Macbeth's Transformation

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The play Macbeth, by William Shakespeare, is a play which, through the protagonist’s interaction with many divergent characters, explores the weakening of a tragic hero. The main character, Macbeth, was depicted as a man of dignity and bravery. However, farther into the play, Shakespeare shows a shocking change in character through the beginning to end in which Hamlet was first seen as a hero before he distorted into an evil tormenter. At the beginning of the play, Shakespeare depicted Macbeth as a Scottish hero. In Act 1, Scene 2, Macbeth is described in a battle as “brave”. The captain even says, “For brave Macbeth—well he deserves that name/ Disdaining fortune, with his brandished steel/ Which smoked with bloody execution” (1.2.18-20).