Macbeth Timed Essay

Cindy Chan
P.3 Asher

In Shakespeare's Macbeth, it is clearly shown that the perceptions man has on his personal fate drive his actions no matter how sever. Macbeth's actions, thoughts, and reactions all become obsessively centered around the fate he believes will reach him, and these often unruly, significant actions prove that a man will never fail to fixate upon personal fate.

At the start of the play, Macbeth happens upon three witches who tell him of the apparent future. Macbeth is told t hat he will become Thane of Cawdor and eventually the King. Although initially skeptical, Macbeth becomes fixated on the idea of becoming King. He begins having uncontrollable thoughts f how he is to complete the prophecy presented by the witches. Macbeth's thoughts reveal that he would murder to become King. Macbeth begins having paranoid thoughts and hallucinations in which he sees the dagger that he should use to kill Duncan. Macbeth's thoughts grow into a full-scale intricate plan to murder Duncan and maliciously place the blame on two guards. Macbeth becomes so convinced that he is to become King, that this consumes his mind entirely. To him, glorious fate is all that awaits him afterwards and he will stop at nothing until he reaches the glory that has been implanted in his mind. These intense thoughts continue to consume Macbeth, and one by one they grow more powerful and influential. These thoughts, at first small, eventually transform into unavoidable actions which grow only more horrendous as the play advances.

By carrying out the actions in his mind, Macbeth shows that his fixation on his fate became the reason that drove every action in his life. All Macbeth could think about was becoming King and these thoughts grew into actions in which Macbeth's malicious intent progressively increased. The first act of murder was upon King Duncan. However, after the scheming calculations of that plan were carried out, Macbeth only grew more paranoid and territorial of his throne. He had anybody that could potentially be a hindrance to his success, taken out of the picture. Macbeth ordered macduff's family to be killed as well as Banquo and his son. macbeth's actions prove that his fixation on fate proved significantly influential on everything he did. Each action grew as a result of more insight in his future; every time the witches told him more of his apparent fate, the more intense and irrational his actions would grow to meet the predictions. Macbeth reacted to each new prophecy with a more intensely focused set of actions, trying to reach the unattainable goal that the witches were taunting him with. Macbeth acted in ways that did not allow resolution to be reached, wanting to become King, neither violence nor emotions stood in his way. Reacting to any questioning with only more gore, Macbeth was driven by the view of the throne in his mind which allowed no one to stop the freight train he had forced on path. Centered solely on his fate, Macbeth was only guided by the twisted ideas of fate in his convoluted mind that fed off of the treacherous actions, thoughts and reactions that led to his fatal end.