Macbeth Essay

Michelle Lam

Period 3

Macbeth Essay

Macbeth is not only a well known Shakespeare play, but it is also a play that portrays how man’s perceptions of fate affect man’s actions. Shakespeare cleverly uses characterization to clarify this perception and how it drives the plot forward. Using characterization, Shakespeare justifies the characters’ actions and hints at further events.

Throughout the play, the character’s personalities are clearly depicted, which explains their thoughts in their soliloquies and actions. Readers learn early on that both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are very ambitious people. However, Macbeth becomes increasingly greedier throughout the duration of the play. After hearing the prophecy of becoming king, Macbeth is immediately imagining the greatness of becoming king and Lady Macbeth is already mustering up strength and courage to kill the current king. Their ambitions and greed are the driving forces that propelled them to take fate into their own hands and murder King Duncan in their home. Also, they never took into consideration of how and when Macbeth would become king. They assumed and believed that murdering is the fastest and only way to make the prophecy true; this too was an affect of their ambitions. The characterization of not only Macbeth but also the other characters, help move the plot forward by giving us glimpses of how they think and act and how they perceive fate.

Much of the play is centered on the characters’ ambitions, greed, and guilt, which help foreshadow future events. The characterizations foreshadowed future events because readers get a feeling of who the characters are and what they are capable of. For example, after Macbeth’s first murder, his greed and ambition show that he is ruthless and will do anything as far as murdering again to keep the throne in his possession further on. Also his guilt of murdering feeds on his insecurities which also hints that he will go to the extremes to keep his secret shame of murdering unknown. Shakespeare skillfully weaves in little things about the character that make them who they are, which in turn drives the action forward.

Shakespeare, without a doubt, clearly expressed the effects man’s perception on fate. He used characterization to show little things about each character in order to justify and hint at further actions.