Examine the development and exploration of one of the themes in Macbeth which makes the play relevant to a modern audience.
Macbeth Essay
Examine the development and exploration of one of the themes in Macbeth which makes the play relevant to a modern audience.
Macbeth is Shakespeare's shortest and bloodiest tragedy. It tells the story of a brave Scottish general, Macbeth, who receives a prophecy from three witches that one day he will become king of Scotland. Consumed with ambitious thoughts and spurred to action by his wife, he murders King Duncan while he is asleep and seizes the throne for himself. A number of themes are conveyed in the play but perhaps the predominant theme is related to ambition and how raw ambition, if left unchecked, can have disastrous effects, which is most definitely relevant to modern audiences. This theme is explored through the utilization of characterization and plot.
Macbeth is the main character of the play, hence the title. At the beginning of the play he is presented as a noble, brave yet ambitious person. The problem occurs soon after when Macbeth is approached by the three witches whom prophesy to him that he will be king of Scotland. His ambition soon consumes him and he begins to debate with himself whether or not he should kill King Duncan. He ends up deciding not to kill the King but he tells this to his wife but she persuades Macbeth to kill King Duncan. Lady Macbeth convinces Macbeth to kill the King by taunting Macbeth and challenging his manhood:
Lady Macbeth: ...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.
After Macbeth kills King Duncan he soon becomes King. But from this point on Macbeth's mental state (e.g. when Macbeth sees a dagger in front of him, or when Macbeth sees the 'ghost' of Banquo) enters a downward spiral thanks to his conscience. But Macbeth's unchecked ambition doesn't only eventually destroy him, but also throws Scotland and nature into chaos:
Ross: ...thou see'st, the ...
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Lady Macbeth: ...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.
After Macbeth kills King Duncan he soon becomes King. But from this point on Macbeth's mental state (e.g. when Macbeth sees a dagger in front of him, or when Macbeth sees the 'ghost' of Banquo) enters a downward spiral thanks to his conscience. But Macbeth's unchecked ambition doesn't only eventually destroy him, but also throws Scotland and nature into chaos:
Ross: ...thou see'st, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock, 'tis day,
And yet dark night strangles the traveling lamp:
Is't night's predominance, or the day's shame,
That darkness does the face of earth entomb,
When living light should kiss it?
We can see how before Macbeth killed Duncan, he was ambitious but everything was fine because Macbeth's morals and values overruled his ambition and kept it in check. But when Macbeth threw his morals and values out the door, his ambition was unchecked and this is when it became destructive. So ambition is not all bad, only when it is left unchecked.
Lady Macbeth is a major character in the play, probably the second most important, and is vital to the play. Her ambition is just as strong as Macbeth's, if not stronger. When she first learns of the witches' prophecies in the letter Macbeth sends to her, she calls on the spirits of darkness and evil to replace all her nurturing, feminine qualities with remorseless cruelty:
Lady Macbeth: ...Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;
Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts,
And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,
Wherever in your sightless substances
You wait on nature's mischief!
She certainly does become filled with remorseless cruelty as well. When Macbeth tells her of his decision not to kill King Duncan she tells him that she would rather kill her own child than to withdraw from a solemn commitment:
Lady Macbeth: ...I have given suck, and know
How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me:
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums,
And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you
Have done to this.
As with Macbeth, Lady Macbeth's conscience begins eating away at her and soon after going crazy she commits suicide. Lady Macbeth's role in the play is of utmost importance as it is she whom persuades Macbeth to kill the King after he decided not to. So in a way it is Lady Macbeth's unbridled ambition which sets off the chain of events which throws all of Scotland into turmoil and eventuates in her own as well as Macbeth's deaths.
The plot is very important in exploring the destructive side of unchecked ambition because there is a change that arcs over the play. This change is evident in the characters, setting/nature and overall mood/atmosphere. The arc goes from good to bad to, good again. The mood starts off good, then goes bad when Macbeth kills Duncan and becomes King up until Macbeth himself is killed, then it's good again with a sense of hope for Scotland now that the evil tyrannical Macbeth has been slain.
This arc is reflected in Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Their unchecked ambition leads them and their country into despair and chaos. But when they die, everything is fine again. When Duncan is killed nature begins to go haywire and nature stays this way until Macbeth and his wife are dead. In essence, when the unchecked ambition of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is present, everything else in the play is negative, but when the ambition is under control or destroyed altogether, everything else in the play is positive.
In conclusion, if ambition is left unchecked it can have disastrous effects, as was explored in the play Macbeth through the utilization of characterization and plot. This theme is explored greatly in the play and, as with most of Macbeth's plays; this theme is still relevant to a modern audience.
David Rose
