Macbeth’s soliloquy at the end of the play is filled with angst and desperation. The metaphors and similes throughout this monolog clearly express this. The metaphor,”Out, out brief candle,” shows his personal suffering and request for the end to come. The simile,”Life is but a walking shadow”, signifies that our existence has no lasting impression on the surrounding world. The final excerpt,“It is a tale told by an idiot full of sound, and fury, signifying nothing,” is the most impactful portion of the speech where Shakespeare shows the truth hidden in Macbeth's struggle. Time and again Macbeth attempts to make his dreams a reality. Through Macbeth’s failures, Shakespeare is telling us life is meaningless and futile.
The opening scene of the play lays the groundwork for the concept of life being predestined and
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He goes to the witches, the individuals responsible for his future. At this point, he is beginning his decline and is desperate to make some sort of change. When Macbeth goes to the witches to learn his fate, they summon up apparitions to deliver their messages. The first apparition warns Macbeth to beware Macduff, but the second one tells Macbeth to "Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn / The power of man, for none of woman born / Shall harm Macbeth" (4.1.81). After hearing their message Macbeth decides he is going to kill Macduff in order to make sure that fate keeps its promise and does not change. It may have just promised that no man of woman born can harm Macbeth, but it has also told him to beware Macduff, and he's afraid that fate is fooling with him. By this point, he has become a crazed individual so consumed with his feeling of hopelessness that he also decides to murder Macduff's innocent wife and child. These are the deeds of a man with no passion. Yet he still does not fully understand why he feels this