word malevolent in deliberately causing harm. First of all, that imperative, "Come, thick night"—she is commanding the night; she is the one in control of this situation, and she's asking night to basically cover up all light, "That my keen knife see not the wound it makes." So that possessive pronoun of "my" on the knife: she is the one who is going to commit the violence; she is explicitly saying that she's the one who's going to engage in the violence there, and she knows that. So that is showing her deliberate desire there to cause harm. So absolutely, in the eyes of our Shakespearean audience in the early stages of the play, she'd be seen as a malevolent character.
It's important to note, though, she's not malevolent the whole way through. Just remember the development of her character: insanity, the hopelessness she feels when she realizes that she's not happy with the crown—none of that is malevolent; that's different. So if you're using malevolent in an essay, it's very much a: at the start she's malevolent, but later on she becomes something else.
The same is true for coercive and domineering. You want to examine: to what extent is she coercive throughout the entire play? Is she still the one who is domineering and coercive by Act 3 and Act 4, at the point that Banquo and Macduff's family are being killed, or is it Macbeth who's coercive and domineering at that point? Examine that. Make sure you're carefully thinking about not just how a word applies to a character, but how it applies to a character at specific points of the play.
On to Macbeth now, and the first word we've got for him is dauntless. A dauntless person is brave and confident and not easily frightened. This, of course, is talking about Macbeth at the very beginning of the play, before he's met the witches, but when we hear about his triumphs on the battlefield against the Norwegians.
For example, we've just been told that the Norwegians have gained more soldiers and the Scottish are losing the battle and all hope is basically lost, and King Duncan says: "Dismayed not this our captains, Macbeth and Banquo?" And the Sergeant responds: "Yes; as sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion." So basically, what the Sergeant is saying is: yeah, Macbeth and Banquo were about as worried about the Norwegians as an eagle would be worried by a sparrow, or a lion would be worried by a hare—aka, they're not worried at all.
And that's important because essentially what we've got here is this animal imagery of eagles and lions suggesting brave, confident, absolutely not easily frightened, absolutely dauntless strength as well. And that is juxtaposed against the weakness of the sparrow and the hare. However, what you have to remember is that those images of sparrow and hare—of weakness and timidity—are being applied to a huge army and a really difficult situation. So taking a sparrow or a hare and applying it to a circumstance that any regular person would be like, "Yeah no, that's the lion, that's not a hare, that's a lion right there"—that is just further reinforcing the bravery and confidence of Banquo and Macbeth, that they can stay so brave and so confident in the face of such a difficult situation.
Now, we have to ask ourselves: why is Macbeth presented as dauntless at the very start of the play? Because, of course, he does not stay dauntless for very long: he's going to lose his confidence, he's going to become frightened, all because of the witches' prophecies and the consequences of those. But the reason he's dauntless in the beginning is arguably linked to the theme of ambition. And why he is able to feel so confident and brave on the battlefield is because his ambitions, his desires in life, are correctly in line with what they should be: he works for the king, he fights for the king, he has honor on his side, he has morals on his side, and therefore he is able to be a brave and confident warrior, knowing that he is doing the right thing.
As soon as he starts to consider killing King Duncan, his confidence drops, his bravery drops, and his fear increases, because he knows that he is doing something immoral; he knows he's doing something unnatural, that he is trying to do something that he shouldn't be. And so what Shakespeare is doing is examining how ambition can actually destroy a person. Because when you desire something that you shouldn't have, when you seek to achieve ambition that you shouldn't, it causes you more harm than it gives you any benefit.
Now, of course, that seems a pretty pessimistic way of thinking about ambition, but part of Shakespeare's goal here was showing support of King James I. And that anti-assassinating the king—called regicide, if you're looking for another vocab word there—that anti-regicide messaging is linked to the fact that a guy you may have heard of called Guy Fawkes tried to kill King James I.
Nascent things or processes are just beginning and are expected to become stronger or to grow bigger. This word again links to the theme of ambition, because in the beginning of the play, we see Macbeth's nascent ambition. For example, in this quote:
"...Why do I yield to that suggestion
Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair
And make my seated heart knock at my ribs,
Against the use of nature?..."
He's just had the witches' prophecies, and he's kind of thinking about what those witches' prophecies mean for him. And he's saying: well, if the prophecies are good, then why do they make me think about killing the king, and killing the king makes me feel really afraid? So what we see here is that nascent ambition, because we can see right from the get-go, right after he's heard the witches' prophecies, already considering something that makes him afraid and he knows goes against nature, because it would help him achieve his ambition.
And of course, we know that that ambition is just going to grow stronger and get bigger. It's going to get bigger because he's actually going to go ahead and kill King Duncan; it's then going to get bigger because he essentially tries to work against the witches' prophecies by wiping out Banquo and making sure Banquo's prophecies can't happen; and then it gets even bigger because he just loses all kind of fear from the King of England coming over and all the rebels—he does not care about any of them because he cannot be killed. And then, of course, he finds out: yeah, that was just talking about Caesarean, you absolutely can be killed.
From the moment that Macbeth officially decides to kill King Duncan, he is absolutely viewed as iniquitous by the audience. When you describe something as iniquitous, you mean that it is very unfair or morally bad. It is morally bad that Macbeth is trying to kill King Duncan, and it's also really unfair because King Duncan is such a good king. And there are so many examples throughout the scenes in the play that have King Duncan in that show his good virtues, how he cares about his people, all that good stuff.
But there's also a bit in one of Macbeth's soliloquies where he shows himself that he knows that King Duncan is a good king, and he says:
"...his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking-off;
And pity, like a naked newborn babe,
Striding the blast, or heaven’s cherubin, horsed
Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,
That tears shall drown the wind..."
Now, that is essentially Macbeth really going over the top about how sad everybody is going to be about King Duncan's death. He describes the death of King Duncan as "deep damnation," which suggests that Macbeth knows that his action of killing King Duncan is a morally bad thing because it's going to damn him to hell. He also shows that he knows how virtuous King Duncan is because of the angels that are going to take him off, because he talks about how the cherubs are going to blow the horrid deed in every eye—the heavens are going to make everybody cry basically from King Duncan's death.
So Macbeth knows his behavior is iniquitous. And again, that's really important: because if he knows his behavior is iniquitous, why does he go ahead with it anyway? And the answer—say it with me, everybody—it is his ambition! He can't help himself because he's just so desperate to make his ambition come true. So again, Shakespeare is pointing out how harmful ambition is, because it just erodes your moral compass and makes you willing to do iniquitous things in order to get what you want.
An ontological crisis is something that Macbeth goes through shortly after he has killed King Duncan. An ontological crisis describes the crisis a human goes through when its model of reality changes—for example, a believer's loss of faith in God. Now, of course, Macbeth's model of reality massively changes because he's killed the king: he's killed the person that God put on Earth to rule Scotland. Big model of reality change! And the consequence of that is that Macbeth immediately feels a loss with his faith, and we see that in this quote:
"But wherefore could not I pronounce 'Amen'?
I had most need of blessing, and 'Amen'
Stuck in my throat."
This is what Macbeth is saying to Lady Macbeth pretty much immediately after the murder of King Duncan. He's asking why couldn't he say "Amen" when he heard one of the guards say "Amen." Now, "Amen," of course, is the word that is said to end a prayer, and it represents that connection with God. And so the "Amen" sticking in his throat is perhaps a metaphor for his inability to connect with God anymore: he's lost that ability to connect with God because of what he has done.
Macbeth being king leads to turmoil. Turmoil is a state of confusion, disorder, uncertainty, or great anxiety. Now, there's turmoil in a couple of ways. First of all, there's turmoil for Macbeth himself. He experiences turmoil before he kills King Duncan because he is really conflicted about whether to do it, whether to go ahead with it, and he has a lot of anxiety and uncertainty about that. He experiences turmoil himself once he has become king; he does continue arguably to experience turmoil because of the whole "What am I going to do about Banquo? What am I going to do about Macduff?"—all that kind of turmoil.
But more than that, the turmoil has now extended beyond Macbeth himself. Lady Macbeth is in turmoil, and the entire of Scotland is in turmoil, as we see from this line from Macduff when he's talking to Malcolm in Act 4:
"...Each new morn
New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows
Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds
As if it felt with Scotland and yelled out
Like syllable of dolor."
So what we can see here: that imagery of suffering, you know, the semantic field of suffering—"howl," "cry," "sorrows," "yelled"—all of this pain and suffering that's going on in Scotland as a result of Macbeth being king and his behavior as king. But also when that is compounded by "each new morn" and that repetition of "new," as if there's just constant additions to the pain and to the suffering as well.
The fact that Scotland itself is in turmoil is important because it tells us about that theme of kingship again, and the natural versus unnatural. Because Macbeth should never have been king, everything is thrown out of whack, everything in Scotland isn't as it should be, Macbeth is not a good king, his people suffer, and there's just turmoil everywhere because it was never meant to be him on the throne.
In fact, the fact that he got the throne is him usurping that role. If you say that someone usurps a job, role, title, or position, they take it from someone when they have no right to do this. So we've already talked about this word, right? That's the key phrase, because Macbeth usurped the position. He didn't earn it, he didn't deserve it; he usurped it from King Duncan, and that is the source of all of the problem: he was never meant to be king, he never should have been king in the first place.
And here's just another quote, this time from Banquo, again reminding us of that—like I was saying before, that motif of clothing:
"New honors come upon him,
Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mold
But with the aid of use."
The "strange garments"—that's talking about their armor. And back in those times, to make armor fit on a knight or fit on a soldier, they used to have to like hammer it on, almost like bend it into shape around your body. So that's what it's talking about: armor doesn't fit without help. This new position of Macbeth's—at this point is just Thane of Cawdor—doesn't fit without help.
Now, of course, what Banquo thinks he's talking about with "the aid of use" is King Duncan. He means: "Oh, Macbeth doesn't feel like he deserves Thane of Cawdor, but the king is going to help him with that, is going to give him the role, make him feel more comfortable with it." What we know because of the dramatic irony as the audience is: we know that the aid of use Macbeth is getting is the witches and their prophecies. We know that Macbeth is not being helped by the right sources.
Last word, and this one fits with towards the end of the play: existential crisis. Existential crises—crises, by the way, is plural for crisis—existential crises are moments when individuals question whether their lives have meaning, purpose, or value. This is another one that you can apply to Macbeth specifically right towards the end of the play, and mainly towards the "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow" soliloquy—one of my, in fact, you know, my absolute all-time favorite soliloquy in Macbeth and in any of Shakespeare's work basically.
In that last soliloquy, Macbeth has just been told that Lady Macbeth has killed herself, and he's musing on the pointlessness of life, and he comes out with this amazing line:
"Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."
So what we can see there is that Macbeth is basically feeling like life is pointless. "Life's but a walking shadow"—that's something that's insignificant, insubstantial, will disappear. "A poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more"—so that metaphor is about how human beings think we have importance, you know, we are the star of the play, we perform and get our attention, but then we disappear and mean nothing. "A tale told by an idiot"—talking about the low value he sees in human beings there. "Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"—so again, that juxtaposition between "sound and fury" and the power behind that, juxtaposed with "signifying nothing." It's complete meaninglessness, purposelessness, and it absolutely shows that Macbeth is going through an existential crisis.
Why is he going through an existential crisis? Because, well, I guess nothing is happening as it's supposed to. He's slowly but surely piecing together that the witches' prophecies—what he thought was fate, what he thought was guaranteeing a life for him—did no such thing. There was no point to any of it: there was no point to the death of Banquo, there was no point to the death of Macduff's family, there was no point to the death of King Duncan, there was no point to the death of his wife. All of it was a waste of time, because ultimately it's going to account for nothing. And so in terms of the theme of ambition here, this is arguably the biggest loss of ambition that he experiences, because he's just like: basically, what's the point of ambition? What's the point of wanting anything? What's the point of doing anything, because ultimately it's all meaningless?
So now you've got some amazing vocabulary that is going to help you take your Macbeth essays to the next level. Make sure you have a look at my other Macbeth videos for more help with this play, and don't forget, if you haven't already, hit like and subscribe.