Macbeth
Macbeth begins as a valiant warrior, praised as 'brave Macbeth' and 'Bellona's bridegroom', but his encounter with the Witches ignites an ambition that consumes him. Shakespeare charts a devastating moral decline: from loyal thane to regicide, from regicide to tyrant, from tyrant to isolated, paranoid figure who has 'supp'd full with horrors'. His tragedy lies in the gap between what he knows is right and what he chooses to do — he is never unaware of his crimes, only unable to stop himself.
Key Themes
Macbeth's ambition is the engine of his destruction — present before the Witches speak, it drives every murder from Duncan to Banquo to Macduff's family.
Macbeth is never free of guilt; his hallucinations (the dagger, Banquo's Ghost) and sleeplessness reveal a conscience that torments him even as he continues to kill.
He hides his 'black and deep desires' behind the mask of a loyal subject and gracious host, performing innocence while planning regicide.
The Witches prophecy his rise but never command him to act — his tragedy is that he chooses to fulfil their words, making his downfall a product of free will, not destiny.
His moral decay is charted structurally: from agonised soliloquy before Duncan's murder to the casual ordering of Banquo's death to the massacre of Macduff's family without hesitation.
Macbeth's reign is the anti-model of kingship — where Duncan ruled through trust and generosity, Macbeth rules through fear, surveillance, and murder.
Character Arc
Introduced through the bleeding Captain's report as 'brave Macbeth', he is a celebrated war hero who has just defeated the rebel Macdonwald. He is trusted by King Duncan, rewarded with the title Thane of Cawdor, and appears the model of feudal loyalty.
The Witches' prophecy ('All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter') triggers an internal conflict. His 'horrible imaginings' show ambition already present, but he hesitates — it takes Lady Macbeth's goading to push him past his moral objections in the 'dagger' soliloquy.
Murders Duncan in his sleep, immediately consumed by guilt: 'Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood / Clean from my hand?' He cannot say 'Amen' and is horrified by what he has done, yet the irrevocable act sets him on a path from which there is no return.
Secures the throne but cannot secure his mind. Orders Banquo's murder without consulting Lady Macbeth, revealing his increasing isolation and autonomy in evil. Haunted by Banquo's ghost at the feast, he descends into paranoia and returns to the Witches for reassurance.
Stripped of all human connection — Lady Macbeth is dead, his thanes have abandoned him, and he recognises the meaninglessness of his actions: 'Life's but a walking shadow.' He fights on not from hope but from stubborn defiance, killed by Macduff and branded a 'dead butcher'.
Key Quotes
“Stars, hide your fires; / Let not light see my black and deep desires.”
Act 1, Scene 4
The imperative 'hide' reveals Macbeth is already concealing murderous ambition. The contrast of 'light' and 'black' connects to the play's motif of darkness concealing evil, while 'deep desires' suggests ambition is innate, not planted by the Witches.
Theme Links
The phrase 'black and deep desires' reveals that Macbeth's ambition is already present and powerful before Lady Macbeth or the Witches push him — it is innate and self-generated.
The imperative 'hide your fires' shows Macbeth consciously constructing a false exterior, asking the cosmos itself to help him conceal his true murderous intent.
That Macbeth must ask the stars to hide his desires proves he knows they are wrong — his corruption is conscious, not ignorant, making it all the more damning.
“Is this a dagger which I see before me, / The handle toward my hand?”
Act 2, Scene 1
The hallucinated dagger externalises Macbeth's internal conflict. The interrogative form shows his fractured psyche — he cannot distinguish reality from imagination. The handle pointing toward him suggests fate (or his own ambition) is directing him toward the murder.
Theme Links
The hallucination reveals Macbeth's psyche fracturing under the weight of what he is about to do — his conscience manifests physically as a vision he cannot control.
The handle pointing toward his hand suggests an external force directing him, yet Macbeth must still choose to grasp it — the dagger embodies the ambiguity between destiny and choice.
Macbeth cannot determine whether the dagger is real or imaginary, mirroring the play's wider collapse of the boundary between what is true and what is performed.
“I am in blood / Stepp'd in so far that, should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o'er.”
Act 3, Scene 4
The extended metaphor of wading through blood presents murder as a journey past the point of no return. 'Tedious' is chillingly casual — killing has become routine. This marks the transition from guilt-ridden murderer to calculating tyrant.
Theme Links
The word 'tedious' reduces mass murder to inconvenience, showing how completely Macbeth's moral sense has eroded — killing is now routine rather than horrifying.
The blood metaphor externalises Macbeth's guilt as a physical substance he is wading through, yet he no longer tries to wash it away — he accepts it as his element.
Macbeth frames continued killing as the path of least resistance, revealing that ambition has replaced conscience as his guiding principle.
“Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player / That struts and frets his hour upon the stage.”
Act 5, Scene 5
Macbeth's nihilistic soliloquy, triggered by Lady Macbeth's death, reduces life to meaningless performance. The metatheatrical metaphor ('poor player', 'stage') collapses the boundary between play and reality. 'Struts and frets' suggests self-importance is always temporary and hollow.
Theme Links
The speech exposes the ultimate emptiness of ambition: Macbeth achieved the crown and found it meaningless, reducing all human striving to a 'tale told by an idiot'.
Macbeth's nihilism implies that neither fate nor free will matters — life is random and purposeless, a despairing conclusion that denies meaning to his own choices.
The 'poor player' who 'struts and frets' is an image of hollow kingship — Macbeth has the title but none of the substance, performing royalty without legitimacy.
Key Relationships
She provides the resolve he lacks in Act 1, questioning his masculinity to drive him to action. Their relationship inverts: she begins dominant and ends broken, while he begins hesitant and ends hardened. By Act 3 he acts alone, and by Act 5 her death barely registers — 'She should have died hereafter.'
Both hear the Witches' prophecy, but Banquo resists temptation while Macbeth surrenders to it. Banquo's moral restraint exposes Macbeth's choice — the supernatural is not to blame, Macbeth's ambition is. The Ghost of Banquo at the feast is the physical manifestation of Macbeth's guilt.
They prophecy but never command — 'All hail, Macbeth' is a greeting, not an instruction. Shakespeare leaves ambiguous whether they create Macbeth's ambition or merely reveal it. James I's audience would have read them as agents of the devil, making Macbeth's willingness to trust them a damning moral choice.
Duncan represents everything Macbeth destroys: legitimate kingship, trust, divine order. Macbeth himself acknowledges Duncan's virtues — 'hath borne his faculties so meek' — making the murder not ignorant but fully conscious, and therefore worse.
Writer’s Methods
Shakespeare uses soliloquies to expose Macbeth's inner turmoil, creating a tragic protagonist the audience understands even as they condemn. The play's imagery of blood, darkness, and sleep tracks his psychological disintegration. Dramatic irony pervades — the audience sees Macbeth's guilt while other characters see a king — and the iambic pentameter fractures as Macbeth's mind deteriorates, with increasingly broken and fragmented verse in Act 5.
Grade 7+ Point
WOWA Freudian reading sees Macbeth's hallucinations (the dagger, Banquo's Ghost) as the return of the repressed — his unconscious guilt erupting into consciousness. The play can also be read through Aristotle's concept of *hamartia*: Macbeth's tragic flaw is not ambition alone but his *awareness* of evil combined with his inability to resist it, making him more culpable than a character who acts in ignorance.
Key Vocabulary
A tragic flaw or error of judgement that leads to the hero's downfall
Excessive pride or self-confidence, especially in defying the gods or fate
The killing of a king — the ultimate crime in the Jacobean worldview
A speech delivered alone on stage, revealing inner thoughts to the audience
Emotional purging the audience experiences through pity and fear for the tragic hero
The belief that life is meaningless — reflected in Macbeth's 'tomorrow' speech
Exam Tip
AOAlways link Macbeth's decline to Shakespeare's purpose: writing for James I, Shakespeare presents regicide as an offence against God and nature, warning that ambition unchecked by morality leads to self-destruction. Show you understand that Macbeth *chooses* evil — the Witches tempt, but he acts.