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Overcoming Ambitions In Macbeth And The Odyssey

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Ambitions are strong desires to do or achieve something, typically requiring determination and hard work.(Oxford Dictionaries, 2018) In Macbeth by William Shakespeare, and The Odyssey by Homer, both protagonists, Macbeth and Odysseus overcome obstacles on the pathway to chase their goals. Although Macbeth and Odysseus want completely different things, they share a similar drive, that they use to reach their goals. Odysseus wants to return home to Ithaca and visit Telemachus, his son, and Penelope, his wife, after 10 years of being away. He has a lot of things going on, and many challenges that can be distracting but at the end of the day he knows that he has to be focusing on getting home to his family. "I drove them, all three wailing, to the ships,/ tied them down under their rowing benches,/ and called the rest: All hands aboard/ come, clear the beach and no one taste/ the Lotus, or you lose your hope of home./ Filing in to their places by the rowlocks/ my oarsmen dipped their long oars in the surf,/ and we moved out again on our seafaring."(9.105-109) The ambition that Odysseus has makes him realize that being home with his family is what he really wants to do and that he needs to put …show more content…

Macbeth uses his ambition to chase his dream of being king of Scotland but it affects him in more of a negative way than a positive way. In Macbeth, ambition can be a good thing but at the

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