Comment on male/female roles and expectations in Macbeth.

In Macbeth, men are at the top of the
Great Chain of Being, women at the bottom.  Here's the order at the beginning of the
play:

1. Duncan (King); 2. Malcolm (Prince); 3. Donalbain;
4. Macbeth; 5.  Banquo

So, this is clearly a patriarchy,
with males as Kings, Princes, and warriors.  Men fought in battle and women stayed
home.

Of the women, Lady Macbeth is ranked highest, but
still she is fairly low in order of importance.  Women's roles were domestic: to be good
hostesses and make babies.  Lady Macbeth is terrible at both.  She completely resents
her domestic role: she wants to be a warrior, or at least achieve the status of warrior.
 She doesn't want to be a man, but she definitely resents being a woman.  She
says:

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Come, you
spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex
me here,
And fill me from the crown to the
toe top-full
Of direst cruelty! make thick my
blood;
Stop up the access and passage to
remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of
nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace
between
The effect and it! Come to my woman's
breasts,
And take my milk for
gall, you murdering ministers,
Wherever in
your sightless substances
You wait on nature's
mischief!

So,
convincing Macbeth of murder is about the closest way for Lady Macbeth to get on the
"battlefield" and achieve status in this society.

The
lowest ranked, of course, are the witches.  Even if you consider them not supernatural,
just old hags, they are still at the bottom.  They are the equivalent of homeless
beggars or mentally ill patients.

But, after Macbeth kills
Duncan, Lady Macbeth becomes a queen and the witches become his advisors.  Though we
don't see the socio-economic benefits for these women, their status is clearly risen
after the toppling of the earlier patriarchal stratus.