Also, they were similar in a way that they loved power too much. Their quench for power were similarly great and they would do their very best just to be the queen. In Lady Macbeth’s case, she killed King Duncan so that her husband, Macbeth, could be the king, and she herself, the queen. Her hunger for power made her do everything that was possible to make her the queen. When her husband refused to kill King Duncan, she talked her husband into doing the deed. “Was the hope drunk? …are u afraid? …live a coward in thine own esteem.” She scolded Macbeth a coward and that indeed, made Macbeth killed King Duncan.
Wu Ze Tian was also a person who craved for power. She had even strangled her own child to death in order to be the queen. Her motive was to frame the empress and made the emperor believed her because no mother in the world would bear to kill their own child. Eventually, the empress was banished and Wu Ze Tian became the empress. However, she was not contented to be just a queen. She wanted to control the country. She wanted to be the emperor. When the emperor died, she made her son the emperor but in fact, she was the one who was telling her son what to do. She was in fact the one ruling the country. Later, she demoted her two sons and became the emperor herself. She was the first and only female emperor in Chinese history.
However, as much as they were alike, there were still some differences between them. Lady Macbeth manipulated other people to do the killing for her. She had her own hesitations as King Duncan reminded her of her own father. She did not bear to do the deed herself. Therefore, Macbeth did it for her.
However, in Wu Ze Tian’s case, she did the killing of her daughter on her own. She has no hesitations. She was willing to sacrifice her daughter’s life in exchange of being the empress. She did everything on her own. When people thought badly of her and badmouthed her, she killed them for she could not stand negative remarks made by other people towards her.
After Lady Macbeth killed King Duncan, she became paranoid and was so guilt-stricken that she went insane. She regretted what she had done to King Duncan and during the night, her sub-conscious mind over powered her conscious mind and guilt arose in her. This shows that she did not want to kill King Duncan. She did everything for power and her husband.
In Wu Ze Tian’s case, she did not feel a tinge of guilt after the killing of her own child. Although that was her own flesh and blood, she did not think that she did any wrong in killing her. Even Lady Macbeth felt guilty when she killed a person not related too her by blood. However, despite being the mother of the poor child, she was not guilt-stricken.
Also, Lady Macbeth loved her husband a lot. Her doings proved that she did everything for Macbeth. However, her husband did not appreciate what Lady Macbeth had done for him. He ignored her after he became the king and did not even show any signs of sadness when Lady Macbeth died.
In Wu Ze Tian’s case, she married the emperor since young and because of her beauty and intelligence and therefore, there was no true love between them. The emperor loved Wu Ze Tian because of her appearance. Wu Ze Tian became a favourite of the emperor because of her talent in arts, history and literature. Therefore, the emperor was attracted to Wu Ze Tian due to her intelligence as well. If Wu Ze Tian loved her husband, she would not have gone into another relationship with other men who became kings after her first husband died.
In conclusion, Lady Macbeth and Wu Ze Tian were similar in the sense that they both think that they are power hungry. However, Lady Macbeth is not as flirtatious as Wu Ze Tian and she was less heartless in a way that she did not do the killing herself.
Credits:
http://www.clicknotes.com/macbeth/T17.html#47
http://www.anoca.org/her/she/wu_ze_tian.html
http://www.womeninworldhistory.com/heroine6.html
http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/bios/b3wuempress.htm
