Lady Macbeth is not the main driving force behind King Duncan’s murder Essay

In my opinion, dame Macbeth is non the main driving force crumb queen mole rat Duncans move out. The onus for this heinous deed rests with Macbeth himself, as he would collapse renderted this treacherous act even if Lady Macbeth had not encourage him on.When the witches make their predictions, they told Macbeth that he would be Thane of Cawdor and then later queer. I firmly believe that these predictions caused Macbeth to start super acidght, and thus started a chain of events that ended up with Duncan cosmos murdered. Macbeths reaction to the witches prophecy was 1 of fear and agitation. Good sir, why do you start, and calculatem to fear things that do sound so fair? says Banquo.I thumb that Macbeth fears the prophecy because he had been prizeing close becoming King before. Deep inside him, Macbeth had the ambition to become King, and this is exactly what the witches prophesized and it was as if they had read his mind. This essential be the reason the witches had e lect Macbeth, and not Banquo or any other Thane in Scotland. The witches prophecy ignited his deep dark ambition, and he starts to think ab bug out how he will become King.How of all clock time, the witches cannot be held responsible for Duncans murder because Macbeth already did have the thought of being King before. The thought was already in Macbeths head, all the witches did was to act as a catalyst in make him pursue his ambition.Macbeth then becomes rapt withal because, I feel, he starts thinking about the different ways he can become King. One of them was to murder Duncan himself, and this must have been the horrid image Macbeth thinks about. Although this image scares him, it stills raises the question of whether Macbeth really is as noble and loyal a Thane as people say he is. If he were such a noble Thane, why would he think about run throughing his accept King? One substantial point to mention here is that he is already thinking about killing King Duncan without any intervention of Lady Macbeth, who has not even been introduced into the play.However, Macbeth then decides that since he was made Thane of Cawdor without doing anything, he capability become King without having to do much either (without my stir). Macbeth decides that if he becomes King it will be because of sheer good luck, not because he did something to try becoming King. I feel that this decision might have been made because he knows that he is one of the most powerful Thane in Scotland and so expects to be made Duncans heir to the throne. However, King Duncan label the heir of his throne to be Malcolm, his elder son, who shall be known as the Prince of Cumberland. It is then that Macbeth decides that he must take some action if he ever hopes to be King.The Prince of Cumberland-that is a step, on which I must fall down, or else oerleap For in my way it lies. Stars hide your fires, Let no light see my black and deep desires, says Macbeth. This is very much a contrast to the de cision he had made of doing nothing against Duncan in the previous scene. His loyalty to his King looses out to his ambition.Lady Macbeth is then introduced into the play when Macbeth sends a letter to her, telling her about the strange events that happened that day, perhaps because he knew that his wife would be there to give him the strength he needed to do anything against the King.Lady Macbeths number one reaction after reading the letter is that Macbeth is too kind and noble to do anything swelled to become King. She knows that Macbeth has the ambition, but she also knows that he would be hesitant to do the evil things to achieve his ambitions. Art not without ambition, but without the illness that should attend it, she says.From the first meeting between Lady Macbeth and Macbeth, I can conclude that Lady Macbeth wants to be butt more than Macbeth wants to be King. Such was her desperation to be Queen that Lady Macbeth was even prepared to call on the evil spirits to make h er strong, and she wants to assume masculine qualities unsex me here so that she will not have any wo slicely weaknesses. She had spoken of pouring her valour into Macbeths ear, and valour (according to Shakespearean audiences) is a masculine quality.This would have shocked the audience in the Elizabethan era, because at that time they believed that the universe, the natural world and human society were ordered in one owing(p) chain or hierarchy. According to the great chain, women should be weak, and their husbands should rule all wives. However, in this scene, Lady Macbeth is shown to have a lot of mettle, and has a power over her husband. She tells him that people can see safe through him. Your face, my Thane, is a book where men May read strange matters. She then tells him to disguise his real thoughts and deceive people into believing something. Look the likes of th innocent flower, But be the serpent undert.Macbeths will to murder Duncan wavers because he starts to list the reasons for why he should not wrap onto the path of evil. He fears judgment from God and his conscience will haunt him for his entire life. Bloody instructions, which being taught return To plague th inventor. He then says that he is Duncans kinsman and his subject and should protect Duncan since he is his host, and not bear the knife myself.He says that Duncan is a good, kind and virtuous King and the sole(prenominal) thing driving him towards Duncans murder is his vaulting ambition. (Macbeth is shown here as being a tragic hero, an otherwise noble and virtuous character who locomote due to one particular flaw, ambition. There are many other Shakespearean plays with tragic heroes, such as Othello, which tells a story of a man destroyed by jealousy.)When his wife arrives Macbeth tells her that he will not murder Duncan. (We will proceed no further in this business)This depicts Macbeths helpless state of mind and his vacillation whether or not to assassinate Duncan.Here, Lady Mac beth shows her deep resolve and when she persuades and manipulates Macbeth into killing Duncan. She accuses him of cowardice and lack of love for her. And live a coward in thine own esteem. She claims that he was drunk when he promised her he would kill Duncan (although nowhere has the audience actually seen Macbeth promise this). She even says that she would dash the brains of her very own child if she had promised to, and so Macbeth should also be loyal to his promise.Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums, And dashed the brains out, had I sworn as you Have do thisThese words from Lady Macbeth suggest that she is less moral than Macbeth and even evil. While she sees nothing wrong in Duncans murder, Macbeth, despite his deep ambition, fears the consequences of his immoral deeds.another(prenominal) reason for not killing Duncan was because he was afraid of getting caught, and not because he wished to remain loyal. Getting caught would jeopardize his chances of becoming King forever. If we should fail? is what he asks Lady Macbeth.After Lady Macbeth formulates a plan, which impresses Macbeth and he says Bring forth men-children only. Macbeth is convinced that this plan was foolproof, and he succumbs to his ambition and proceeds to murder Duncan. This reveals that he cute to kill Duncan all along, and was just waiting for the right opportunity to present itself. The moment Lady Macbeth came up with a plan, he readily agreed. Lady Macbeth believed that this was the time to murder Duncan without getting caught, and this is what she made Macbeth believe. If Lady Macbeth had not been there Macbeth would has probably stuck to his decision of not killing Duncan at that time but he would have killed Duncan later.He says this in the end of the scene- I am settled and bend up each corporal agent to this terrible feat. He even starts making plans of what to do with the daggers after he murders Duncan- When we mark with blood those sleepy two.Fate was also playing its hand at making Macbeth feel that it was his destiny to kill Duncan when Macbeth starts hallucinating and sees a dagger, leading him to Duncans room. (Is this dagger which I see before me?) It shows that fate also played its role in trying to adjure Macbeth into murdering his King.Later, Act Two Scene Two we see Lady Macbeth waiting for Macbeth, who has left to murder Duncan. It is then when she says that she would have killed Duncan herself if he hadnt looked like her sky pilot sleeping. Lady Macbeth did not have the courage to kill someone who looked like her father. Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had donet, says Lady Macbeth. This tells us that she is not as brave and courageous as she made herself sound before, and still had some womanly weaknesses.This would have made Elizabethan audiences feel that although Lady Macbeth is evil and is stronger than her husband in some aspects, she is still the dutiful daughter she should be. This father-daughter relationsh ip was considered very important at that time, and they were also very important in Shakespearean plays. There are many other examples of father daughter relationships in other plays written by Shakespeare, such as Othello and King Lear.When Macbeth arrives after killing Duncan he starts wavering again, he was worried about the consequences of him murdering murder. He was afraid of being judged by God for the evil he had done. Macbeth profoundly regrets killing Duncan, and this was his immediate reaction, so he probably never wanted to. This is shown when Macbeth hears the Thanes knocking on Duncans bedroom door- Wake Duncan with thy knocking. I would thou couldst.There is also a marked contrast between the reaction of Lady Macbeth and Macbeth once they both have Duncans blood on their hands. Macbeth starts discharge mad with guilt from the sight of the blood, while Lady Macbeth just tells him to wash it off, as if nothing happened. She said that My hands are of your colour but I shame To wear a heart so white.From the murder onwards all the devious plots and plans were made by Macbeth and not Lady Macbeth. He is the one who kills Banquo, because he knows that Banquo suspects him of foul play. (To be thus is nothing, But to be safely thus.). This shows that Macbeth is also quite evil and black hearted and will do anything to be King. From the murder onwards Macbeth is the real driving force and not Lady Macbeth.In conclusion the final responsibility for his actions rests with Macbeth himself. The witches predictions did stroke his ambition and Lady Macbeth egged him on to commit acts of perfidy. However Macbeth always had a choice. Witches had predicted that Banquos sons would be Kings. Banquo chose to do nothing- leaving matters to fate. Macbeth became Thane of Cawdor by being a loyal subject and he could have chosen to remain so until his destiny ordained him King. He could have easily said that since he was destined to be King it would somehow happen anyw ay. instead he chose to murder his King and arranged to kill his best friend. His ambition drives him to rule as a tyrant, and he chose to abandon his former path of job and honour which ultimately leads to his downfall and tragic end.