Literary Analysis of Macbeth

Literary Analysis of Macbeth Having a lust for power can cause a loss in many things. It’s as if you’re in a win-lose situation. In this case, the play Macbeth written by Shakespeare has scholars sayings, “The lust for power by Macbeth and Lady Macbeth led to a loss of humanity. ” With that said, I totally agree with their view. Both Lady Macbeth and Macbeth went out of their way to even killing King Duncan and burdening the murder on his guardsmen. Even though that’s a common human act, you just don’t do something like that. It’s just so wrong.

The acts of both these people are very evil and violent, in which causes Macbeth to move from one act of endangerment to another just to protect himself from a great disaster which I likely consider his death to be it. Lady Macbeth is like a tag along buddy. She is like a huge helping hand to Macbeth and ends up dying on her way to the top with him. Both of their desires for high royalty led themselves to death. So, as said lusting for power is very harmful to oneself unless done in a proper way; meaning without anyone getting hurt.

The prophecies from the three witches which take place in the woods are what started Macbeth to lose his mind and soon after Lady Macbeth. With the encounter of the witches, they greeted Macbeth as, “Hail to thee; Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and King here-after. ” The title he has now is Thane of Glamis, but he doesn’t understand how he could have the title of Thane of Cawdor, when actually Macbeth only led King Duncan’s forces to victory, so considering that the Thane of Cawdor still lives, there’s no way he can get that title.

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Being called King here-after definitely got his head pumped up with adrenaline to seek more questions and answers. Soon after the witches vanish, the noblemen of Scotland; Ross and Angus were sent by King Duncan to tell Macbeth of the execution of the Thane of Cawdor and to grant Macbeth of the title. With that said, Macbeth was shocked that the prophecy had come true. So, after one prediction, he’s hoping for another-in which it is to become King of Scotland. With the visit to King Duncan, the King announces that his son Malcolm will be heir to the throne.

In Macbeth’s mind, all he can think about is murdering the King and all that will come along with it. Macbeth sends a letter to his wife telling of all that has happened and to prepare for the King’s visit. In order to keep the murder in her mind she doesn’t want anything to get in her way, so she even goes to the point of seeking evil and not wanting to be a women-afraid of the feminine ways which will interfere in the murder. When Lady Macbeth says, “Come, you spirits/ That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, / And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full/ Of direst cruelty!

Make thick my blood; (I v ll. 44-47) it shows how far Lady Macbeth is willing to go to make sure her husband and herself gets to the top. She even goes to the point to call upon the spirits to unsex her and fill her with cruelty to make sure that here feminine ways don’t cause the plan to go wrong. A huge act of lusting for power taking place which led to a loss of humanity was when the killing of King Duncan actually took place. The way he died was very unfortunate for Scotland but at least he died without torture. Lady Macbeth’s plan was to get King Duncan’s guardsmen drunk in which she did.

That then led to an open path to walk in and carry out the murder of the King. However, a weakness rose for Lady Macbeth; the resemblance of her father was seen in the King and led her to backtrack. With the guardsmen drunk to a state of sleep, Macbeth then moves in for the kill. He takes the guardsmen sword, goes in and stabs King Duncan in his sleep. With that done, Lady Macbeth puts the sword back with the guardsmen, seeing that Macbeth has been cowardly traumatized of what he had done and cannot return the sword back to the King’s guardsmen.

The aftermath soon takes place with Macduff soon getting suspicious of Macbeth. Another prophecy is put into Macbeth’s mind about when the witches say Banquo’s children will rule while Macbeth’s does not. Now, keep in mind that Banquo is like Macbeth’s best friend. But, do you think that will stop Macbeth from doing anything worse? No, he doesn’t care about Banquo, as a matter of fact not even anyone; now that he thinks he is unstoppable. Macbeth soon sends his people to kill Banquo and his son Fleance. Banquo is dead, but Fleance manages to escape.

With the plan to kill Banquo and Fleance in his mind, he does not say anything to his wife and so that leaves her on her own. When he tells his wife, “And with thy bloody and invisible hand/ Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond/ Which keeps my pale! ... Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill. / So prithee go with me. ” (III ii ll. 53-55/60-61) he shows how bad he is really lusting to get to the top. He’ll even break that bond of good friendship with Banquo to get it. By ill-fated events, Macbeth means that things will be stronger in whatever takes place of those events.

The turning point of this whole ordeal is when Macbeth should’ve drew the line when deciding that he would murder; slaughter Macduff’s family. He just went over the edge with this plan. In my opinion, Macbeth has just lost it. To go and murder someone’s family is as if your planning your own death. As Macduff has gone to England and Macbeth is getting suspicious of him, he seeks the killing of the family. You can guarantee retaliation is amongst Macduff when he finds out all this. Another shocking turn of events is when Macbeth learns of Lady Macbeth’s death. He had shown little emotion.

His lust for power caused him to even care little of the suicidal murder of his Lady. Macbeth ends up dying in the most horrible way. During battle against Malcolm and Macduff’s troops, he ends up getting his head chopped off by Macduff. Macbeth died like a tyran he is. As you can see, Lady Macbeth and Macbeth had this great amount of lust, desire, want, and craving for power. They got everything, but as a result lives have been lost. While Lady Macbeth has her new title as queen, she slowly seems like she isn’t enjoying it, and the reason for that is due to the fact that her guilty conscience followed up on her little by little.

She felt like what she did was wrong as in killing King Duncan and lying to everyone. She couldn’t even take it anymore that it caused her to lose her mind and commit suicide. Macbeth, in my opinion throughout this whole play sets him up to die from the start. It was like he wrote his own death. Both these two lost their mind completely, almost un-human like. Overall, as you can see, all the events of trying to gain power caused all these tragic events.

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