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English Lit
Macbeth as Tragedy
ENG 125
Week 4 Discussion 2
I have to agree that Shakespeare’s Macbeth much about the human, nature experiences because it deals with many of the dark depths of humanity. What it conveys about humanity and the human experience is betrayal, cruelty, jealous, power, murder, revenge, and we must be careful about becoming to ambitious. We also have to be careful allowing others to influence us to do something that we know is morally wrong. This play is mostly showing ambition and calling the play a tragedy, Macbeth’s ambition is that of negative outcome murdering people and sending them to slaughter due to his own fears.
Macbeth’s subject matter, themes, form, or other literary elements might be characteristics of tragedy due to of him murdering Duncan in Act 2 Scene 1, Para 3: :”I go, and it is done. The bell invites me. Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell that summons thee to heaven or to hell.” (Crowther, 2005). Macbeth’s ambition to be king is what drives him negatively into more and more fear and hatred causing him to lose control of reality. Macbeth begins to lose his wife on his road to becoming more and more a monster and loses his own grip in reality seeing things and seeking council from the witches in visions of the future which drive him more and more insane. He begins to trust no one and isolates himself from everyone around him. This I believe to be a tragedy due to all negative aspects in this play. This tragic qualities of the play contribute to the story’s larger message by conveying to the audience or reader of the play in portraying the negative effects of becoming power hungry after murdering then a sadistic ruling of people through use of fear and executions, thus making more steps toward evil, murder, power, lust for control, loss of control, trust in no one, and fearing everyone. For Macbeth’s lust for more power he eventually loses control of reality, starts seeing ghosts, and his life by Macduff.
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