Sanity And Insanity In Macbeth

Act 2 from Macbeth is a very captivating and significant section of the book. It encompasses of King Duncan’s murder by Macbeth, so he could become King. Prior to the killing, Macbeth had an excentric hallucination of a blood-stained dagger that epitomised, to Macbeth, to go and murder Duncan. The next day, Macbeth blamed Duncan’s attendants for the killing. In fear of being killed Duncan’s sons, Malcom (who was heir to the throne) and Donalbain, flee the country. Due to them departing so expeditiously Macduff had believed that they murdered their father. Hence, Macbeth was to be crowned King of Scotland.

Macbeth’s mental state is revealed to the audience prior to Duncan’s murder, describing the guilt he already reserves for the proceedings ‘Is this a dagger which I see before me…I have thee not and yet I see thee still’ (2.1.35). The soliloquy ‘Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear‘(2.2.56-57) establishes that his guilt and remorse prove he’s not purely evil and remains somewhat sane. The hallucinations Lady Macbeth and Macbeth experience are clear indicators of the immense guilt that consumes them. Additionally, the soliloquys have indicated the significant effect that guilt has on their conscience and how it impends on their mental

“Do you know the difference between neurotics and psychotics? Neurotics build castles in the sky; psychotics move into them.” -Tanya Thompson, Assuming Names.The Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised is a diagnostic tool used to diagnose psychopathy. The list consists of twenty different Psychopathic traits which are used as a rating scale to determine prison sentences. Macbeth is the epitome of a psychopath. He presents with many symptoms of psychopathy including his inability to empathize with the ramifications of his actions due to his emotional poverty and lack of empathy, his grandiose self worth and his state of delusion. While Macbeth’s ambition is a key factor in his downfall, his nature as a psychopath

In the tragedy, “Macbeth” by William Shakespeare, guilt is contributed throughout the play, sacrificing a feeling that haunts the conscience. The feeling of guilt can come from committing a crime, a faulty act, or even violation over someone. The criminal may have remorse in their sinful hands creating an awful grudge with their past. It can lead them to their horrific death of repeatedly seeing their hands, as a reminder of what they have done. ”Hands”, signify the important components of self and violence that rounds out an emphasis placed on choice throughout the play. It is the impression of responsibility for this poor action that has been committed. In this play, there are many ideas, but guilt is one of the most significant ones. It teaches important lessons to the readers, with everlasting morals.

The Tragedy of Macbeth by William Shakespeare, a play wrought with prophecies, deception, guilt, and death, brings light to the symptoms of mental illnesses and their effects on the human brain’s ability to reason, trust, and act in times of pressure. Both Macbeth and his lady are plagued by mental illness, and the effects of their illness only grow as the play evolves. Macbeth’s symptoms of schizophrenia and anxiety, as well as Lady Macbeth’s anxiety as well as hallucinations that eventually push her to suicide prove that not only can mental illness alter the way a person sees a situation, but it can also drive them to harm others and themselves.

Throughout Act 3, Macbeth has essentially lost all moral direction, reasoning, and self control, thus signifying the escalating eventuality of his demise. Moreover, in Act 3 Scene 4, after Macbeth kills and then hallucinates Banquo, he states to Lady Macbeth ‘I am in blood stepped in so far that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as to go o’er’. The use of grotesque hyperbole communicates the unnatural occurrences that represent moral corruption, and the symbolism of blood links to Macbeth’s guilt as a stain on his conscience. This also conveys that though Macbeth is aware that his own actions have resulted in the disintegration of his sanity, he remains willing to continue to commit crimes and take immoral action to ensure he maintains power. Macbeth is now enduring the repercussions of his actions, and by attempting to alter the future by murdering Banquo, he has become tormented and anguished, and his guilt has begun permeating every aspect of his life. In addition, the blood motif metaphorically represents the fateful choices of Macbeth and alludes to his inevitable death. Macbeth is now acknowledging the fact that he has no choice but to progress, and through his attempts to disrupt the natural order, the idea that Macbeth’s downfall occurs as a repercussion for his own decisions is

William Shakespeare is considered as one of the best play writers in history. One of his most well known plays is Macbeth where a Scottish general named Macbeth has a strong desire to be king which leads him to betray and murder his king, Duncan. He also kills the nobles who have been loyal to him in order to maintain his title as king. Throughout this play, Shakespeare uses the motif of ambition, guilt, and fate to characterize the characters, show the different themes present within the play, and how the motifs are still relevant today.

Shakespeare was one of the greatest writers of his time. Throughout his plays he constantly uses different metaphors and motifs to give a more detailed picture of the play to the reader. In Shakespeare’s tragedy, Macbeth, the motif of blood often represents guilt and courage.

In the past scene Macbeth is being hesitant in going through with the assassination of King Duncan.Macbeth has a moment where he talks to himself after he sees a floating dagger and says “Is this a dagger which I see before me/The handle toward my hand?/Come, let me clutch thee./I have thee not, and yet I see thee still./Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible/To feeling as to sight?or art thou but/A dagger of the mind, a false creation,/Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?.” (II.I, 44-49). This shows Macbeth in a vulnerable place of mind. He is experiencing this as a result of guilt he has deep down inside. Macbeth is appalled for the reason that he did not expect to live on with guilt after the murder of The king that Macbeth and Lady

Imagine the President of the United States admitting to having mental instability. This scenario may rattle some, but it clearly plays out in William Shakespeare’s tragedy, Macbeth. The play’s title character uses violence to maintain power but gradually plummets into mental illness. Before Macbeth and his wife, Lady Macbeth, conspire to murder his cousin Duncan, the King of Scotland, in order to attain authority, Macbeth foreshadows the possible repercussions; afterward, he experiences an immediate sense of remorse. The subsequent murder of a friend displays his progressive unsteadiness, but the massacre of an entire family demonstrates his transformation from instability to deviance. Lady Macbeth tries to mask her guilt by covering up for her husband, but eventually comes to grips with her own instability. In Macbeth, Shakespeare asserts that power drives the title character and his wife to insanity, particularly after their conspiracy to kill Duncan.

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.

Macbeths guilty conscience makes him unable to play the ‘true’ role of a villain of the play. Macbeth begins to see ‘false creations’ before murdering Duncan; the image of a floating dagger taunts Macbeth’s senses. Macbeth is devoured in his anxiety he starts to hallucinate the crime before going through with it. Macbeth is unable to dispose thoughts of his guilt and doubt, which prevents him from being stuck at the point where it is too late to turn back, yet the fear of his nature prevents him from turning completely into a ruthless coldblooded

Thinking this means everyone, Macbeth feels he no longer has to worry about Macduff, a main he finds most threatening to his position as king. However, this is not enough to satisfy Macbeth’s mental scorpions. Looking over the situation, Macbeth comments, “Then live, Macduff; what need I fear of thee?/But yet I’ll make assurance double sure/And take a bond of fate. Thou shalt not live,/That I may tell pale-hearted fear it lies,/And sleep in spite of thunder” (4.1.93-97). His mentality about kingship has grown so strong that he finds fear in a man he has foreseen to do absolutely no harm to him. The demons laying siege to his conscience compel him to murder not only Macduff, but his family, which is a most unnecessary move given the prophecy he learned. His mentality has taken a cataclysmic shift towards staunch protection of himself and his throne through ruthlessness and bloodshed. This condition is further exemplified when Macbeth rambles, “I have lived long enough. My way of life/Is fall’n into the sere, the yellow leaf,/And that which should accompany old age,/As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,/I must not look to have, but in their stead/Curses, not loud but deep, outh-honor, breath/Which the poor heart would fain deny and dare/not” (5.3.26-33). Macbeth audible expresses his weariness of holding the throne. However, he goes on to state, “I’ll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked” (5.2.38). Despite his weariness of being king, his mind is hardwired at this point to defend the throne with his life. It’s as if his mind has been overtaken by its besiegers and fully corrupted. He is no longer who he once was. Rather than fight for his allies and the common good, he fights for himself against his former allies. This action symbolizes a one-hundred-eighty degree turn in mental attitude, like a contagion that has possessed his

As his obsessions with killing King Duncan grew, it caused him to hallucinate about a dagger which he is going to use to murder King Duncan. The bloody dagger illustrates a reality in Macbeth’s mind in which it foreshadows things to come. Although Macbeth has not committed a crime, the soliloquy illustrates his conscience and how his mind is already filled with guilt. “And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood, which was not so before.” (Macbeth 2.1 47-48). Before Macbeth planned on murdering King Duncan his conscious was clear of guilt, but now he is experiencing a guilt he never felt before.

Furthermore, since Macbeth is dominated by desire, he have no free will to control himself, and he would wipeout anything that hinder his ambition by any means. After he is blind by his ambitious thoughts, he begin to commit sinful actions one after another, like a killing machine. While Lady Macbeth said, "He is about it:/ The doors are open; and the surfeited grooms/ Do mock their charge with snores: I have drugg'd their possets,/ That death and nature do contend about them,/ Whether they live or die" (II. ii. 6-11), Macbeth slays king Duncan in his sleep and exits with his bloody dagger. It is clear that Macbeth becomes a person without any feelings and sensitivities like a wandering soul that possess with power. His desire could even guide