Transcendentalism and Anit-Transcendentalim

English 10 Honors
May 30th, 2012

Blinded Ambition in Macbeth The Tragedy of Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies. Macbeth himself is the play’s protagonist. Macbeth is a man who was consumed by ambition from his wife Lady Macbeth and both characters could not escape from the guilt caused.
Macbeth is the main character in Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Macbeth. Macbeth is known as a noble and gifted man who chooses to become a treacherous character. The character Macbeth is interesting because he is well aware of the horror of his deeds. In Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth’s growing ambition changed him from a respected war-hero to a ruthless murderer. As Macbeth became a ruthless murderer, guilt began to play a huge part in his life. His own guilt began to haunt him.
Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare’s play is the wife of Macbeth. Lady Macbeth is known for being an ambitious person for honor, superiority, and power. Lady Macbeth plays a very commanding and persuasive character in Shakespeare’s Macbeth. She persuades her husband Macbeth into a greedy ambitious person. Macbeth listens to his wife and gets his way of becoming king through murder. With that, Lady Macbeth plays a controlling wife throughout the play.
As said by Darroll, A.C Bradley writes in his Shakespearean Tragedy, She takes the superior position and assumes the direction of affairs- appears to assume it even more than really can, that she may spur him on . . . she bears down his faint resistance by presenting him with a prepared scheme. She rouses him with a taunt no man can bear. . .It is . . . through the admiration she extorts from him and through sheer force of will, that she impels him to the deed. Her eyes are fixed upon the crown and the means to it . . . (Darroll 49-50) Lady Macbeth and Macbeth have a loving and different relationship. In the beginning of the play both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are comfortable with sharing and giving advice to each other. They were both very affectionate with each other and Macbeth kept his wife aware of what was going on with King Duncan at the time. They both had the same view on what they wanted to do to usurp Duncan’s throne. After Macbeth tells Lady Macbeth he does not want to go along with her plan to kill Duncan because he realizes that he has done nothing wrong to anyone, he is a good king, and he is much loved. The only reason he has to kill Duncan at the time was that he wanted to become king. Macbeth is hesitant with killing Duncan. Lady Macbeth is outraged when she hears what he has to say about negating her plan. Lady Macbeth begins to say:
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. (1:7:54-59)
Lady Macbeth begins to accuse her husband Macbeth about his manhood and courage. She challenges Macbeth to commit to the plan to murder Duncan.
After the death of Duncan, we notice the influence that Lady Macbeth plays onto her husband Macbeth. When Macbeth goes to kill the guards, we realize that was not part of Lady Macbeth’s plan to kill them and addition to the King. The fault was to be on them but Macbeth killed the guards and from there we realize that was Macbeth’s choice.
As said by Brown, Here Macbeth’s explanation shows how far he has gone beyond her in taking the initiative on his own; killing the grooms in addition to the King was not in her thought and this marks the point at which she begins to lose him. He was at first horrified at his own deed in killing Duncan, but can return to look on the dead King and kill the grooms without a qualm. (Brown 18)
Lady Macbeth does not know the difference of good and evil. Macbeth realizes there will be consequences. Macbeth also realizes what he did and that it cannot be forgotten. As Macbeth looks at his hands he realizes what has been done and Lady Macbeth responds to him with telling him to just wash it off. The way Macbeth questions and thinks about killing the king shows that he knows that killing the king is wrong and that he will feel guilty if he does so. Lady Macbeth never worries that they will be caught and never worries that she will feel guilty. Those who read the Tragedy of Macbeth can say that Lady Macbeth was blinded by her own ambition and talked her husband into it. After the deaths of Duncan, the guards and Banquo Macbeth starts to feel guilty and guilt takes up a big part in his life. All the murderers he has gotten away with begin to dwell on him. He does have hallucinations and they reflect on his actions. Macbeth also sees a ghost of Banquo which ends up making the people curious of Macbeth and all the deaths reappearing. Not only Macbeth begins to feel guilt racing upon him but his wife Lady Macbeth feels guilt too. Macbeth lacks sleep and Lady Macbeth is sleep-walking. When the thought of killing King Duncan first arose, and the death was done Lady Macbeth was the one who told Macbeth just to wipe his hands off. Lady Macbeth is now the one that cannot deal with what she has caused. Those who read Shakespeare’s play dwell on the fact that she is the main one who has brought this idea to her husband Macbeth.
As said by Favila, Moral thoughts haunt Macbeth. Evil spirits tend them; Lady Macbeth inspires them; the hero embraces them - In turn, Lady Macbeth feeds these “moral thoughts” to her husband, They flash like a light bulb above his head in the image of a sword dripping blood- But before the play is over, these thoughts become a killing conscience; for Macbeth, thoughts of mortality. Mocked by Banquo’s line of dynasty, stretching to the judgment day, Macbeth embraces mortal thoughts, magical thoughts, and kills and kills again. (Favila 1)
Lady Macbeth deals with guilt until her death and Macbeth’s reaction to her death is that it was going to happen eventually. Towards the end of the play before Macbeth is killed, he realizes that he only has some men on his side and the others have switched their place and are now going to fight against him. Macbeth is then killed by the Thane of Fife, Macduff.
As said by Shanley, Macbeth is defeated as is no other of Shakespeare’s great tragic figures. No pity and reverent awe attend his death. Dying off-stage, he is, as it were, shuffled off, in keeping with his dreadful state and the desire of all in his world to be rid of him. The sight of his “cursed head” is the signal for glad hailing of Malcolm as king; all thought of him is dismissed with “this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen.” (Shanley 305) From reading Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Macbeth, the readers can tell that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have had a different relationship. Lady Macbeth greatly influenced her husband and Macbeth was driven by ambition and could not escape his own guilt.