Power In The Man Who Was Almost A Man

It is one thing to have power. It is another to know how to use it. Once a person is giver power over others it is important that they know how to use it in the correct way. The more power one has, the more responsibility they take on. Once Macbeth got the power he wanted, he abused it. Early on in the story, Macbeth hated the idea of killing for his own gain, but after he becomes king he has no problem with it. He orders to have his best friend, Banquo, killed and decides to have Macduff’s whole family killed, all out of his paranoia and desire for power. When Duncan was the King of Scotland he was benevolent with his power As king, Macbeth used his power to make people suffer. In Dave’s case in The Man Who Was Almost A Man, Richard Wright’s character, Dave, desperately wanted a gun because he believed that he was a man. Almost immediately after the gun comes into Dave’s possession, he becomes reckless with it. Even though he wanted the gun to validate his maturity, he lied and hid it from his mother, a very childlike thing to do. Once Dave had the weapon in his possession, he did not have the patience to wait for a safe opportunity to shoot it. Once he was alone on the farm, Dave was not even careful
enough to make sure that the mule was out of the gun’s way. Once Dave did what he did, he panicked and tried to fix and hide the situation instead of admitting his mistake to his boss and family. Subsequently, after getting off with very few consequences for killing the mule, Dave takes the gun, which at this point seems to be the only thing that matters to him, and runs away. It is clear that possessing the gun severely clouded Dave’s judgement. It was the lack of responsibility with their newly gained power that lead to Dave and Macbeth’s downfall.
It was Macbeth’s own foul actions that made all of Scotland hate him, and it was his overconfidence that lead to his fight to the death with Macduff. Similarly, it was Dave’s lack of responsibility that caused Dave to refuse to give up his gun to his mother. Later on, he isn’t conscious enough of his surroundings to avoid shooting the mule. Instead of accepting responsibility in the aftermath of that incident, Dave was frustrated and embarrassed enough to run away from the whole situation in an attempt to find somewhere where he could be his own man. It was the two characters’ lack of responsibility with their new power that lead to their respective
collapses. As said before, the more power that an individual possesses, the more responsibility that they need to take on. Macbeth surrendered his morals to become king and mercilessly abused his new power. Similarly, Dave became obsessed yet careless once he obtained his gun. For both characters, their lack of responsibility that would lead to their respective downfalls. Because an individual must be careful when they suddenly obtain power over another person.