The porter
May 10, 2025
The porter
The porter appears on the stage in a drunken stupor. His character serves as comic relief. There are hidden messages in the soliloquy
- adds unsettling humour to the soliloquy.
- knock, knock, knock. Macbeth knocking at the gates of his own hell abandoning his humanity for an evil or fiendish nature.
- ironically imagines himself to be the porter of the gate of hell “if a man were porter of hell-gate, he should have old turning the key.”
- he then imagines three people approaching the gates of hell
- A farmer who stored up grain in hope of making a profit but kills himself when a good harvest lowers the price
- an equivocator who covers up his crimes with the skill of his tongue
- a tailor who is discovered cheating his customers by cutting cloth out of the garment he sells
Macbeth’s sins
- These three characters represents a different sin that is in Macbeth.
- The farmer overreaches but loses everything instead
- The equivocator reveals how Macbeth is a skilful liar who pledges unfailing allegiance to the king yet murders him in cold blood
- the tailor makes the clothes look better than they are. Macbeth’s false aspirations for the crown he is essentially clothing himself in a lie
Ending
- He ends the soliloquy with the question “What are you?”
- The porter breaks the fourth wall, seeming to speak to the audience- asks us what one of the sinners we are.
- this line would have made the audience question their own morality
The porters last line “I pray you, remember the porter.” Perhaps a warning to the audience not to follow Macbeth’s traitorous exampleThe madness and humour in the porter’s speech amplify the horror of the play as a whole.