How far does Shakespeare’s portrayal of Macbeth enable an
audience to empathise with him as a tragic hero?
According to Aristotle (Poetics, Aristotle) “Every great tragedy is dominated by a
protagonist who has within himself a tragic flaw”, too much or too little of one of
Aristotle's twelve virtues; a tragic hero must also evoke pity in the audience.
In Macbeth, by William Shakespeare, Macbeth, a great Scottish general and thane of
Glamis, has just won an important battle, when he is told by three witches that he will
become thane of Cawdor and then king of Scotland. After Macbeth is given Cawdor by
King Duncan, he takes the witches words for truth and conspires against Duncan with his
wife. When Duncan comes to Macbeth's castle that night, Macbeth kills him and takes
the crown for himself after Duncan's sons flee from Scotland. Then Macbeth reigns for a
while, has several people killed, and is eventually slain by Macduff when he and
Malcolm return leading the armies of England.
Macbeth appears first in the play as a military hero. King Duncan calls him “valiant
cousin, worthy gentlemen”, “noble Macbeth”, “worthiest cousin”. He ends the play
as a cruel tyrant, deserted by his soldiers and allies, and finally slain by Mcduff. The new
king, Malcolm, viewing Macbeth’s severed head, dismisses him as “this dead butcher”.
As he journeys through the play from brave soldier to murderous tyrant, Macbeth is
revealed as a deeply sensitive man, tortured by his imagination and his conscience. His
wife believes him to be a good man (“too full o’th’ milk of human kindness”) and he
knows that it is wrong to kill Duncan. He struggles to overcome his evil thoughts, but is
tempted to criminality by the witches, by his wife’s pressure, and by his own ambition.
He murders his way to the throne of Scotland, then arranges the killing of anyone he
suspects to be his enemy.
Conflicting thoughts of good and evil constantly torment Macbeth (“O, full of scorpions
is my mind, dear wife!”). But as he is drawn ever deeper into cruel and brutal actions he
strives to harden his responses and to lose “the taste of fear”. Learning of his wife’s
death, he reflects despairingly on the emptiness of life “a tale / Told by an idiot, full of
sound and fury / Signifying nothing”.
He finally becomes aware that the Witches have misled him (“be these juggling fiends
no more believed”). Even in his despair and weariness he determines to die bravely
(“Blow wind, come wrack; / At least we’ll die with harness on our back”). He slays
Young Siward and, coming face to face with Mcduff, still fights defiantly to the end
although he realises he has met his nemesis (“Lay on Macduff, / And damned be him
that first cries, ‘hold enough!’ ”). Whether Macbeth’s final words and actions represent
heroic endurance or the snarling of a trapped animal is open for each reader to decide.
Lady Macbeth appears first as a supremely confident, dominant figure. She revels in the
prospect of Macbeth becoming king, and calls on evil spirits to help her persuade him to
kill Duncan. She urges him to use deception to cloak murderous intentions (“look like
th’innocent flower, / But be the serpent under’t”). When Macbeth’s resolve to do the
murder slackens, she taunts his manhood, convincing him to do the deed. She becomes
his active accomplice, even returning the bloody daggers to Duncan’s bed room when
Macbeth fears to return them himself.
In Act three Lady Macbeth begins to feel the emptiness of their achievement, seeing only
“doubtful joy”. She appears increasingly isolated and drained of energy as Macbeth
moves away from her into his own troubled thoughts. She becomes more of an audience
to Macbeth’s words, rather than his partner. Although she rallies at the disastrous
banquet, she ends that scene displaying none of her earlier dominance over her husband.
Shakespeare does not show Lady Macbeth’s decline into nervous breakdown and suicide,
giving only one glimpse of that horrifying process: the torment she experiences in her
sleepwalking.
Shakespeare use of metaphor and imagery to explore the themes within the play, are very
evident, and relatively easy to ascertain for example: "Fair is foul and foul is fair.” This
phrase is a metaphor that describes the state of affairs within Macbeth and within
Scotland. Evil and sinister things have taken the place of all that is good and just.
Macbeth is a tyrannous ruler who consorts with witches and "murders" sleep; the kind
and venerable King Duncan and Banquo are brutally killed. In the midst of all of this,
Inverness becomes a living hell for its inhabitants while Macbeth and his wife suffer from
delusions and paranoia.
"And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, The instruments of darkness tell us truths.”
The comparison of the witches to "instruments of darkness" reveals their truly foul
nature. Shakespeare is implying through Banquo that the honeyed prophecies of the
weird sisters will only bring about Macbeth's downfall. In addition, since Macbeth
listens to the witches, he can be considered an "instrument of darkness" himself.
"The sleeping and the dead Are but as pictures. 'Tis the eye of childhood That fears
a painted devil." Lady Macbeth's comparison of the sleeping and the dead to "pictures"
exemplifies her extraordinary courage and calm state of mind after the murder. Lady
Macbeth should supposedly be faint-hearted because she is a woman; in reality, however,
she and her husband have switched roles.
"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the
stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.” In this world-renowned quote, Macbeth compares life to an
incompetent actor. This metaphor is important because it exemplifies his fatalistic and
rebel-like tendencies as well as his apathy for his wife's death.
Shakespeare applies the imagery of clothing, darkness and blood. Each detail in his
imagery contains an important symbol of the play. These symbols need to be understood
in order to interpret the entire play.
Within the play `Macbeth' the imagery of clothing portrays that Macbeth is seeking to
hide his "disgraceful self" from his eyes and others. . Shakespeare wants to keep alive the
contrast between the pitiful creature that Macbeth really is and the disguises he assumes
to conceal the fact. Macbeth is constantly represented symbolically as the wearer of
robes not belonging to him. He is wearing an undeserved dignity, which is a point well
made by the uses of clothing imagery. The description of the purpose of clothing in
Macbeth is the fact that these garments are not his. Therefore, Macbeth is uncomfortable
in them because he is continually conscious of the fact that they do not belong to him. In
the following passage, the idea constantly reappears, Macbeth's new honours sit ill upon
him, like loose and badly fitting garments, belonging to someone else: “The Thane of
Cawdor lives. Why do you dress me In borrowed robes?”, ” New honours come
upon him Like strange garments, cleave not to their mould, But with the aid of use”.
These passages are clearly demonstrating that Macbeth cannot fit in these garments. They
are not meant to and the clothing imagery is therefore effective.
The second form of imagery used to add to the atmosphere is the imagery of darkness.
Macbeth, a Shakespearean tragedy contains and demonstrates the darkness in a tragedy.
In the play, the design of the witches, the guilt in Macbeth's soul and the darkness of the
night establish the atmosphere. All of the remarkable scenes take place at night or in
some dark spot, for instance; the vision of the dagger, the murder of Duncan, the murder
of Banquo and Lady Macbeth's sleep walking. Darkness symbolizes many things such as
evil and death in the play. Thus is evident when Macbeth calls on night to come so that
he can proceed with Duncan's murder. Macbeth says: “ Come, thick night, And pall
thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, That my keen knife see not thee wound makes Nor
heaven peep through the blanket of the dark”. Macbeth calls on thick night to come
cloaked in the blackest smoke so that it may not reveal or witness his evil deed and black
desires.
Shakespeare also uses blood imagery extensively in Macbeth. Blood can represent life,
death and often injury. Shakespeare uses blood to represent treason, guilt, murder and
death. Lady Macbeth shows the most vivid example of guilt with the use of the imagery
of blood, in the scene that she walks in her sleep. She says: “Out, damned spot! Out, I
say! One; two; why then `tis time to do't. Hell is murky! Fie, my Lord--fie! A soldier, and
afeard? What need we fear who Knows it, when none can all out power to account? Yet
who have thought the old man to have Had so much blood in him”. It is ironic that this is
said, when right after the murder, when Macbeth was feeling guilty. Lady Macbeth says:
"A little water clears us of the deed.”. It becomes very evident that she is having
troubles with her guilt. Also through the blood Macbeth convinces himself to commit the
crimes and continue to murder and deceit. This is demonstrated when the return of
Banquo as a ghost feels that there is no choice of retracting from evil and so Macbeth
says: "I am in blood stepp'd in so far, that, should I wade no more/ Returning were
as tedious go o'er.". The blood sheds have influenced Macbeth into thinking that there
is no turning back and he must continue to murder and deceit.
Imagery plays a crucial role in developing plot. This is seen through the images of
clothing, darkness and blood. Clothing in Macbeth is often compared to positions or
ranks. Macbeth's ambition caused him to strive to improve his social standing. Darkness
establishes the evil parts of the play. Blood the most dominant image in the play brings a
sense of guilt and violence to the tragedy. It leads Macbeth to continue his deceitful life.
Shakespeare’s use of imagery in his plays is notorious. Without imagery Macbeth may
have lacked because imagery gives an effect on the play as a whole.
Shakespeare uses nature as a setting (the witches only come in thunderstorms, murders
happen under cover of darkness, etc.) to highlight that men are still part of the natural
world. The characters in the play don’t abide by man’s law, but by the laws of nature.
They struggle, adapt, fight and even kill just like any other animals, and just like the real
(and natural) world, there’s no moral to this story. Macbeth is not about human justice,
but natural survival of the fittest. What makes men different from animals is our ability to
curb our natures. Desire, fear and all sorts of other primitive feelings which originate
from our natural beginnings, but the triumph of good in this play, with the rightful King
restored and the zealous tyrant dead, proves that man’s natural state is civilization, not the
chaos of the wild.
In conclusion, the prophecies given to him by the witches, Lady Macbeth's influence and
plan, and his intensified ambition, all contributed greatly to his degeneration of character
which resulted to his downfall and ultimately death. Therefore Macbeth character
displays strong signs of a tragic hero, making him the ideal classic example.