In Shakespeare's era, women possessed few political and private rights. Renaissance women were expected to remain silent, avoid political discussions, and stick to the duties of their husbands' households. Men were considered higher morally, intellectually, and physically, and women were subjugated to the will of men. Men were also considered more ambitious, firm, decisive, lucid, and refined than women of the time. In Macbeth, this world of male-dominance is both displayed and challenged through the characters of Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Macduff, and Lady Macduff-the text introduces two opposite realities which lead to the question of what it means to be a man.
             In the beginning of the play, before Duncan's murder, Macbeth is portrayed as a very masculine character-at least by the soldiers from the battlefield. Duncan refers to him as a "valiant cousin" and "worthy gentleman" (1.2.24) who, according to the Captain, "with his brandished steel/Which smoked with bloody execution,/Like Valour's minion carved out his passage..." (1.2.17-19). Macbeth's manliness cannot be questioned on the battlefield; Duncan and his men have no reason to suspect Macbeth of anything.
             Macbeth's marriage to Lady Macbeth is a unique one, because of an evident reversal of gender roles. Lady Macbeth could not have been any more manly without actually being a man. It is clear that if Lady Macbeth hadn't influenced Macbeth in the way she did, Duncan's murder never would have occurred. Lady Macbeth manipulates Macbeth by questioning his manhood, and asks the gods to "unsex [her] here/And fill [her] from the crown to the toe topfull/Of direst cruelty..." (1.5.39-41). In the same way Lady Macbeth questions Macbeth's manhood to persuade him to kill, Macbeth questions the manhood of Banquo's murderers. Lady Macbeth undoubtedly provides the brains and will behind her hus...