Lady Macbeth
16th century (fictional)
Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth, a character consumed by guilt who cannot wash imagined blood from her hands. Her obsessive hand-washing is one of literature's most powerful images of inescapable guilt.
Connection to Taylor Swift
Present through her most famous image, the bloodstain that will not wash out. Uncle Jerry and Angela hear Lady Macbeth behind loml, where the residue of a ruined love clings like guilt that cannot be scrubbed away. She belongs to the wider seam of Shakespearean borrowing that runs through the catalogue.
Notable Works
- Shakespeare's Macbeth
Appears in the Archive
Context within the Archive
Lady Macbeth — the blood stain
“Still alive, killing time at the cemetery Never quite buried”
Uncle Jerry compares the inability to bury this relationship, 'never quite buried', to Lady Macbeth's blood stain that can't be washed off, saying 'It's like that blood stain you can't wash off Lady Macbeth. It's just there all the time.' He uses this to illustrate the omnipresent, indelible nature of the relationship's memory.