Beyond Mr. Darcy: Romantic Historical Fiction discussion
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Lady Macbeth
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June 2013 Group Read: Lady Macbeth
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1. What did you already know about Gruadh and Macbeth before reading Lady Macbeth?
2. When Gruadh meets Macbeth for the first time she tells him she would never marry him because “men intent on destroying each other cannot make very good husbands” (page 49). How was her initial reaction correct? How was it inaccurate?
3. Catriona was Gruadh's “womb-woman,” but later their relationship changed. How? Did they ever restore their friendship? Why or why not? What would you have done?
4. What is the story of Deirdre? How did it relate to Gruadh's own fate (page 190)?
I haven't started reading Lady Macbeth yet but I'm glad you are posting discussion question again!
Mod
Yes I know I have been slacking a bit lately and I am very sorry for that. I am going to be more on top of things starting now. I have put up the rest of this year's books and I know some of them are quite good and newish. Hopefully that will draw more people in. We are also advertising heavily for the summer reading program (which if you haven't done before at the library you definitely need to April).
I have done the reading program every for the last 6 or 7 years. I also have enrolled the girls I nanny for every since they turned 3. This will be T (7) 4th year and 2nd year she will be reading the books herself and A(5) 2nd year and we will focusing on pre reader skills(phonics, rhyming and sight words).
Started reading yesterday. My answer to question 1 is not much. I have seen Shakespeare's play and that is it.
Mod
1. I knew very little about Macbeth and Lady Macbeth before reading the book. I knew a little bit about Shakespeare's play but had never read it. I had read Susan King's Queen Hereafter: A Novel of Margaret of Scotland before and Lady Macbeth made an appearance in that as well. I do recommend if you liked this book to try that one.
2. Gruadh was correct in her initial reaction in that Macbeth's life was cut short and left her alone to deal with Malcolm. Not to mention Macbeth had killed her first husband leaving her a pregnant teenage widow. However, I believe that Macbeth was a good husband to her for the time. Many men of the time would have frowned on a woman wanting to fight like a man and would have set aside a woman who could not bear children, but Macbeth did right by Gruadh in my opinion and raised up her son by her first marriage as his heir.
3. Catriona and Gruadh's relationship changed when Gruadh found out what Catriona meant to Macbeth. It was unclear to me if their friendship was ever restored but I think they came to a place of mutual respect. I know I would not have handled the betrayal as gracefully as Gruadh did, but I think such things were expected during that time period more so than they are today.
4. The parallels between Deirdre's story and Rue's are that both married men who met with the king's wrath, both were very passionate women, and both experienced heartbreak when their husbands died in battle.
2. Gruadh was correct in her initial reaction was correct in the fact that Macbeth's ambition led to his own early death and also caused him to kill her 1st husbands. Her initial reaction was inaccurate because Macbeth did turn out to a good husband to her. He raised her son as his own, respected he wish to be a warrior in her own right and truly loved her.
Catriona and Grudah relationship changed when Grudah when she learn of the relationship between Macbeth and Catriona. I think they did restore their friend eventually. I think I would have reacted in a similar way as Grudah IG I lived in the same time period.
Mod
I think that it probably helped to restore their friendship that Gruadh did not have a great deal of female companionship to begin with, other than her servants. Moray seemed pretty isolated and she had moved away from her family.
I agree Grudah did seem isolated and definitely had more male friends, even when she was younger.
daughter to a prince, a wife twice over, a queen
as well. I have fought with sword and bow, and
struggled fierce to bear my babes into this world.
I have loved deeply and hated deeply, too.
Lady Gruadh, called Rue, is the last female descendent of Scotland’s most royal line. Married to a powerful northern lord, she is widowed while still carrying his child and forced to marry her husband’s murderer: a rising war-lord named Macbeth. Encountering danger from Vikings, Saxons, and treacherous Scottish lords, Rue begins to respect the man she once despised–and then realizes that Macbeth’s complex ambitions extend beyond the borders of the vast northern region. Among the powerful warlords and their steel-games, only Macbeth can unite Scotland–and his wife’s royal blood is the key to his ultimate success.
Determined to protect her small son and a proud legacy of warrior kings and strong women, Rue invokes the ancient wisdom and secret practices of her female ancestors as she strives to hold her own in a warrior society. Finally, side by side as the last Celtic king and queen of Scotland, she and Macbeth must face the gathering storm brought on by their combined destiny.
From towering crags to misted moors and formidable fortresses, Lady Macbeth transports readers to the heart of eleventh-century Scotland, painting a bold, vivid portrait of a woman much maligned by history.