Macbeth Quote Analysis

As Macbeth and Lady Macbeth enter as king and queen, Lady Macbeth publicly praises Banquo's importance, saying that forgetting to invite him to the feast would have been a serious error.

Lady Macbeth describes Banquo's absence as a 'gap,' a spatial void that would mar the feast's completeness. The word is jarring because it shifts the register from social courtesy to architectural flaw, as if Banquo were a structural element holding up their legitimacy. This reveals the performative anxiety beneath their new power: they need Banquo's presence to look like legitimate rulers, even as they plan his death.

Support a thesis that the Macbeths' public performance of hospitality is inseparable from their paranoia—this line shows they rely on the very people they fear to validate their stolen crown.