Macbeth as a tragic hero
The character Macbeth is a classic example of a Shakespearean tragic hero. There are many factors that contribute to the degeneration of Macbeth of which three will be discussed. The three points, which contribute greatly to Macbeth's degeneration are the prophecies, which were told to him by the weird sisters, how Lady Macbeth influenced and manipulated Macbeth's judgment, and finally Macbeth's long time ambition, which drove his desire to be king. Macbeth's growing character degenerate from a noble man to a violent individual.
The prophecies, which were told by the weird sisters, were one of the factors, which contributed to the decline of his strong character. It is believed that if the predictions hadn't been made about Macbeth becoming Thane of Cawdor, and an eventual king, he would still be focused on his career as a warrior. Greed and power drive humans to change themselves, when it is not needed. As a result of the prophecies, Macbeth's curiosity was aroused, and he know was driven to become King of Scotland. As the play progresses, Macbeth slowly relies on the witches prophecies. Shakespeare uses the witches as a remedy for Macbeth's curiosity, which corrupts his character.
The influences of Macbeth's wife, Lady Macbeth, also contributed to his descend of character. Lady Macbeth's character in the beginning reveals that she is a lovable person. When Lady Macbeth was ready to kill King Duncan, she couldn't follow through with it because Duncan reminded her of her father. This example proves that lady Macbeth was not such a bad person. Lady Macbeth played an important role in this play because she provided a scheme, which caused Macbeth to murder Duncan himself. Afterwards, he later regretted his wrongdoing. During this point in the play, the climax, the audience can note the change in Macbeth's character. Macbeth's first murder was a trying experience for him, however after the first murder, killing seemed, to him, the only solution to maintain his eventual reign of Scotland. Therefore, saying that Lady Macbeth was the person who introduced a sin to Macbeth.
Macbeth's ambition also influenced his decline of character. However, Macbeth's ambition wasn't strong enough to carry the motive to kill Duncan. Lady Macbeth's influence also comes into play because if it weren't for her, he wouldn't have been driven to do anything it took to be an eventual king.
Macbeth could justly be classified a “Tragic Hero” as his tragic story fills out the defined criteria for a tragic hero. Macbeth holds a significant social status, reveals essential truths about humanity through his suffering, has tragically wasted talent, contains a “tragic flaw” leading to his downfall and finally he finds some relief in his death.
Comparing Macbeth to a tragic hero would be like comparing Spiderman to Venom. Although Spiderman was the hero in the beginning, he had a bad side too. This is much like Macbeth in the beginning of the story. He went against his wife and did not want to kill until she finally got into his head and convinced him that it was the only way for him to receive the throne. Now, is Macbeth a tragic hero? No. Macbeth is not a tragic hero due to the fact that tragic heros always learn from their mistake and always undergo some sort of meaningful suffering; Macbeth did neither.
Without meeting these three intertwined characteristics, the social movement in question cannot be successful. The Occupy Wall Street movement for example, as mentioned previously, is lacking leadership and organization and its common purpose was very wide, as it focused on social and economic inequality worldwide. It would have probably succeeded if the movement had broken down the claims they made in small movements. Contrastingly, feminist movements embody perfectly this idea, as they each fought for one cause, from the legal right to file complaints independently to contraception. By taking the problem of gender inequality as a basis, they succeeded in taking issues like voting, contraception or matrimonial rights, in the prospect of making changes in society. So today, we can affirm that the feminist movement is succeeding, as it still criticizes current issues. Also, as seen before, sustaining contentious adds the success determinant of other new issues emerge from them, as it brings new political opportunities, by the dissolution of constraints in society. In the end, the key to success of social movements is adaptation to the context, and the flexibility of the movements’
The influence of Macbeth's wife, Lady Macbeth, also contributed to the degeneration of his character. Lady Macbeth's character in the beginning revealed that she was a lovable person. When Lady Macbeth was ready to kill King Duncan herself, it was revealed that Lady Macbeth could not murder him because he, "resembled her father" (II.ii.14). This proved that Lady Macbeth did in fact have a heart deep inside her and was in fact only human. Lady Macbeth played an extremely important role in this play as she provided the scheme that caused Macbeth to assassinate King Duncan. She told Macbeth to "Only look up clear" and to "leave all the rest to me" (I.iv.70-72). Macbeth vacillates before the murder of Duncan (I.vii.1ff.). He experiences hallucinations that precede (II.i.33-35) and follow (II.ii.35-36) this murder; he is unable
Everyone is influenced by other people, including leaders or authority, to make the wrong decisions at some point in their lives. In the play Macbeth, Lady Macbeth is responsible for the evil doings of Macbeth. Lady Macbeth is responsible for this by using his love for her to persuade him into killing King Duncan. Because Macbeth loved and trusted his wife, he was vulnerable to her opinions and suggestions. We also know that she is responsible for these heartless things because she has so much guilt that she commits suicide. Macbeth would never have done any of those horrible things if it were not for the murder of King Duncan, which was forced on by Lady Macbeth.
1) Name and describe the Social Movement. What is the goal of the Social Movement?
We start to see Lady Macbeth’s actions have a huge impact on Macbeth’s character as he transforms from a decent being to an overly bitter creature. The cause of his alteration is due to the fact that Lady Macbeth is constantly excreting heartless information into his mind. "Art thou afeard to be the same in thine own act and valour as thou art in desire?" (I;vii;39-41) "And, to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man." (I;vii;50-51) Lady Macbeth uses these quotes to push her husband beyond limits and is therefore responsible for his dramatic change in attitude. She is constantly feeding his thoughts with negative comments and later on Macbeth realizes that he has another side to him. As he moves along to discover the concealed side of him, Macbeth falls in love with himself and begins to be drawn towards his evil desires. Because Lady Macbeth was the main cause of his new hidden discovery, she is fully responsible for opening up the door and letting the darkness in. This results in Macbeth committing both murders.
Poverty can be defined in many different ways. It is described as the state of being extremely poor. It is hunger, lack of shelter, lack of resources, decline in mental and physical health, not having a job, lack of power and representation. It is living one day at a time and fear of looking towards the future. Poverty is a significant threat to women’s equality. More women live in poverty than men, and women’s experience of poverty can be harsher, and more prolonged. Women are often left to bear more burden of poverty which results in the “feminization of poverty”. The goal of this paper is to identify key aspects of alleviating poverty specifically for women, by means of government assistance programs.
When her husband reveals his indecisiveness on whether he should process the assassination, Lady Macbeth relentlessly accuses Macbeth’s fear of rebellion. She fully understands Macbeth’s desire and weakness; thus, she first utilizes their love to satirize Macbeth, and then questions Macbeth’s manhood which is the most serious taboo for any soldier by saying: “…live a coward in thine own esteem, Letting ‘I dear not’ wait upon ‘I would’.” Obviously, Lady Macbeth’s eloquence immediately impacts on Macbeth so that he commits to kill the king Duncan and “become a man.” Even though the argument against Lady Macbeth might focusing on she provokes Macbeth’s evil ambition and directly causes Macbeth’s death, I think Lady Macbeth forces Macbeth to face his greedy ambition of being a King and strive for the ambition without
A social movement is a group of people who are organized to resist or promote a social change (Henslin, 2012). Many social movements die out over time and it may take generations for that to happen. Some like abortion have started many generations ago and are still around today with no signs of the movement ending anytime soon. Abortion has two sides: pro-life and pro-choice. This essay explains the five different stages of a social movement and the opposing sides of abortion.
While not the only contributing factor, Lady Macbeth does play a substantial role in the downfall of her husband. She is a like a catalyst for Macbeth and essentially pushes him to do what he would not have been able to do on his own. Macbeth himself highly ambitious and determined, but his wife is even more so. At first he refuses to kill Duncan but she persists and eventually gets him to do it. It is important to note here that Lady Macbeth pushes Macbeth forward by manipulating him.
The witches play a brief, yet important role in Macbeth’s fate. At the beginning of the play, the witches deliver a prophecy to Macbeth stating that Macbeth is the Thane of Glamis, and he will become the Thane of Cawdor and the King of Scotland. At first, Macbeth is humbled by this news. However, the prophecies give him false hope, overconfidence and much temptation and ambition to become King. This is exhibited when Macbeth writes a letter to his wife about the witches prophecies in which he says, “My dearest partner of greatness,/ that thou might’st not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being/ ignorant of what greatness is promised thee.” (1.5.10-12). As this quotation demonstrates, Macbeth is now eager to have the witches prophecies fulfilled as he knows now what his future holds. The witches also deliver another prophecy to Macbeth which aids in his downfall. This prophecy explains that no man who was born of a woman is capable of harming Macbeth. This causes...
Some theorists view social interactions as an exchange of objective and subjective power (Benford & Hunt, 1992, p. 3), with social movements being created for the purpose of restructuring an imbalance in social, political, and economic power, or the way in which such power is used (Lukes 1974, pp. 24-5). The dramaturgy theory agrees that the focus of a social movement is the amendment or transformation of power relations, and goes even farther by suggesting that leaders of said movements are responsible for developing new and alternate possibilities for current power relations, and must persuade members that they are capable of generating change (Benford & Hunt, 1992, pp. 3-6). Thus, the effectiveness, quality, and sustainability of
Poverty is defined as a state or condition in which a person has little or no money, goods and/or means of support. No matter how poverty is defined families that have no male figure, single mothers, live mostly in poverty out of all demographic groups. This is often called Feminization of poverty. To better understand the feminization of poverty, it is important to recognize what are the contributions of poverty for women and what factors can decrease the probabilities of occurring. In this paper I will identify the problems that are contributing to feminization of poverty. Also, I will discuss what we need to do in order to improve this issue in America by identifying key agents and their responsibilities.
Newspapers have allowed for such a freedom in our everyday lives, and most have not even realized this fact. They have provided us with an outlet to speak our mind about politics, societal issues, public differences, and religion and cultures. Searching online to find such knowledge can be extremely challenging; moreover, newspapers always seem to be a place to find valid information. Newspapers have started to come off the printer more slowly over the past decade. More people are turning to electronic ways to find information rather than going to the direct source where that electronic media got their information. Most reliable information comes from newspapers where high up and educated citizens or leaders speak their mind on certain and important topics. The reason newspapers should stay a part of today’s society is because they offer a way for people to speak freely about what they please and get their voice heard, they are always credible, and they help us hear the problems of the world openly from different perspectives.