Note 35 — PART II Literary Section (continued 3)

One notes the emptiness of this passage. She could scarcely have said much less, if she wished to comfort him. And yet this passage is always quoted by those authors who accept love on the part of Lady Macbeth for her husband as the driving motive for her action. Indeed, Friedrich Theodor Vischer himself does not shrink from an interpolation and translates the passage: Lady Macbeth (“caressingly”)—“Come, come, my noble lord, remove thy wrinkles, smooth thy gloomy brow, be jovial this evening, well-disposed toward thy guests.” And although the original English text contains no word for “caressingly,” yet Vischer gives this commentary: “His wife's answer to him must be spoken on the stage with an altogether tender accent. She embraces him and strokes his forehead.” (Shakespeare-Vorträge, Vol. 2, pp. 36, 102.)