Macbeth is the classic story that illustrates the fragility of human nature. Written 1606-1607, Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedies. To understand the character of Macbeth, it’s important to consider the role of fate and choice. As in many famous plays and stories, the question arises of whether or not Macbeth is a helpless victim of fate or a man overrun by selfish desires. Equally important are the concepts of how actions shape a person’s character and how they can rob someone of personal insight.Although, in the end Macbeth is a ruthless, murderous tyrant, he didn’t start out that way. Ironically, the first description of Macbeth is the hero in battle who charged in without fear and defeated the enemy, namely their leader, Macdonwald, whose head he put on a stake. It’s interesting how our first perception of him is the conqueror of a traitorous villain, one whom he will resemble by the end of the play.
But then Macbeth meets the Weird Sisters. Up until this point we have no reason to believe that Macbeth has traitorous tendencies. But he always had the potential to become a murderous traitor, and this is the reason we cannot blame his repulsive moral condition on the Weird Sisters or Lady Macbeth or Fate. The Weird Sisters relay three prophesies to Macbeth: “All hall, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Glamis! All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor! All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter!” (1.3 lines 48-50). Even the choice of words at the beginning of the play hint that Macbeth isn’t’ a victim of Fate. “But all’s too weak: For brave Macbeth—Disdaining Fortune, with his brandished steel.” This suggests that Macbeth is above fortune or Fate; it doesn’t control him. Macbeth is ruined by his choice to take matters into his own hands. Fate had given him the perfect hand and Macbeth knew that if he played his hand right, the game would be in the bag. But does Macbeth “disdain Fortune” for the sake of loyalty to his country or just sheer decency? Macbeth knew what he was doing. He was painfully aware of it. “I am afraid to think what I have done: Look on ‘t again I dare not.” (2.2 lines 55-56). It’s tempting to blame Macbeth’s sins on Fate, especially when we consider ourselves in his place, but this is not the case.
Throughout the play we see devolution of Macbeth’s character. When Macbeth hears the prophesies of the Weird Sisters he’s not sure what he’s going to do yet, although he immediately entertains thoughts of murder: “Why do I yield to that suggestion whose horrid image doth unfix my hair and make my seated heart knock at my ribs, against the use of nature? Present fears are less than horrible imaginings shakes so my single state of man that function is smothered in surmise and nothing is but what is not.” And with this beginning or conflict, we see that as Macbeth ascends in power, his moral character rapidly declines. Before Macbeth murders Duncan he is swayed back and forth—should he do it? Should he not? Although some of his doubts come from selfish fears of being caught, it does seem that Macbeth is wholly corrupt. He’s still able to distinguish between right and wrong. After the deed is done Macbeth feels extreme regret, but it’s not long before the regret wears off. As the action continues, Macbeth feels less emotion regarding his depravity, and it becomes easier with each murder. By the end, he tells us that he fears no longer: “I have almost forgotten the taste of fears. Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts, cannot once start me.” (5.5 lines 8 and 13-14). In this sense, never fearing is an unnatural and sickly state of being. When we consider each of Macbeth’s murders, it’s important to see how truly perverted they are, firstly the murder of his king, to whom he’d sworn eternal allegiance. Next, with much less reluctance, the murder of his close friend, Banquo, is a comment on how desperate Macbeth is becoming to tie up all the end of his treachery. And third, Macbeth has come to a state of such unnaturalness that he feels threated by women and children. His senseless butchery is repulsive. Each of these murders twists Macbeth, forming different characteristics in him. With the murder of Duncan, Macbeth becomes the tyrant. With the murder of his good friend Banquo, he cuts himself off from human companionship. And the complete unnatural murder of women and children is nothing but the work of a coward. Utterly low, Macbeth has become a wretched creature, willing to do anything to keep his power.
Macbeth does not die a heroic death, but a pitiful death. Near the end of the play, before he battles Malcolm and Macduff, Macbeth clings to the prophesies of the three witches. Cleverly, Malcolm’s army has carried three branches from the forest Birnham to conceal the number of troops coming, therefore fulfilling the prophesy of the witches. Macbeth meets Macduff, and they begin to duel. Macbeth claims that Macduff cannot defeat him, boasting, “I bear a charmed life, which must not yield to one of woman born.” But Macduff was ripped from his mother’s womb early, thus; he is not born of woman. Now Macbeth is without loyal solider to follow him, without his wife, who was his driving force, and now it seems that all Fortune is really against him and not for him. The prophesies have fallen flat and Macbeth has nothing left to cling to. Still, he refuses to surrender, and he vows never to give in. “Though Birnam Wood be come to Dunsinane and thou opposed, being of no woman born, yet I will try the last. Before my body I throw my warlike shield. Lay on, Macduff. And damned be him that first cries ‘Hold, enough.’” Macbeth has become so wretched that he will not surrender and admit that he’s defeated. He’s so far into his evil ways that he can no longer realize that his cause is lost. Early in the play, Lady Macbeth reassures her husband that “A little water clears us of this deed” (2.2 line 6.9), but it is not so. Macbeth dies fighting to keep the power that never belonged to him. Maybe if Macbeth had realized this, had begged for death on his knees before Macduff, this wouldn’t be a tragedy, but Macbeth is unable to do so in his corruptness.
In one regard, Macbeth hardly feels like a tragedy. No one sitting in the audience is on Macbeth’s side, cheering for him to kill Macduff. As the curtain closes, the villain is dead, and good has triumphed, even if it is at great cost. At one point, the crowd might have felt a liking for Macbeth and hoped that he wouldn’t commit his atrocities. “Don’t do it, Macbeth! Don’t do it!” But towards the end, the mutual feeling is, “Just kill him, Macduff.” The most important thing about the character of Macbeth is the concept of a good man turning into a vile tyrant. Since the beginning of history, our stories demonstrate that each and every one of us is susceptible to corruption.
