Macbeth vs Banquo

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Recommended: How did Banquo in Macbeth determine his fate

Macbeth and Banquo start out in the beginning of the Play as very similar men. An example would be that these men both honor Banquo and both of these men have been given respect for what they did at the battlefield. However we find out that shortly after Macbeth and Banquo learn about the predictions from the three witches, both of these men seem to laugh off the claims and say that there not true, however it becomes evidently more serious when Ross informs them that Macbeth is now the Thane of Cawdor (Act 1 Scene 3 Page 5) “And for an earnest of a greater honor, He bade me, from him, call thee thane of Cawdor in which addition, hail most worthy thane, for it is the thine”.

When Macbeth and Banquo learn about the first prediction becoming true both of them are somewhat in a shock. Macbeth cannot believe that it happened and Banquo is also in shock, in addition right after Ross tells Macbeth that he is Thane of Cawdor, Banquo says the following important line (Act 1 Scene 3 page 5 Line 109) “What, can the devil speak true?”, what Banquo is trying to tell us is that he is trying to decide on whether the forces of evil are telling the truth or if it was just simply good luck. As we can see just from those few lines above we can already tell that Banquo is not a person who is believes is correct right away. While Macbeth we can determine that he already believes that the witches were telling the truth yet he does not understand that these witches are leading Macbeth, to back this up we can look at the short conversation between Macbeth and Banquo, (MACBETH Act 1 Scene 3 Page 6 Line 120 “Glamis, and thane of Cawdor! The greatest is behind. Thanks for your pains. Do you not hope your children shall be kings, When those that gave th...

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...siness from the common eye for sundry weighty reasons.” What he is saying in those lines is basically that Macbeth is lying to the murderers as to why Banquo has to die. The main reason he is saying this is because of the fact that he does not want the murderers to go out and tell the world that Macbeth killed an innocent man; furthermore what Macbeth did was betrayal to Banquo.

Finally when it comes down to which character was a better character it would absolutely have to be Banquo. The main reason as to why is because Banquo has more character and thinks more clearly about the issues with the witches. Furthermore he knows that the witches work directly for the devil and that sooner or later either Macbeth or Banquo’s life is going to be destroyed

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William, and John Wilders. Macbeth. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2004. Print.

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