Blood Imagery: Macbeth’s Blood Imagery breathes life into a story. Imagery of a play circulates the flow and pushes the tempo until the last note beats. William Shakespeare uses the image of blood being poisoned by greed in “Macbeth”. Blood imagery traces the transformation of once valiant Macbeth and how he leaves a trail of red leading down to his end as a greedy and evil tyrant. Bravery, reason, and respect are in Macbeth’s blood, but it fuels his effusive ambition, eventually leading to the first drops of blood on his hands. Macbeth always fights for his king, even facing the deadliest of foes directly. He is known as “brave Macbeth (well he deserves that name)…” (I, ii, 18), which means he is respected, not to mention that he is such a great warrior, that “his brandished steel… [is] smoked with bloody execution…” (I, ii, 19-20). He learns that he may be king in the future, but obstacles arise. Lady Macbeth suggests “removing” those obstacles in order for his prophecy to come true. The last thread of his chivalry on his coat of arms gives him the wisdom to know better than such deeds. He says that if they kill someone, the law of equivalent exchange will force the same fate on them. “Bloody instructions… return to plague th’inventor” (I, vii, 9-10). Macbeth has the chance to prevent the wound or fall and leave a scrape, allowing more blood to escape a wound he could prevent. Macbeth turns to bloodshed to achieve his ambition and trips, foolishly falling into bloody hands of regret, while having to inevitably suffer from guilt. Macbeth is waiting with a heat-oppressed brain, even before the murder. He waits outside King Duncan’s room, knowing full well that this act is foolish. As if speaking to Duncan, he can “see thee still, and, on thy blade and dudgeon, gouts of blood, which was not so before. There’s no such thing. It is the bloody business which informs thus to mine eyes” (II, I, 57-61). Macbeth begins to numb, transforming into a stained and marked man. In the last moments of his “pure” self, he begins to reflect on the life he will lead as a man with blood that will never wash away… “Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood clean from his hand?” (II, ii, 78-79). Macbeth will live with a ruined life while dragging his guilt behind him. The blood imagery intensifies as Macbeth’s transformation into an evil tyrant has weaved and sewed its way to a close. The blood will never cease and his transformation to greed is nearly complete. Too much blood has been shed. He is a