Macbeth

Macbeth is an epic tragedy inspiring pity and remorse because the hero, though flawed, is also shown to be human. The play portrays a journey of self-discovery and awareness as both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth pass from happiness to misery. Their punishment is well deserved but the retributive price is enormous.

Evil, both internal and external corrupts their minds, distorting their positive traits and exaggerating their worst. Both fall victim to 'vaulting ambition', pride and greed, tempting them to acts of treason and betrayal of friends, kinsman and the nation itself. Warfare on the battlefield mirrors the metaphorical warfare being played out between the forces of good and evil within them.

Spurred by ambition, supernatural solicitation and by the taunting of his wife, Macbeth deliberately chooses to embark on what he knows to be an evil course. From the moment he listens with 'rapt' attention to the witches, he allows himself to be drawn further and further into a vision of hell. The audience accompanies him into a morass of nightmares, ghosts, bloody visions and false prophecies. Abnormal conditions of mind such as insanity, sleep walking and hallucinations demonstrate his moral and emotional decline.

We are given insight into their feelings of agitation, anxiety, fear, determination and regret which minimises the horror of the murder. Macbeth's soliloquies voice his inner thoughts, making him an object of pity as well as a fascinating portrait of evil. A psychological change takes place as we witness the valiant general become a ruthless murderer. Although conscious of this evil transformation, he cannot resist the process. Ambition has become a powerful drug, usurping his reason and will as he lurches towards personal disaster. Brutality hardens him and his misrule brings suffering and chaos to Scotland.

Macbeth

Macbeth exhibits many of the traditional attributes of a tragic hero. Courage, determination, intelligence and moral awareness are clearly evident in his actions in the early scenes. His reputation is high and he holds a noble, aristocratic position of power and influence. He is introduced as a courageous general, worthy of respect and honour, brave, valiant, noble, imaginative, kind, ambitious, loving and artless. 'Brave Macbeth--well he deserves that name.' He is ambitious for public acclaim, recognition and wants to appear great and admirable, as he says:

'... I have bought

Golden opinions from all sorts of people,

Which would be worn now in their newest gloss,

Not cast aside so soon.'

He is willing to murder Duncan but shrinks from the recriminations and pity it will bring upon him. He hesitates not so much from a troubled conscience or moral scruples but because he knows the King is loved and considered virtuous. Lady Macbeth accuses him of unmanly cowardice which goads him into action. She boldly mocks and ridicules his fears and Macbeth cannot bear to be scorned and baited as a coward by the woman he loves.

With frightening speed he becomes a callous murderer, each successive crime bloodier than the one before. All are committed to gain personal security for 'To be thus is nothing, but to be safely thus.' In killing his king and kinsman he has released a bestial ferocity latent in his nature which has unhinged his mind, clearly shown in his vision of the dagger and his later distracted manner. Morbid reflections generate an imagined voice crying 'Sleep no more!' and images of hands trying to pluck out his eyes.

Obsession with power makes him ruthless for he thinks only of his own welfare. No feelings of pity, hesitation or qualms of conscience are shown. Everything must now give way to his interests alone. Macbeth has travelled far from the man he was in Act I. Then, the mere thought of murder, made his heart knock against his ribs and his hair stand on end. He becomes a monstrous king causing his country to suffer 'under the hand accursed'. Deceit, dishonour, hypocrisy, treachery and arrogant egotism have replaced the positive characteristics he previously displayed. The warrior of Act I has become a murderous criminal by Act III and in the process of transformation he arouses the terror and fascination of the audience.

Through his soliloquies in particular, the audience comes to share his thoughts and visions, forced to confront and accept the darker side of human nature, the bestial atavistic primitive side. He changes before our eyes, becoming isolated, brutalised, desensitised and utterly corrupted by the effects of evil. His cursing the witches in Act IV, 'And damned be all those that trust them,' is prophetically ironic for in believing in them he brings his own curse upon himself. 'Macbeth shall sleep no more'. He finds himself trapped in a new world where he is hated rather than honoured, where those 'he commands move only in command, Nothing in love.' He has become corrupt and his mind teems with images of fear, blood and disorder. 'Oh, full of scorpions is my mind.' He and his 'partner in crime' find that the crown, which they have waded through so much blood to steal, does but 'scald their brows and stuff their pillow with thorns.'

Murder does not answer his fears but only serves to call for new victims. He lurches into a series of sickening deceptions, no longer even confiding in his wife, no longer needing her advice or assistance for he has become evil enough without her. Incident after incident build to create a paradoxical world where 'nothing is but what it is not.' Suspicion, confusion, loss of self-control and mental instability are outward signs of his declining character.

Only his wife's death touches him but he has become too dehumanised to mourn. He aches with loneliness but accepts it as the price he must pay for the crimes he has committed. He becomes introspective, trying to make sense of a world that has become for him increasingly insane. He finds himself in an emotional void. Now that his wife, sole friend and true supporter is dead he watches helplessly as his thanes revolt and flee. His hopes decline as the witches' promises prove to be hollow and false. In the catastrophe of the final act, Macbeth agitation, uncertainty, irresolution, lack of plan and superstitious dependence on evil magic is contrasted with the steadfastness, organisation, courage and the conviction of Malcolm and his loyal subjects and the justice of their cause.

When the Scottish thanes march to join Malcolm's army,