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The passage in Macbeth, one of William Shakespeare’s most famous plays, where Lady Macbeth, the wife of the main protagonist, is fantasizing about motherhood and infanticide, can be interpreted differently. In traditional interpretations, most of the scholars ascribe her expressions about the topic, to the main “unsex me here”-theme. Because this is the quote, which is the best proof to show how Lady Macbeth tries to mobilize her masculine powers to support the political goal of her husband. But these expressions are more than that. Stephanie Chamberlain, who is a associate professor for English at Southeast Missouri State University, Cape Girardeau argues in her work “Fantasizing Infanticide: Lady Macbeth and the Murdering Mother in Early Modern England” ,which was published in 2002, that there can be seen a lot more in Lady Macbeth’s utterances. According to her, the lines including Lady Macbeth’s act one fantasy about motherhood and infanticide express the power mothers have in general, on the one hand because of their ability to break the patrilineal and through that have more political influence than they should have by this act, on the other hand because of their influence on their child in education and the connected communication of values. The following essay will figure out the main themes and thesis of Chamberlain, will give arguments to support it, and tries to give background information and explanations why this discussion nowadays loses importance.

For the beginning, let’s have a look on William Shakespeare’s drama itself. Macbeth was written around the year 1606 and although it is a fiction drama, there are historical facts about the historic King Macbeth and the, at this time in England and Scotland actual present, King Jacob I. included. The plot is about the army commander Macbeth who rises to the King of Scotland by a complot, later changes to a tyrant and finally his fall. After winning the final battle of King Duncan’s troops against the troops of the Norwegian King Sweno who were supported by the rebelling former Thane of Cawdor, Banquo and Macbeth, the two commanders of the troops, were called back home. The King ordered them to his castle and wants to thank them and make Macbeth, former Thane of Glemis, to the new Thane of Cawdor. On the way back home from the battlefield, the two meet three witches who prophesy them that Macbeth will be Thane of Cawdor and King of Scotland and that Banquo will be the father or father’s father of future kings. After the first prophecy fulfils, Macbeth starts to ponder. He tells his wife who is completely gripped by ambition and excited about the idea of Macbeth becoming king. So under her pressure they plan the murder of the King, which leads to the statement by Lady Macbeth about the

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infanticide “I have given suck, and know how tender ´tis to love the babe that milks me: I would, while it was smiling in my face, have pluck’d the nipple from his boneless gums, and dash’d the brains out, had I sworn as you have done to this” (Shakespeare 1.7.54-58). This is the statement Chamberlains work is about. After the deed is done by the Macbeths, while the King stays at their castle, and Macbeth stabbed him to death at night, Macduff, another English nobleman is visiting them. He detects the murdered King and in the trouble which now is in the castle, Macbeth strikes the two valets of the King dead, pretending that they bear the blame. But this action makes Macduff mistrustful. The sons of the King flee to England and Ireland because they are in fear that the suspicion is on them. Macbeth is crowned as the new King. But he is in fear because of the prophecy of the witches who told that Banquo will be the patrilineal ancestor of the future Kings. So he sends two murderers to kill Banquo and his son Fleance. But Fleance escapes and Macbeth gets visions from the ghost of Banquo which make him very suspicious. Because of the visions, Macbeth decides to meet the witches again to request them to forecast him his further destiny. The witches summon three apparitions. The first one, a cut head, warns him to take care with Macduff, the second one, a bloody child tells him, that no woman born child can cause harm to him and the third one, a crowned child with a tree in his hands tells him that he has not to be in fear of anything unless the forest of Birnan comes up to Dunsinaine castle. That appeased him, but he still wants to know whether Banquo’s descendents will be kings. So the witches show him a apparitation where eight people, dressed like kings, are walking in a row. The last one is Banquo and it is clear that the first ones are descendents of him. After Macbeth was told that Macduff had fled to England to build a rebellious host to fight him, he ordered the murder on Macduff’s wife and children, which finally leads to the war. Macbeth more and more becomes a tyrant, his wife becomes mad and finally takes her own life. The approaching troops hide themselves behind branches from the forest, so Macbeth believes that this part of the prophecy is becoming true. After they entered the castle it comes to the final fight between Macduff and Macbeth, which ends with Macduff beating Macbeth and decollating him. After this, Malcolm becomes the new King of Scotland.

In her work, Chamberlain focuses on the declaration by Lady Macbeth, who says that she would rather smash the skull of a nursling to reach the unachievable goal than to fail. Traditionally interpreted as a sign of support and attempt to strengthen Macbeth’s conviction, Chamberlain starts a completely new discussion figuring out the point of maternity and the

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given influence of mothers. She argues that Lady Macbeth tries to get her power from motherhood here, and searches for more power and influence, over the masculinity and also over her husband. The power of mothers was an important conflict in Early Modern England. There was a constant fear of mothers in the society, because they are in the position to have influence on the patrilineal row of offspring. In these times a woman easily was able to break succession by defalcation or infanticide. Of course the science was not as far as today. Paternity tests were not invented yet, and so the fathers, or rather all the people who were connected to the family had to believe the mothers that their baby has really the patriarch as his father. Today, all relative relations are easily controlled by medical tests which are able to give a person the one hundred percent insurance that a child is a descendant of himself. This makes the discussion dispensable and also belittles the given fear of being deceived in the question of fatherhood. So the mothers had a big power because of their monopoly position on the transmission of patrilineage. In the play this power is expressed by the initiated murder on the King and the connected break of patrilineage. Of course the discussion about whether Lady Macbeth, Macbeth or both initiated the murder and do now bear responsibility is a big one and leads seldom to a conclusion which is acceptable for both arguing parties, but you have to say that Lady Macbeth bears a big part of it. Mothers were viewed in the New Modern Age very controversial. On the one hand, they were praised for their “selfless devotion to their children” (Chamberlain 73), on the other hand they were simultaneously “condemned for harming the innocents entrusted to their care” (Chamberlain 73). This means that a mother is not only a danger for the correct patrilineal succession, she can also represent a bad influence on the development of the child’s mind, his behavior and his moral and ethical values. In most of the cases, the mother is the main attachment figure, which makes her to the person with the most influence on the child. So the conclusion is, that if the mother is of a naughty nature, the child will adopt her characteristics. According to Chamberlain who draws upon some modern Behaviorists, it even is a bad decision to give the baby to a wet-nurse. But in New Modern England this was an established practice. But wet-nurses often do their jobs just for economic reasons and are not situated well. So they are doing their job reluctantly and with a feeling of annoyance. But if the mother would have done the nursing by herself, the bad influence would also have been there, because natural mothers had the annoyance for other reasons. Nursing was objected as troublesome and that it makes oneself look old. During this time there was a great refusal against it. As a last solution for an unwilling maternity, there is the infanticide. This way was only taken by the most desperate and economically worst situated mothers and