William Shakespeare's Macbeth

William Shakespeare's Macbeth

Macbeth has just been killed in battle and Malcolm is now king.

Scotland lies in ruin due to Macbeth's reign, people have fled their

houses and there is death and destruction everywhere. Everybody is

glad Macbeth is dead, as he was a bloodthirsty tyrant: even Malcolm

describes him as a butcher, as in the title quotation.

Throughout the play there are a lot of contrasts used by Shakespeare,

the most predominant being the one used in the dialogue:

"Fair is foul and foul is fair."

This sets up the entire play to be a riddle: you don't know if Macbeth

is evil or if the witches are evil or if what Macbeth does is wrong.

Good is bad and bad is good.

Throughout the play we can see how Macbeth's attitude and mood

changes. As he goes on, his mind is more and more troubled. At the

start of the play, just after the battle, Macbeth behaves like any

hero would: he is happy, making jokes and pleased to have won the

battle. Almost immediately after meeting the witches we can see how

his mood changes. After finding out that some of what they said was

true, Macbeth becomes more secretive. In Polanski's movie version, we

can see already how Macbeth looks troubled and seems to be plotting

something in his head. Macbeth also has more asides than before. The

scene where Macbeth and Banquo find out that the witches were telling

the truth shows us how weak-minded Macbeth is. Although both Macbeth

and Banquo heard the witches' prophecies, Banquo chose to make a joke

out of the whole thing whereas Macbeth took it seriously and sent a

letter to Lady Macbeth telling her everything - this is another

example of Macbeth's weak mind.

We can see how Macbeth's sense of right and wrong becomes increasingly

confused throughout the play. While Duncan is Macbeth's guest, Macbeth

ponders over the reasons to kill Duncan, for and against:

"As his host who should against his murderers shut the door, not bear