Story of Macbeth
English IV Zachary CoddingtonMr,Thompson June, 14 2015 One of the greatest plays ever written out of William Shakespeare’s eight-teen published pieces of old literature is the story of Macbeth. Macbeth is considered to represent a tragic hero throughout the play. For every tragic hero there is usually a tragic flaw to accompany them. After enjoyably reading this play, Macbeth’s tragic flaw is his blinding ambition and his taste for power. He is so over-confident and worked up by what he hears that he forgets to make wise moral choices leading to his downfall at the end of the play. As he tumbles into mentally agony soon to become physical distress I do believe his downfall had some influence of others, close and far from his personal love life. The witches played a major role by presenting Macbeth the idea of killing Duncan, the king of Scotland. His wife, by questioning his manhood and making him stand up for himself. Lastly, Macbeth himself for showing no will to follow what is right and disrupting “The Great Chain of Being” leading to the unbalance of nature which is seen in the play when night turns to day and a falcon is being killed by a nursing owl.
The witches played the most psychotic role in the play due to putting the plague of an idea into Macbeth’s head knowing what mental chaos, destruction, physical death and unbalance that was to be had in the future. This shows their evil intent that Macbeth and Banquo questioned after their departure with the witches. The story of how one witch murdered a sailor due to his wife not sparing a chestnut does them no justice for being kind hearted entities as well. Before meeting the witches Macbeth was happy where he stood as Thane of Glams without ever thinking he deserves more. However upon meeting the witches they tell both Banquo and himself their past, present, and future. As the witches vanished the two men walk ahead laughing and joking about what they had just heard, taking no word of the witches to any degree of seriousness. Until the next day when Macbeth is granted /Thane of Cawdor proving the witches prophesy to be true. This is the starting point of mental breakdown where Macbeth gets that first idea of being king and how to go about it, by killing Duncan. This leads him on an ego boost making him blind of the different directions of his choices only choosing the ones leading up to king. After being king for quite some time, it doesn’t help that the witches told him that he cannot be killed by man of woman making him feel immortal, invincible to the world around him. If it were not for the witches showing up in Macbeth’s life, these mental sufferings of what’s wrong and what’s right would be non-existent.