How Does Shakespeare Use Power In Macbeth

William Shakespeare, playwright of Macbeth, shows the importance that power and corruption can hold on a person’s humanity. In order to prove the true effect of personal gains, he uses the main character, Macbeth, to show how evil people are willing to become. Personal power has the ability to be essential to greatness, but at the same time is able to destroy a person’s true nature. Believe it or not, Macbeth once was a man of honor. At the beginning of the play, Macbeth was loyal to King Duncan, a strong military leader, and a respected husband. Throughout the tragedy, Macbeth 's character takes a big, yet gradual change for the worst as ambition starts to completely take over him. Once the three witches give Macbeth his prophecies he transitions from a brave, loyal man to a cold blooded murderer. His power hungry personality leads to a character change from who he was before he knew about the witches prophecies, after he learned of them, and right before he was murdered. In Macbeth, Shakespeare dramatises the damaging physical and mental effects of ambition on those who seek power for their own sake.

A continuous struggle for power is a common idea in literature, but the immoral desire of power can destroy the goodness in people. In the tragedy, Macbeth William Shakespeare introduces Macbeth and his story how his desires of power lead to his demise. Initially Macbeth was a loyal warrior who lived and served for his king,; however, his desires for power corrupts him. In order to maintain his power, he begins to kill

Aung San Suu Kyi once said, “It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.” It is human nature that the more power one desires, the more corrupt actions one must do to attain it. In Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the ways in which characters speak and think about their morals change due to their overpowering ambition for power and wealth, and the fear of losing this power sends them into a spiral of chaos.

Greed for power has always been evil and even made a saint turn into a demon. As the quote goes “All power tends to corrupt and an absolute power corrupts absolutely” (unquote), which is true not only in the fictitious stories but also in real life and Shakespeare, th9e greatest writer ever known, has always been in habit of making fictitious character come alive and Macbeth is no exception to the rule. The character of Macbeth has two sides, one which is wholesome while other been dubious. He symbolized great ambition but went overboard and in the process not only became corrupt but also became a killer. Macbeth reflects great strength but within he has his own weakness and thus good over took evil resulting in its downfall and finally his own death.

Power can not only bring ambitious people honors, but also make them lose everything. In the play, Macbeth, written by William Shakespeare, it demonstrates that the immoral power influences the life of Macbeth dramatically. Macbeth’s abuse of power destroys his relationship with his cousin, friend, and wife, which shows that Macbeth’s wild ambition causes him to be isolated.

The reader is able to see this through Macbeth’s contemplation on whether or not he should kill Duncan, Lady Macbeth's lust for power and Macbeth’s final yet selfish decision. The overall comparisons are able to demonstrate the harmful physical and psychological effects of power throughout a community. As a result, the reader can learn from both Queen and Shakespeare that one's evil pleasure and desires can be a result of one's destruction all

Today, the issue of the corruptive nature of power is an important one, as seen in our current presidential election. This issue is also present in the book Macbeth by William Shakespeare. We chose to do a children's picture book in order to illustrate the theme of the destruction nature of power, using specific characters and parts of scenes. With focus on the main character, Macbeth, and minor characters such as Lady Macbeth, Banquo, and Duncan, it allows us to devote most of the book to the characters that affected and were affected by power the most. We actually included every scene within the play in a condensed format so that we could keep all of the negative aspects of power while still keeping it accessible to children. We also chose to focus on the specific parts of scenes that illustrated the evolution of who is in power, how they got there, and how they acted when they were in power.

Throughout the play Macbeth there are plenty of examples of corruption of power, the character that shows corruption of power the most in the play is Macbeth. Throughout the play, you can see Macbeth get greedier for power and as you continue reading the play you can see Macbeth's thirst for power. Macbeth kills the king so he could be next in line to become king, he kills Banquo, his companion, to cover his tracks of killing the king so Banquo could not get suspicious about the death of Duncan. The final example of corruption of power is when Macbeth gets the power of being king he leads troops into a battle he believes he can’t lose. "Stars, hide your fires; / Let not light see my black and deep desires"(1.4.50-51).

The Power of Ambition For many individuals pride is the driving force behind motivation and ambition but when one’s pride gets the best of him or her it can cause the individual to break down and self destruct. Every human has a little pride in them but when that pride becomes selfish and done for personal benefit that is when it can become dangerous, taking focus away from the things that really matter like honor, love, family, friends and integrity. In his play, Macbeth, Shakespeare suggests that if one’s motivation is selfish and pride-driven, eventually honor and integrity are lost leading to one’s destruction. Initially, when one’s selfish ambition and motivation is just starting to grow, one is able to maintain honor and integrity.

Thousands of leaders have come and gone, yet not all were true to their people and often chose a corrupted path full of absolute power and tyranny. Although determination and willpower helps people obtain a position of leadership, this same drive can lead to arrogance and an abuse of power. Hundreds of pieces of literature highlight this frequently seen concept of leaders and William Shakespeare was no different when he wrote the play Macbeth. Shakespeare wrote many tragedies to reflect humanity’s turmoils and shining moments and the tragic hero of the play, Macbeth, best displays such truths as the reader is led through his immoral path to overthrow King Duncan and assume the throne. The corruption of power is not that uncommon and Macbeth

Shakespeare's Macbeth includes the power that affects over a person who has rose to a post authority. Influenced by unchecked power, Macbeth takes events that have serious and devastating results for himself and for different characters in the play. When Macbeth has presented an act in which he utilizes control for negative ends, he discovers it is progressively harder to limit himself from perverted use of force. Eventually, it’s his failure to recognize the adaptive and maladaptive elements of force from each other that keeps him from understanding his potential significance.

Both greed and power, if not controlled, can lead to destruction. Throughout William Shakespeare’s play Macbeth, Shakespeare uses both characters Macbeth and Lady Macbeth to demonstrate how ambition can change one’s personal relationships. As in the beginning of Act 1, Scene 7 Macbeth and Lady Macbeth do not share the same ambition, and it is because of this that their relationship lacks love and affection however through the use of persuasion and other means, Lady Macbeth is able to get Macbeth to pursue her ambition. This not only changes their relationship drastically but it also changes Macbeth’s attitude towards ambition. Throughout the play, Shakespeare shows us through Macbeth, the possibility for ambition to eventually turn into greed and how the lust for power may corrupt us.

One thing I have learnt from the text ‘Macbeth’ written by William Shakespeare is that Macbeth fought hard to become King, a king that he thought would be much different. However, once Macbeth gained the reigns of King he began killing innocent people, disobeying the natural order and doing whatever he pleases. The actions of Macbeth the statement I have chosen, “why do people abuse power?”. I will investigate this statement further by answering the following three questions:

First, Lady Macbeth influenced Macbeth to kill Duncan. Secondly, the witches mentally manipulated Macbeth into doing and thinking bad things. Finally, Macbeth Manipulated two men to think Banquo was an evil being. In this piece of literature, Shakespeare uses the classic old age form of manipulation to draw reference to the natural human

Macbeth was the greatest king that ever lived and that anyone could have asked for to run their kingdom, yeah right. Macbeth was this lunatic crazed man who kills everyone that he doesn't think is trust worthy. Macbeth is so power hungry that he doesn't even care if his wife just died because in the book he says “ It was going to happen sooner or later”, like wow thats how he honestly feels all because he is the King and can do whatever if he puts his faith into the witches, but seriously Macbeth is no where near the greatest king that ever lived, I wouldn't even have this man take care of my turtles.