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Macbeth Essay

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The tragedy "Macbeth" by William Shakespeare examines the deadly consequences of excessive ambition. The play was originally performed in 1606 as a memorial to King James and to warn people about betraying him through lying or regicide. The meaning of this tragedy is still relevant to modern audiences because of the cautionary lesson it tells about the tragic hero's collapse, despite its numerous specific connections to King James. The plot of Macbeth illustrates how the continuous quest for status and power will ultimately result in moral deterioration and catastrophic outcomes. The story of Macbeth focuses attention on the corrupting effect of power that results from uncontrolled ambition. After his first encounter with the witches, Macbeth's …show more content…

He decides to kill Banquo because his conscience starts to fail and he starts to develop paranoia over the prophecy that says Banquo "shalt have kings." He accomplishes this without requiring Lady Macbeth's help, even going so far as to conceal his goals from her by telling her to "be innocent of the knowledge dearest Chuck." There is a shift in the dynamic between these characters as evidenced by Macbeth's paternal tone and the term of endearment he employs to speak to his wife. She had criticized him earlier in the play for having a "heart so white," a metaphor that emphasized her vulnerability to ambition. Nevertheless, he is now capable of murder for his cause without his wife's influence. After the deed is completed, Macbeth's guilty conscience reappears as Banquo's ghost, to which he sobs in front of his large party, "Thou canst not say I did it. Never shake thy gory locks at me.” This aside's devastating phrasing emphasizes Macbeth's ability to continue seeing the wickedness of his deeds. He acknowledges that he has "in blood stepped in so far that, should [he] wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o'er." despite his conscience, he said. His use of metaphors illustrates how his crumbling conscience, driven by his constant thirst for power and need to avoid punishment, justifies his following

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He does not want to do the dirty work himself because it will look bad on his part, so he hires murderers to kill Banquo. With the killing of Banquo, Macbeth says “Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold Thou hast no speculation in those eyes.” The murder of Banquo gets to him to a point where he starts hallucinating and seeing ghost of Banquo.

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Lady Macbeth orders a servant to fetch Macbeth and before he arrives, she bemoans “Naught’s had, all’s spent, Where our desire is got without content,” indicating that even though she has gotten everything she wants, Lady Macbeth is still not happy because she had to kill to get what she wanted. According to Edith Whitehurst Williams, Lady Macbeth has “a conscience far from dead” that is seen in how she is not happy despite having the power she wanted, since the means of obtaining that power were unsavory (Williams 222). Once Macbeth arrives, Lady Macbeth consults him, advising that “what’s done is done,” meaning that Duncan is dead and their plan is through, so he does not need to do anything more or kill anyone else (3.2.12). Macbeth can sense that Lady Macbeth will not advocate for any more murders and therefore he “does not make her a party to the murder of Banquo” (Williams 222) and so when Lady Macbeth tells him to “sleek o’er your rugged looks”(3.2.27) in order to stop him from his planning of further murders, he simply agrees. At the banquet where Macbeth sees Banquo’s ghost, after everyone has left, Macbeth is talking about how he has more schemes to kill people, it is seen that Lady Macbeth’s “dedications to evil… [are] not going to sustain her”(Williams 222).

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