What drives Macbeth to kill Duncan the king?

 The play ‘Macbeth’ gives the audience plenty of opportunities to consider the reasons for the main character Macbeth deciding to kill Duncan the king. In this essay I will consider how Shakespeare’s super natural characters, the three witches play a part in driving Macbeth to kill the king. They visit Macbeth with three predictions, one of which tells him that which is already true, that he is the Thane of Glamis, one telling him that he will be Thane of Cowador, and the final prediction tells him that he will eventually become king of Scotland. Other factors that contribute to Duncan’s murder are Macbeth’s own ambition, and Lady Macbeth, whose great greed inspires her to take control of the situation.

        There are many different parts in the play that shows that the witches have supernatural powers. ‘But in a sieve ill tither sail.’ This was thought to be a common practice for witches, they would fly in sieves over the sea and make strong winds and storms so that it would damage the ships that were in the sea. Another example of the witches having supernatural powers is when one of the witches put a curse on the sailor ‘He shall live a man forbid.’ The witches have the power to put curses on people and they are evil enough to do so, also the witches had limits of what they can do. ‘Though his bark cannot be lost.’ Witches were not allowed to actually kill anyone, which is probably why the witches didn’t kill the sailor they only put a curse on him. Another example of the witches supernatural powers are shown when they tell

Macbeth the last prediction, ‘All hail Macbeth that shalt be king hereafter.’ The witches have predicted the future as Macbeth does later become the king of Scotland. The witches also had the power to control the weather, ‘I’ll give thee a wind.’ They chose to use their powers in an evil and bad way.

        In the play Shakespeare has made the witches very evil characters. It starts straight away by describing the scenery and atmosphere, ‘in thunder, lightning or in rain.’ This creates an evil atmosphere and a dramatic, immediate impact on the audience. ‘upon the heath.’ The heath is a very isolated and derelict place it is like the witches are meeting there so no one will see what they are doing. The witches are meeting in darkness, ‘That will be ere the set of sun.’ they are being secretive and something they shouldn’t.

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        Throughout the play the witches seem to always be doing something evil, ‘When the hurly burly’s done.’ This makes the witches sound like there up to no good as hurly burly means turmoil and trouble.

The downfall of Macbeth begins early on in the play when he and Banquo (a fellow Scottish noble) meet the witches. The witches waylay Macbeth and Banquo whilst they were on their way to meet Duncan, King of Scotland. They decide to listen to the witches, out of sheer curiosity. The three witches greet Macbeth as “Thane of Glamis”, the title he already holds, ...

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