From Noble Macbeth To

Abhorred Tyrant . Show How The Macbeth Of Act 1 Contains Within Him The Seeds Of The Macbeth Of Act 5. Essay, Research Paper

The great tragedy of Macbeth is the loss of the kind of man Macbeth could have been and almost was, but for the contradictions in his character. They lead him to choose his vaulting ambition over what is just. At the scene of the opening battle Macbeth is described as having all the virtues of a great man and warrior. His savagery and ferocity in war are illustrated in the captain s description of how Macbeth carved out his passage and his sword smoked with bloody execution . He is thought to be so brave that he is worthy of being called Bellona s bridegroom . Macbeth s killings are applauded now and his brute strength and ability to kill are considered to be qualities to admire and ones for which King Duncan calls him valiant cousin and worthy gentleman . These facets of Macbeth s character are his defining ones, both at the beginning and at the end of the play. They turn him from an ambitious soldier to a tyrant and a butcher. His bloodthirstiness in battle is a trait that is released in the subsequent killings Macbeth carries out during his reign as king.Macbeth s eventual fall from grace is subtly mirrored in the nature of the first Thane of Cawdor and he is a forewarning of everything that Macbeth becomes when he is given the title of Cawdor. Duncan s words; He was a gentleman on whom I built/An absolute trust , in Act1 Sc4, are meant for the first Thane, but Duncan also comes to trust Macbeth. This trust is established when Duncan is Macbeth s guest and declares We love (Macbeth) highly . What is truly ironic about Macbeth assuming the mantle of the treacherous Cawdor is that Macbeth turns out to be even more duplicitous and succeeds in usurping Duncan.Macbeth s own betrayal of Duncan is pre-echoed in Ross description of Macbeth fighting that disloyal traitor/Thane of Cawdor with self-comparisons , in Act 1 Sc. 2. Words that imply Macbeth, too, will turn against the king. Even the nature of Macbeth s demise is present in the first Thane s death as it is said by Malcolm of him, in Act 1 Sc. 4, that nothing in his life/Became him like the leaving it . This is also true of Macbeth s return, at the end, to bravery, courageousness and defiance in the face of the overwhelming adversity he encounters. When everything he has come to rely on, the witches prophecies and Lady Macbeth, is gone he still battles on. Yet I will try the last, he says in Act 5 Sc. 8, Lay on Macduff/And damned be him that first cries Hold, enough! These uncompromising words spur the audience on to admire the way he fights on no matter what. After all the terrible things he has done, Macbeth s death, in comparison, is more admirable than his life.Being a brave and fearless warrior is what Macbeth seems to be best at, yet it only takes the 3 witches, in Act 1 Sc. 3, and their words Macbeth…shalt be king hereafter to bewilder this great man so much that he becomes rapt with the potential of their prophesy. This, coupled with Macbeth s earlier subconscious repetition of the witches words foul and fair , creates in the audiences mind a relationship, already, between the witches and Macbeth.This signals the ever-intensifying power the supernatural will come to have over Macbeth. By the end of the play he is so reliant on the witches that although his castle is under siege, his subjects have deserted him and Lady Macbeth is dead, he cannot stop believing in their prophesies that None of woman born shall harm Macbeth and (He) shall never vanquished be until/Birnam Wood to Dunsinane Hill shall come . Even at this late stage he hopes that somehow they will save him. His absolute belief in the supernatural is credible in a time when people were very superstitious and believed in witches and spirits more fervently, rather than dismissing them to books and films, as we do now. Shakespeare uses the supernatural in other popular tragedies, Hamlet and Julius Caesar, for example, which goes to show that this theme interested audiences of that time. But Macbeth dies come to realise, at the end, the reality of the witches effect on him. Against the backdrop of his deserted castle and country, Macbeth stands alone on stage, in Act 5 Sc. 7, with his desperate words They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly expressing the powerlessness he now feels because of the witches.The nature of Macbeth s dependence on the witches at the end is foreseeable in his earlier reliance on his wife, Lady Macbeth. Her character in the early acts proves to be the proverbial woman behind every great man as she plots the initial murder and persuades Macbeth, by a perversion of normal morality, that the two of them are acting bravely, nobly and victoriously. On hearing what the witches have predicted for Macbeth, in Act 1 Sc. 5, she immediately starts to prepare herself mentally, in a way that would not have been normal behaviour for a woman in her own or in Shakespearean times. She calls to the spirits so that no feelings of remorse should shake (her) fell purpose . She knows that they will have to kill Duncan for Macbeth to become king, but he is unsure and tells her that we will speak further . At this point, Lady Macbeth is already decided in her course of action and dismisses Macbeth s reluctance, telling him to leave all the rest to (her) .Macbeth s weakness in tackling this moral problem is contrasted and highlighted by Lady