William Shakespeare’s Macbeth
Macbeth was not always an evil person. He was a war leader and noble lord but his greed for power led to his ultimate destruction “Our captains, Macbeth and Banquo? ... As sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion. If I say sooth, I must report they were, As cannons overcharged with double cracks.” (I.ii.37-41). He was a loyal subject and friend to the king, but after his first meeting with the witches his lust for power took over his long lived loyalty to the king. Right after the meeting with the witches Macbeth decided that he must not wait for fate to end King Duncan’s reign but take matters into his own hands by murdering the long beloved king. That is when he started his way down the path of evil. Just as the unsuspecting king was asleep in Macbeth’s home Macbeth started to think back on his decision to kill Duncan. This shows that he is still not entirely a monster but still has some humanity in him. It was ultimately his wife Lady Macbeth who pushes him over the edge to kill Duncan because of her questioning his manhood. The King’s murder is the first of a long line of murder either committed or ordered by the tyrannical Macbeth and each one puts him that much farther along the path of corruption until his destruction in act five of the play.
Lady Macbeth is the kind of woman who will do anything and manipulate anybody in order to achieve power for her and her husband. This is shown by how she asks everything evil in the world to make her more masculine so that she could help her husband become king “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!” (I.v.41-44). She asks the devil and everything evil to fill her with evil thoughts and substances so that she could convince Macbeth to kill King Duncan in order to achieve the throne of Scotland. She finally does convince him and then Macbeth inherits the Scottish throne from Duncan. After the murder of Duncan the roles between Macbeth and his wife switch to where Macbeth is now the mastermind behind their crimes and Lady Macbeth is the one questioning if they should really commit their next crime. This shows that she begins to become more