Preview

Corruption In Macbeth

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
676 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Corruption In Macbeth
Witches
As creators of turmoil by nature, the witches catalyze changes in Macbeth that enable his transformation from a righteous military general into a committed megalomaniac. Furthermore, they inspire the awakening of Macbeth’s ambition and fool him by providing a false sense of security. This exploitation is expected from the dark and sinister creatures as they firmly believe that “fair is foul, and foul is fair.” The paradox and enigma behind this principle suggests that the witches feel disdain towards the laws of human nature, morality, and ethics. Their embodiment of pure evil allows the witches to find meaning and delight in the harshest of things while despising compassion. Furthermore, this belief shows that for them, there is a
…show more content…
As a result, her desire for power allows her to be stronger, more remorseless, and more driven than Macbeth. In fact, she is fully aware of this when she declares that Macbeth is "art not without ambition, but without the illness should attend it.” This is why Lady Macbeth acts not only as Macbeth's confidant, but his also his controller. Consumed by her desire to become Queen, Lady Macbeth herself plots the murder of Duncan and when Macbeth questions the idea of regicide, she manipulates him with her powerful soliloquies. This is done by condemning her husband’s biggest insecurity; his manhood. She states that Macbeth would be “so much more the man” if he were to follow through with the plan. Lady Macbeth even points out that she herself would even kill her own baby as a means to reach her goals. This drives Macbeth to the point where he is “settled and bend-up” to prove himself. Her condescending inspiration is the first to trigger a change in his morals and attitude. However, as Macbeth’s own ambition starts to flourish and facilitate an obsessive and power hungry killing spree, Lady Macbeth’s character changes as well. She becomes helpless and is reduced to a weak figure that sleepwalks and is constantly trying to wash nonexistent blood from her hands. This is because she is so overwhelmed by the guilt of her treachery that a

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Unlike Macbeth, the knowledge of the prediction, makes Lady Macbeth confident in her husbands future, and her desire for the throne strengthens and so does her impatiences. She believed her husband’s nature was ‘too full o' th' milk of human kindness’ to assassinate his own monarch and interpreted it, is a weakness. The controlling, Lady Macbeth manipulated Macbeth into submission by stating ‘When you durst do it, then you are a man’ to emasculate his character. Without Lady Macbeth’s persuasive ability, Macbeth would have never undertaken the unlawful murder of King Duncan and the unethical rise to the crown. Lady Macbeth was unable to control Macbeth, as he continued the heinous crimes of ‘Murder most foul’ throughout his rule. Lady Macbeth realises that her ‘desire was got without content’ as the consequences of their murderous actions, where met with remorse and insanity. Overwhelmed with guilt, the audience is able to witness Lady Macbeth fade in to the background, as Macbeth’s overshadowing, corrupt rule, grows. Through his wife’s ambition, greed and manipulation Macbeth’s morals are destroyed and his downfall as a person and a monarch becomes…

    • 741 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Power and corruption are some of the major themes presented in Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth. The story deals with these themes by showing us how Macbeth’s actions have grim consequences which ensue in poor results, such as Macbeth’s complete change of character.…

    • 624 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Lady Macbeth is an ambitious and ruthless woman who desires power and status. She appears stronger and more callous than Macbeth as she manipulates him to assassinate Duncan. However, as the bloodshed continues, her guilty conscience becomes more affected than Macbeth’s. Unlike Macbeth, who grows insensitive to the murders that he has committed, she descends into madness and (apparently) commits suicide as she becomes less capable to withstand the horrors of her crime.…

    • 679 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mental Trauma In Macbeth

    • 938 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The audience is introduced to Lady Macbeth when she is plotting the murder the king, sacrificing her womanhood and humanity in the process. She is shown asking dark spirits to take away her mortality and womanhood in order to be able to actualize the prophecy. Lady Macbeth then starts planning Duncan’s murder to secure Macbeth’s position as king, and even finds herself coercing her husband into agreeing with her plan. She tells him that she would, if she had promised Macbeth that. In the end of the play, however, Lady Macbeth obtains no compensation for her untiring support of her husband and his increasingly violent crimes. Lady Macbeth’s main motivation for encouraging Macbeth to kill Duncan was to see her husband succeed and become king, not for her own benefit. Therefore, when she sees that all her hard work and sacrifice have led to nothing, she becomes infuriated to a degree where she is mentally ill. She thus ends up sacrificing her sanity and wellbeing for a position that does not advantage her nearly as much as it benefits Macbeth. Evidently, Lady Macbeth is willing to give everything up, such as her humanity and her own offspring, to help Macbeth become king of Scotland, yet in the end she is mistreated by Macbeth and receives no compensation for her…

    • 938 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The consequence of corrupting power does not only affect the monarchs, but also their families. The families of three monarchs committed suicide and abandoned them as they are ashamed of those princes. Macbeth does not believe in the ties of loyalty and brotherhood which causes his soldiers and subject not to put faith in his master. When MacDuff’s and Malcom’s armies came to attack his castle, Macbeth’s soldiers refuse to stay loyal to him as they cannot feel attached to him. The soldiers who once fought by Macbeth’s side express how “those who command move only in command, nothing in love” (Shakespeare 72). In addition, Iokaste kills herself as she is ashamed of Oedipus, and afraid of getting her reputation tarnished. The throne of Oedipus is depended on how people think about him; his ability to maintain power is not by his merits. Machiavelli develops an argument how “a wise Prince should build on what is his own, and not on what rests with others” (Machiavelli 45). As a result, the truth of Oedipus’ birth and background brought dishonor upon his families, thus causing Iokaste’s death and the loss of his eyesight. Furthermore, Creon has suspicious and controlling nature, which causes his family to loathe him. Creon attempts to fix his mistakes at the last minute, but Haemon’s hatred…

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Lady Macbeth possesses the ability to wean Macbeth off of his own morals and values and assures him that their plan to power is the best way to accomplish their goals. Moreover, Lady Macbeth leads by example as after Duncan has been killed, she displays to Macbeth that she does not feel an ounce of guilt and neither should he. She tells him “My hands are of your colour, but I shame/ To wear a heart so white” (II.ii.67-68). She continues to persuade Macbeth that what he has done is not wrong and that nothing is off limits when it comes to acquiring total power for oneself. However, by the end of the play Lady Macbeth shows just how deceptive she has been to Macbeth. Although she is continually softening the impact of guilt on Macbeth, she is eventually taken over by her own reality. Lady Macbeth is overwhelmed with guilt from the murder of Duncan and begins to go insane. She is seen in her room pretending to wash her hands and saying “Out damned spot! Out I say...Yet who would /have thought the old man to have so much blood in /him?” while still asleep (V.i.32-36). Macbeth trusts Lady Macbeth whole heartedly and uses her apparent lack of guilt to convince himself that he too should not feel badly about what he has done. Even though Lady Macbeth alters Macbeth’s perception of guilt and innocence she is unable to deceive herself and commits…

    • 917 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Lord Acton’s 19th century words of wisdom were never more true than in the pages of Shakespeare's Macbeth tragedy. The corruption of power is one of the major and overarching themes of this play, Shakespeare uses charter dialogue and actions to flawlessly portray the corrupting grip that power wields. He shows just how cruel this kingdom of corruption can get. Lady Macbeth and Macbeth are by far the most corrupted by power as their blood soaked pursuit of total authority clearly shows. Aggressive and abusive behavior forces the pair to the extremes, ultimately making the capricious decisions to usurp the throne by assassinating King Duncan.…

    • 503 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The greek myth of Daedalus and Icarus, Daedalus makes he and his son wings so that they can escape from the Labyrinth they are trapped in. Daedalus’ invention works and they take flight out of the castle and set forth into the sky. Unfortunately, Icarus gets too excited and flies too close to the sun. As a result, his wings start to melt because a flying human is unnatural. Nature revolts against the unnatural and will do it’s best to restore order. Similarly, in MacBeth, the natural world tries to undo the evil works of the unnatural creatures.…

    • 572 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Personal power has the ability to be essential to greatness, and at the same time is able to destroy a person's nature. In the drama Macbeth by William Shakespeare, the main character, Macbeth, becomes corrupt through power that he gains. The play shows that even someone who starts out like Macbeth and does not crave power, will do terrible things to gain authority and power.…

    • 769 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Sani Abacha, a Nigerian military dictator and politician, was tied to human rights violations and corruption, he was considered the world’s fourth most corrupt leader. He was linked to taking money from the Nigerian government and keeping it for himself, the estimated total was 1.4 billion dollars. Corruption is common amongst people with substantial amounts of power, whether the corruption may be linked with murders, money transfers, human rights violations, or rigged elections, corruption occurs because people fear the leader and stopping them once the corruption has begun. When someone is introduced to power, they are overwhelmed and feel it is necessary to become corrupt, this can be compared to William Shakespeare 's Macbeth…

    • 1223 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    From this scene we immediately learn that Lady Macbeth is a dark hearted person with strong determination. She has already concluded that her husband will kill King Duncan and become the ruler of Scotland, though Macbeth is currently a good hearted, loyal human being. Because of these qualities, she fears that Macbeth will not have what it takes to end the life of an innocent and honorable man, though he has great ambition. It is now evident that she is the one who will be responsible for the corruption of Macbeth and the death of the King. Lady Macbeth…

    • 1471 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Lady Macbeth instigating masculine qualities within Macbeth to kill Duncan results in Macbeth’s tyrant like nature. When Macbeth is no longer willing to follow through the plan of murdering Duncan, Lady Macbeth changes his opinion by convincing him of being a man, she states, “What beast was’t then That made you break this enterprise to me? When you durst do it, then you were a man; and to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man.” (I, VII, 52-56). Lady Macbeth manipulates Macbeth by defining characteristics of a man which lead him to perform riskful tasks that otherwise he would not have done. Likewise, Lady Macbeth truly manipulating Macbeth can easily be recognized when she receives the letter and describes Macbeth, “It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness” (I, V, 16). Lady Macbeth knows that Macbeth is too innocent to kill Duncan, this is why she is determined to build up a destructive type of courage in Macbeth; otherwise, Macbeth would have remained the same and most likely would not have considered killing the king. Moreover, Lady Macbeth constantly assures Macbeth to go further towards his crimes when he is in a stage of doubtfulness. When Macbeth is insecure about their plan to kill Duncan, Lady Macbeth says, “We fail! But screw your courage to the sticking place, And we’ll not fail.” (I, VII, 66-68). This is a straightforward response of Lady Macbeth possessing courage of not only pushing herself forwards, but also Macbeth to a crime that neither have committed before. One can also observe Lady Macbeth’s assurance on Macbeth when he hallucinates Banquo’s ghost and is very confused as to why no one else sees it. Lady Macbeth simply says it is his personal hallucination, “This is the very painting of…

    • 1961 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The play Macbeth by William Shakespeare tells the story of Macbeth, who became the king of Scotland by murder and he used murders to kill people who opposed by him. He was later overthrown by the last king’s son. Many different emotions can transform a person if they are looking for power. Ambition can transform individuals into completely different people by greed and aggression.…

    • 478 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Macbeth's Corruption

    • 1492 Words
    • 6 Pages

    As a common definition, a tyrant is a cruel and oppressive ruler, while, in ancient Greece, a tyrant is referred to as a ruler who seized power unconstitutionally or inherited such power. In the mind of Shakespeare, it is clear he believes that anyone who is a tyrant is also inherently corrupt; these individuals, as demonstrated in Macbeth, obtain control in an unjust way, quickly adapt to their role in a self-destructive manner, and receive their comeuppance in the end. Due to this, Shakespeare demonstrates the idea of how absolute power corrupts absolutely and all who exploit their power will be destroyed in the end through the use of motifs such as sleep and blood among the characters, his emphasis on Macbeth's diminishing sense of morality,…

    • 1492 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Macbeth is a kind-hearted and respected general who serves a position of great honor in his kingdom. He doesn’t, however, know the fate he has yet to come. Unto him fall the words of the wicked, twisted sisters and his seducing wife. This brainwashing trial causes a transformation of Macbeth’s character. Shakespeare is able to express how Macbeth goes from fair to foul and pulls the kingdom down along the same path. Milk and blood imagery are utilized throughout The Tragedy of Macbeth to reveal how the Macbeths’ foul behavior corrupts everything once considered fair and sacred; ultimately these unnatural effects must be righted so that kingship is again holy and just.…

    • 1280 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays