40- Hysteria

On the other hand, the attempt to wash away the bloodstain evokes both the blood of murder and the menstrual blood of femininity. In Studies on Hysteria, Freud sees the compulsive act of washing hands as the hysterical perception of sex as something dirty. Lady Macbeth's compulsive act brings together, in the same gesture, a desire to eliminate the mark of death, of femininity, and of sexual act. Because, let's not forget, extinguishing the femininity of her body means not having to submit, not having to surrender to the sexual act, not having to bear its consequences, neither during nor after pregnancy. Lady Macbeth seems, at first glance, to love her husband so much that, she is willing to do anything to help him achieve his ambition. However, her compulsive act of washing the bloodstain reveals a deeper fear and disgust towards sex and its consequences. By eliminating the blood, she is trying to erase the physical reminder of femininity and the sexual act.

Freud's interpretation of the act of washing hands as a hysterical perception of sex as dirty suggests that Lady Macbeth is hiding a deep-seated fear and anxiety towards her own sexuality. She sees the act of sex as something that dirties and taints her, and by extension, femininity itself. By washing away the blood, she is attempting to rid herself of this perceived dirtiness.

Furthermore, Lady Macbeth's refusal to bear the consequences of the sexual act, such as pregnancy, highlights her desire to maintain control and power. In a patriarchal society, pregnancy often reduces a woman's independence and agency, as she becomes primarily responsible for the care and upbringing of children. By eradicating the reminder of femininity and the sexual act, Lady Macbeth hopes to avoid this loss of control and autonomy.

In this interpretation, Lady Macbeth's love for her husband is intertwined with her fear and rejection of femininity and the sexual act. It is a love that is driven by a desire for power and control, rather than a genuine emotional connection. Her actions and motivations are complex, reflecting the societal pressures and anxieties surrounding femininity and sexuality during Shakespeare's time.On the other hand, the attempt to wash away the blood stain evokes both the blood of the homicide and the menstrual blood of femininity. In Studies on Hysteria, Freud sees the compulsive act of washing hands as the hysteric's perception of sex as something dirty. This compulsive act of Lady Macbeth combines, in the same gesture, a desire to eliminate the mark of death, femininity, and the sexual act. Because, let's not forget, extinguishing her femininity means not having to submit, to give herself to the sexual act, not having to endure its consequences, not during or after pregnancy. Lady Macbeth seems, at first glance, to love her husband so much that she is capable of annihilating herself to fulfill the vilest desires of man's power. But, we believe that's not the case. By annihilating her sex, she doesn't have to give her female body to her husband, she doesn't have to sacrifice herself. And that's why, following Bataille in the sense he gives to the term sacrifice, we believe that Lady Macbeth doesn't sacrifice herself, she annihilates herself, annihilates her entire being because she fears being devoured by overwhelming pleasure.

There is no clash with the husband's body, there is no conjugal bed in Shakespeare's work. There is only a deathbed, a violent death of the symbolic father. The bed loses its sense of being a place of sleep, love, and birth, ceasing to possess its sense of sacred center, as affirmed by Chevalier and Gheerbrant. The bed acquires, in the play, a place of sinister experience with the real, not a sacred place of sacred office or sacrifice. The character who lies down, who sleeps and dreams the sleep of the innocent, is King Duncan. Macbeths are always awake on stage, conspiring while the innocent sleep. Sleepwalkers, they wander through the castle, unable to give themselves to the bed, to sleep, or to the delights of horizontality, of lying in peace. The bed, in its mythical sense, is the meeting place of eroticism and violence. Field of seduction, but also of solution, the bed leads us on a journey that goes from sexual experience to death. But, in both, contact with the real is mediated by the symbolic. On the contrary, the bed of the Macbeth couple is only a space of nightmares and bloody conspiracy. The mythical and sacred function of the marital bed as a space of sacred office does not exist in Macbeth.

What does Lady Macbeth want? What is her pleasure? To the viewer, her husband's pleasure seems clearer. The man gradually fulfills his desires one by one: to be Lord of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and, finally, to be King. Everything he has longed for, he obtains as if by magic. Like a child, he sees all his desires fulfilled and has as his collaborator a powerful woman who is capable of anything to satisfy his bloodiest desires. But things are not as simple as they seem. If everything Macbeth has desired appears in the Real, the result will be a Macbeth King ascended to the highest tower, but defeated. We call upon Trias again in his analysis of Vertigo, as his reading of Scottie fits perfectly with that of Macbeth. Let's listen:

"The subject among us is powerful, is free: he has ascended to the tower, he has embodied his dream, he has achieved his reality. But the result of this is sinister. (Is that not what is sinister, the fulfillment in the real of a dream that ultimately reveals itself as a nightmare?) What we see is a defeated Scottie. Defeated by his own power, by his own freedom, by his own accomplishment."

On the other hand, Lady Macbeth, by becoming a great goddess, desires to occupy that place of ultimate power. She desires to be Everything, not to submit to anything or anyone. But gradually, from one scene to another, we see how the King of Scotland no longer needs the support of his former companion in greatness to perpetrate his crimes. Lady Macbeth, the delirious one, the sleepwalker, no longer matters to him. He ignores her, despises her, distances himself from his former and loyal squire. Her husband no longer looks at her, Macbeth's eyes only reflect death. "The gaze is the modality of the presence of the death drive in the imaginary, it is the deadly edge of the mirror beyond joy. The Other is the death that looks." Lady Macbeth plunges into a well of disillusionment, weariness, and madness.

Barbara: nothing, nothing can be achieved! Woe is me if, at a tremendous price, the achievement of a desire is finally attained without pleasure or joy. It is more secure to perish as a victim of angry hands than to be its sacrificer, thus craving the vain image of joy. After annihilating her femininity, seeing her husband immerse himself in immoderate ambitions without summoning her anymore, realizing that her nest is empty and the crown without heirs, Lady Macbeth succumbs. There is no satisfaction, contentment, or joy. In the end, she becomes the victim of her own angry hand. Suicide appears as the last way out for a fallen goddess. What a wrench this character produces in the viewer, what pain and fascination! Lady Macbeth succumbs to nothingness, sinks into her empty nest, condemned to the abyss. Nothing and no one emerges to shelter her, to hold her. Only the longed-for death can open its claws for its final embrace: "Desire will only find it, at the limit, in an action that culminates in death."