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The killing of the king in macbeth
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Macbeth killed King Duncan and many other people so he would become king. According to the play Lady Macbeth told Macbeth,”When you durst do it, then you were a man; And to be more than what you were, you would Be so much more the man.” She commented on his manhood to manipulate him into making an irrational decision. He took that prophecy seriously and wanted to be king by any means possible no matter who had to get hurt. Macbeth knew his time was coming
As king Duncan will be visiting Macbeth’s domain, lady Macbeth sees and opportunity that cannot be passed, to kill king Duncan in his sleep. Her greed and ambition far surpasses Macbeth’s, and she persuades him to conspire against the king. Macbeth hesitates and thinks long and hard, but when Duncan declares that his son will be the next king instead of
Starting off with Macbeth, he is given the option to either Kill Duncan and become the new king or let things go the way they are. Macbeth personally is hesitant about this decision and believes that this will ruin his reputation and he will also in a sense betray his king as he was a soldier before. However, this does not satisfy his wife, Lady Macbeth
Although he is powerful and dominant, he has a lust for more and becomes impatient for the time he will be crowned king. Anxious for the possibility of becoming royalty, Macbeth’s wife, Lady Macbeth encourages Macbeth to take control and murder King Duncan while he is visiting Macbeth in his castle. Although Macbeth hesitates at first, he is compelled to be forceful to guarantee that he becomes king. Macbeth’s character is transformed from a faithful protector of King Duncan to a hysteric murderer when he kills King Duncan during his stay in Macbeth’s own home.
Macbeth gives many reasons as to why he does not want to kill Duncan. One reason he does not want to kill Duncan is because he is afraid of getting caught. He says that if he does kill Duncan, he needs to do it quickly because killing the king would be dangerous. Another reason he is hesitant to kill Duncan is because he is his kinsman. He feels like he will be going against a lot of rules by harming his guest.
In play Macbeth, Shakespeare reveals that an individual’s great desire for power will lead him/her to perform consequential deeds that will scar his/her conscience and change the outcome of his/her life eternally. Macbeth is informed by three witches that he is going to become king and this initiates Macbeth’s thought of becoming powerful. Macbeth doesn’t act on his thoughts until he tells his wife, Lady Macbeth, that he could become king. Lady Macbeth is extremely power hungry and does all she can to convince Macbeth to be just as desirable as her. Together, they come up with a plan to murder King Duncan, so that Macbeth can become king like the witches foretold.
[and]crown [him]without [his] stir” or kill Duncan to guarantee his title (1.3.144-145). However, between hearing about Malcolm’s designation to succeed Duncan’s throne and his “black and deep desires” for power, Macbeth makes the final decision to believe in free will rather than fate by concluding that murdering the king is necessary in order to immediately acquire King Duncan’s title
Macbeth doesn’t want to kill Duncan, but knows he has to to become king quickly. He could wait and let things happen, but why miss your
He could even live as King for many years and rule the nation, but he could also be killed. I think that if he chooses to kill the King then the King will not only lose his life, but Macbeth will lose his source of identity. Macbeth will know that he is a murderer, and he will know of
In fact, with the King’s murder MacBeth gains his power, freeing him from many who before had a hold over him that he could not shake. Another example of MacBeth trying to free himself from others’ power is in the murder of Banquo and the attempted murder of his son, Fleance. This happens in Act III, scene I, when he says, “Banquo, thy soul’s light / if it finds heaven / must find it tonight,” lines 140-141. With the knowledge that Banquo’s sons will one day become king, MacBeth is fearful of being overthrown by them. Killing the two of them would hypothetically free him from their potential power he may one day face.
I think that Macbeth should not kill the King because he knows that it is against his own morals. If Macbeth were to kill the King, the one pro would be that Macbeth would be the new King. This is something that Macbeth has dreamed about for a long time and he will not let anyone get in the way of it. There are many cons of killing the King in which Macbeth ruminates. One of these cons is the guilt that will haunt Macbeth for the rest of his life: “Let not light see my black and deep desires”(Macbeth Act 1 Sc 4 li. 59).
He now perceives that in order to become king he has to step over some people, kill them. For all intents and purposes, how can he become king if Duncan is already running the position? Executing Duncan was the only option in order for him to become king, at least to his regards. Despite his bad ambition, Macbeth is not happy about committing murder, not to the slightest. It's like if he'd close his eyes and reopened them (hoping to see things differently)
Macbeth shows that he is willing to kill King Duncan because he is interested in the witches prophecy, after they tell him that he will become ‘Thane of Cawdor’ and then the King.
Macbeth is also a power hungry man who would do just about anything to achieve his goal of becoming King. When Macbeth first hears the prophecies from the three witches he instantly became invested with the journey to become king. Similar to Lady Macbeth, nothing was going to come between him and his potential power, “My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, shakes so my single state of man. That function is smother'd in surmise, and nothing is but what is not” (1.3.52-55). This quote exemplifies how Macbeth’s initial solution to becoming king was murder.
Macbeth had another chance to change his outcome. his wife was consumed with the idea that he would become king, so much so that she pushed him to kill the current King. She said she couldn 't do it because King Duncan looked too much like her own father. Macbeth could have easily dismissed this and not listened to his mentally dwindling wife, “Come, thick night, and pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, that my keen knife see not the wound it makes, nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark, to cry ‘hold, hold!’” He followed the instructions of his wife and killed the king.
