Throughout the play Shakespeare illuminates Macbeth’s escape from reality. His perceptions attribute to his immoral actions, just as Lady Macbeth continually washes her clean hands from the blood she helps to spill. Shakespeare defines these perceptions as the symbols of dark deeds the main characters commit. Consequently, after the murder of Banquo, King Macbeth imagines his presence at the banquet. Macbeth’s blames his paranoia on his dinner guests, shifting blame from himself to them, showing his weak character and inability to take responsibility for his own actions.
Although Macbeth’s conscious is in this state, it becomes overridden by his ambition for power. Even while knowing killing someone is sinful, he still murders his beloved king and friend, Duncan. Without Lady Macbeth pressuring him the way she did, Macbeth will not gain the ambition and immense strive for power he does
The first act of cruelty that contributes to Macbeth’s downfall is the murder of Duncan. After contemplating the consequences associated with planning the murder, Macbeth kills Duncan, convinced that it is the only way he can become king. Following the murder, Macbeth becomes overwhelmed with shock and begins to experience auditory hallucinations. Upon experiencing shock, Macbeth is unaware that he brings back the daggers from the crime. Commanded by Lady Macbeth to return the daggers to the scene, he claims, “I am afraid to think what I have done.” Riddled with guilt, Macbeth feels remorse.
After Lady Macbeth’s reaction to Macbeth’s letter he wrote to her about the prophecies, readers started to understand what kind of character Lady Macbeth was. Of course with her being the plotting character in the crime scene, it is obvious she is the more evil character. Never once did she question herself to not go along with the plan, unlike Macbeth. After Macbeth had committed the murder, he brought her the dagger in which he used to murder King Duncan. Her response was, “Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
To fulfill the prophecy, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth decide that they are going to kill the King and expedite the process. Following the decision, Macbeth proclaims,“Is this a dagger which I see before me?” (2.1.33) He is about to kill the King, however he is questioning the very thought of doing so. Although he is only imagining the dagger at this point in the monologue, the question serves to let the readers know of his fatal intentions. Additionally, this question relates back to the idea of Macbeth being deceptive and manipulative. He’s passing off the murder of King Duncan to an inadvertent act, as we see in the next line, “The handle toward my hand?
Macbeth soon succeeds at killing king Duncan and soon realizes that all the violence and killing are making him powerful and have the adrenaline to kill. Starting with the bloody dagger which is not there and is just a hallucination
In conclusion, the idea that Macbeth is a work in which human feelings mix with enigma and mystery should be highlighted. The struggle between good and evil plays a very significant role in the success of Macbeth. In this case, the good would be Macbeth’s thoughts towards the murder of King Duncan, before when he thought as a loyal soldier would. The evil won and he became ambitious and oblivious to his actions just to end up dead, killed by Macduff as revenge for his family. The blood on every page of the play shows the guilt of Macbeth and how it drove him to the end, just for his
Later on in the play, Macbeth asserts his right over Lady Macbeth, flipping their dynamic, and distances himself from her,"be innocent of the knowlded dearest chuck." He no longer confides in his most trusted confidant showing his descension into paranoia and obsession with control. The natural order of the universe is disrupted when they murder the king and chaos it unleashed. This is shown in the aftermath: Macbeth hallucinates, Lady Macbeth
The dagger is his temptation and represents his future destiny of violence. His hallucinations represent his guilty conscious and temptation, but also inspire him to continue to kill to stay king. However, he does not realize that he can not kill more to run away from what he has done and what his destiny is. As the play continue, Macbeth becomes worse and worse and his hallucinations represent how he is digging deeper into madness. All together his visions are a symbol of his violence, actions, and
Though first confused by the dagger, he later concludes that is a figment of his imagination from a guilt-ridden mind. The intensity of the dagger hallucinations experienced by Macbeth increases as he states that his eyes are “made the fools o’ the other senses,” showing that his eyes perceive visions of which he knows not to be there (2.1.56). He later reasons that it is the “bloody business which informs/Thus to mine eyes,” as the reason he sees this dagger is due to the murderous journey he