The Fine Line Between 

"Insane" and "in a Valiant Fury"

        It's interesting how many of these Macbeth blog posts, looking back, pertain to evaluations of the sanity of various characters. Is Macbeth or Banquo more sane? (answer: Banquo) Is Macbeth a good man? (answer: he used to be...) Is Lady Macbeth sane? (answer: far, far, far from it) Who's the sane one now? (answer: neither Macbeth nor Lady Macbeth, nor anyone voluntarily staying in their kingdom, for that matter) How did Macbeth lose his former, sane self? (answer: by compromising his moral values). I find myself inclined to venture that one theme of this play, other than “appearances are deceiving”, may be that murder drives the murderer and everyone around him (or her, as Lady Macbeth had originally intended, though she didn't) utterly insane. Now we are drawing nigh to the conclusion of Macbeth, and ***SPOILER ALERT*** to his dramatic defeat and downfall and the mounting of his head on Malcolm's battlements (an ironic twist paying pointed homage to Macbeth's mounting of the former rebellion leader's head on Duncan's battlements) (yes, I have read again now. I just can't not. It doesn't feel right not knowing in advance what will happen...). I had to mark this spoiler alert because it just annoys me when people don’t properly mark spoiler alerts. Anyways--END SPOILER ALERT you can read safely again now.
        We have come to Macbeth’s sixth soliloquy, having heard the musings of several of the thanes who have jumped off of his cruel and sinking ship to the safe shore of Malcolm's English army. One of these, Caithness, informed us that, "some say [Macbeth]'s mad; others that lesser hate him do call it valiant fury."And so we once more turn to a debate of Macbeth's sanity. I do not believe Macbeth is sane in any way, shape, or form. This said, I do think that it's a combination of the two that's driving him. In his 6th soliloquy, he does sort of sound more towards valiant fury. He would even sound sane if the soliloquy were taken on its own. He sounds like a saddened but noble king watching his kingdom slip from his grasp when he says, "I am sick at heart... my way of life is fall'n into the sere (from side-notes: "the (condition of being) dry and withered")". He sounds bitter and spiteful but not crazy when he says, "that which should accompany old age, as honor, love, obedience, troops of friends, I must not look to have, but in their stead, curses... [and] mouth-honor [lip service]". He sounds most like he's in a valiant fury when he says shortly after his soliloquy, "I'll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked. Give me my armor." This makes him sound brave and fierce, like a good warrior ready to go out swinging. These all seem to become a noble and valiant king whose kingdom is being prised from his grasp by rebellions. In some measure, he is motivated by this brave anger.
        Yet when we look at the context surrounding them, we see how unwound Macbeth really is. Just before his soliloquy, he creatively and repeatedly insults a servant, who has only come to deliver news, for no apparent reason. He comes up with some colorful insults, calling the servant "whey-face", "cream-faced loon", "villain", "lily-livered boy", and "patch", asking him "where got'st thou that goose-look?", telling him to "go prick thy face", and informing him, "those linen cheeks of thine are counsellors to fear." The very moment the poor message-bearer enters Macbeth greets him, "the devil damn thee", a very polite greeting sane people often give their servants (not), and when the servant is attempting to report to Macbeth, he gets as far as "there is ten thousand--" when Macbeth extreemley impatiently cuts him off and sneers at him "geese?" (which is even more insulting considering what it can mean in Shakespearean) like a hyperactive and inattentive, rude young child, throwing in another insult in addition to rudely interrupting important news the unlucky boy is bringing what is supposed to be his venerable king. Finally, Macbeth thanks him for delivering the report by wishing him, “death of thy soul” and dismissing him, “take thy face hence.” Macbeth seems very cheery (not)! Macbeth insults the servant all these times and still more in the space of a mere eleven lines, including those lines in which the servant attempts to speak. Macbeth is clearly revealing how stressed, disturbed, angry, destroyed, and totally off his rocker he truly is. I could understand classifying Macbeth as sane were it only based upon his 6th soliloquy, but one cannot look at this flat-out ridiculous and over-the-top, completely unprovoked and purposeless bullying of a humble and polite servant and think of Macbeth as anything but either filled “from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty” as Lady Macbeth previously asked to be, or else entirely and utterly consumed with insanity and irreprievably psychotic. He is lost in hatred and overtaken by madness.
        Throughout his soliloquy, Macbeth is calling wildly for his servant, Seyton (the pronunciation of which I wonder about, and if it is pronounced how I think it might be--that is, say-ten--then I wonder if there is some subtle meaning behind it), as if he can’t even focus on what he’s saying to himself. So whilst he’s saying those things that make him sound like a noble and poignant king, a righteously bitter man, and a warrior in a valiant fury, all the while he’s not focusing on what he’s saying and he’s calling belligerently for his servant to demand news and then to neither listen to nor pay attention to the servant for whom he bade. Macbeth has learned to be a good actor since his murder of Duncan, but as more things are falling apart in his life, so too his ruse is disintegrating about him, and his inner madness is shining through. There may well be some motivation of valiant fury, but it is a minisculely marginal degree. Beyond the violet mist, we are watching one after another fall to the all-consuming grasp of insanity as the tragedy we are so intently regarding draws nigh to its close.