Act 4 — Macbeth — AQA GCSE English Literature 8702
AQA GCSE English Literature · 8702
Act 4
The plot, part by part
What you need to know
The apparitions, the murder of Macduff's family, and Malcolm testing Macduff in England.
Key quotations: 'Double, double toil and trouble', 'By the pricking of my thumbs', 'beware Macduff', 'none of woman born / Shall harm Macbeth', 'Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill', 'The very firstlings of my heart shall be / The firstlings of my hand', 'He loves us not', 'Bleed, bleed, poor country!', 'the king-becoming graces', 'All my pretty ones?', 'But I must also feel it as a man'.
Equivocation in the apparitions' promises, and Malcolm's test of Macduff as a lesson in kingship.
