In Act Three Scene Two, Macbeth is becoming increasingly unsettled by his own inauthenticity and hypocrisy before his friends at court, suggesting that he realises that he has destroyed their previous high regard in exchange for the transient power of a precariously held Kingship. Lady Macbeth attempts to soothe her husband’s agitation away with the direct plea, ‘ you must leave this,’ which imaginatively seems to fall short of his emotional need as he replies immediately,’ O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!’ This admission is shockingly vivid and intimately divulges the nightmarish horrors of Macbeth’s anguished consciousness. The ironic endearment, ‘dear wife’ reveals Macbeth’s desperation for reassurance and even the exorbitant ( literal and psychological) cost of such intimacy which has destroyed his equilibrium and honour. The vivid quality of the macabre image of the ‘scorpions’ crowding out everything in Macbeth’s mind brilliantly communicates the poisonous contamination of Macbeth’s fears about Banquo’s fate as well as his consuming guilt over Duncan. We sense that there is now a rupture in the intimacy between the murderous couple and that this gulf is represented in the disparity between Lady Macbeth’s trite platitudes like ‘leave this’ and the abject terrors conjured up by Macbeth’s feverish, scorpion filled imagination.
Excellent analysis of this brilliant extract. The nightmarish scorpion image reminded me of Cleopatra, feeding herself most delicious poison – but with the Macbeth’s, sensuality is absent, overpowered by the solipsism of mental torment. As you suggest, this is no basis for marital contentment!