Macbeth- What to study??

analyse this

OK so i don't have enough time (or energy) to study everything i wanted to on macbeth. so i have decided to keep to 4/5 aspects. anyone have any suggestions?

sternn

1. Kingship
2. Magic
3. Relationship between macbeth and lady macbeth
4. How it would have appealed to the people of that time... (something like that, cant remember the century)

md99

sternn wrote:

3. Relationship between macbeth and lady macbeth

I would learn this one if you're really stuck, it's a lot less specific and you can do it in so many different ways... Lots of people limit down what they're gonna learn on Macbeth, and on paper it looks like they've studied it thoroughly. Learn some quotes by each of them, but really if you get an idea of the structure of the play...ie what happens when (and I don't mean Act specific) and you have a few quotes by the two, you'll have a lot to write about. Look like the innocent flower... but be the serpent under't.

Marshy

sternn wrote:

4. How it would have appealed to the people of that time...

I think it'd be more the perennial or modern appeal of the play that would come up.

Make sure you know the character of macbeth and Lady m. inside out as there's a good chance of a question on some aspect of them.

Limerick Dude

Tbh if you know the play well enough, understand it and know your quotes, you can answer pretty much most questions that come up.

Rozabeez

Theme of:
Evil.
Ambition.
Relationships.


Mebbe?

nick23

I'd have a look at the role of MacDuff as a character as well

Limerick Dude

nick23 wrote:

I'd have a look at the role of MacDuff as a character as well

I seriously don't understand how one can right 4 pages on Macduff, his purpose in the play is to kill Macbeth, bout it tbh

md99

Limerick Dude wrote:

I seriously don't understand how one can right 4 pages on Macduff, his purpose in the play is to kill Macbeth, bout it tbh

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lies, lies, lies, murder and treason! Macduff MAKES Macbeth, he is central to the play and in my opinion (and many others) more important than the likes of Malcolm, Edward, Banquo, the Witches etc... I would rate his part third in significance after Macbeth and Lady Mac.

ZorbaTehZ

What about the witches?

Limerick Dude

md99 wrote:

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lies, lies, lies, murder and treason! Macduff MAKES Macbeth, he is central to the play and in my opinion (and many others) more important than the likes of Malcolm, Edward, Banquo, the Witches etc... I would rate his part third in significance after Macbeth and Lady Mac.

Please expand on that.

Selphie

Limerick Dude wrote:

I seriously don't understand how one can right 4 pages on Macduff, his purpose in the play is to kill Macbeth, bout it tbh

I'm with md99. While I wouldn't be happy writing an essay on him really, there's a lot more to his character than just to kill Macbeth. It his him who discovers the murder of Duncan, which nicely leads on to him being developed as a character of sound morals and judgement. He knows what Macbeth has done, refuses to recognise him as king, does not go to Scone to see Macbeth being crowned and doesn't attend Macbeth's banquet. Instead, while people are being killed and murdered, Macduff leaves his family for the sake of his country to go seek out help from Edward the Confessor. This clearly shows that Macduff is on the side of goodness etc.
It's Macduff's decision to do precisely this that makes Macbeth a little more mad. It spurs him on to commit the murder of Macduff's family, which in turn makes us lose all sympathy for Macbeth.
Back to England, where we see that Macduff is truely Scotland's hero (the scene where Malcom tests him.) When he finds out that Macbeth killed his family, you can clearly see his humanity, his feeling etc. His killing of Macbeth is supposed to represent his humanity, his overwhelming desire to see goodness and justice. Macduff's sort of like the instrument of fate, if you like. By going to England, he ensured the triumph of good, at the cost of his family's death...

And so on and so forth.

Mackleton

On that note why not make up a hierarchy of characters, mine is:

1. Macbeth
2. Lady Macbeth (Partner in crime)
3. Banquo (as a foil to Macbeth)
4. Duncan (opposite style of king to Macbeth)
5. Macduff (as Macbeth's nemesis)
6. Malcolm (Model of a good king to be contrasted with Macbeth)

Any other lists?

Limerick Dude

Selphie wrote:

I'm with md99. While I wouldn't be happy writing an essay on him really, there's a lot more to his character than just to kill Macbeth. It his him who discovers the murder of Duncan, which nicely leads on to him being developed as a character of sound morals and judgement. He knows what Macbeth has done, refuses to recognise him as king, does not go to Scone to see Macbeth being crowned and doesn't attend Macbeth's banquet. Instead, while people are being killed and murdered, Macduff leaves his family for the sake of his country to go seek out help from Edward the Confessor. This clearly shows that Macduff is on the side of goodness etc.
It's Macduff's decision to do precisely this that makes Macbeth a little more mad. It spurs him on to commit the murder of Macduff's family, which in turn makes us lose all sympathy for Macbeth.
Back to England, where we see that Macduff is truely Scotland's hero (the scene where Malcom tests him.) When he finds out that Macbeth killed his family, you can clearly see his humanity, his feeling etc. His killing of Macbeth is supposed to represent his humanity, his overwhelming desire to see goodness and justice. Macduff's sort of like the instrument of fate, if you like. By going to England, he ensured the triumph of good, at the cost of his family's death...

And so on and so forth.

Hmmm thats some good stuff out of you, still though 4 pages might be pushing it....

adam_ccfc

md99 wrote:

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lies, lies, lies, murder and treason! Macduff MAKES Macbeth, he is central to the play and in my opinion (and many others) more important than the likes of Malcolm, Edward, Banquo, the Witches etc... I would rate his part third in significance after Macbeth and Lady Mac.

Christ, what a nonce.:rolleyes:

lilmizzme

Am I the only one who feels sorry for Macbeth??

Limerick Dude

lilmizzme wrote:

Am I the only one who feels sorry for Macbeth??

Everyone has there own interpretation of him, tis one of the things whcih makes it a great play.

I for one do have a level of sympathy for him .

Mé Féin

1.Learn the soliliquies - this will cover you for the characters of Lady Macbeth and Macbeth

2.Images and language - this will help with most themes

3.Kingship is being hinted at alot

4.Role of the witches

5.Role of Banquo

Good luck!!

failsafe

A large part of an essay about mcduff could also be about macbeth. One of his primary funtions is to act as a foil for macbeth's charachter. When the two are juxtaposed, the fact that he is everything macbeth is not, only serves to highlight the extent of macbeth's demise. This can be expanded on for ages, and there's on great quote where mcduff is described as having all the "King becoming qualities" ("truth, justice, temprence, verity" if my memory serves me correctly) which not only show us what a true king should be, but also highlight exactly what macbeth is not.

This also links into the appeal of people at the time. IIRC this was first performed infront of king richard the somethingth, and the character of mcduff shows what shakespeare believes a true king is like (as a compliment to the king in the audience)

You could write on mcduff for days!

Selphie

adam_ccfc wrote:

Christ, what a nonce.:rolleyes:

Ah, don't say that. md99 can't help his infatuation.

Em, I don't think Macduff is described as having all those characteristics. Malcolm lists all those and says that he doesn't possess any of them, therefore making Macduff fear for the future of Scotland, though Malcolm's just testing him.
I've an essay on Macduff around the place somewhere. I could put it up on that wiki thing if anybody needed it?

md99

Limerick Dude wrote:

Please expand on that.

Hmmm thats some good stuff out of you, still though 4 pages might be pushing it....

Ehhh... sorry, I was just too tired to, anyway Selphie has expanded on it enough, so there's your answer...

I know what you mean, I'd find Banquo very hard to write a lot about, I'd probably do a Macduff essay above it coz I just admire the character. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are the only ones I'd feel content to write a lot about.. Actually, many who watch Roman Polanski's (*shudder*) Macbeth seem to discard Macduff as his part in the film is greatly reduced, and he kinda looks like a hobo in it... or maybe it's just his beard

lilmizzme wrote:

Am I the only one who feels sorry for Macbeth??

I don't, he murdered his close friend Banquo and more significantly had Macduffs wife and babes savagely slaughtered, the former I could excuse but what he did to Macduffs family... Lost any sympathy I could have had for the guy right there.

adam_ccfc wrote:

Christ, what a nonce.:rolleyes:

Great contribution to the thread, you have a problem with enthusiasm or something? the 'murder and treason' part is a line Macduff has in the play soon after he discovers Duncans body. If you disagree, say so and say why, or keep quiet and keep us all happy. If you're pissed off, keep it to yourself or lash out on someone WITH REASON. It's okay, I would be pretty pissed off too if I was from Douglas...

Marshy

md99 wrote:

I don't, he murdered his close friend Banquo and more significantly had Macduffs wife and babes savagely slaughtered, the former I could excuse but what he did to Macduffs family... Lost any sympathy I could have had for the guy right there.

Well though he brutally murders so many, the existence of his poetic self ie. "Out, Out..." and the regret he expresses at what he's done towards the end, "My soul is too much charged..." indicates hes not just a mere villain in my view. There is a sense of wasted potential and although we are rightly horrified by Macbeths tyrannical rule theres an element of sympathy I think due to his rapid descent into tyranny despite the potential for good that surfaces occasionally.

Agri_trust

Go to www.e-xamit.ie and get the answers for all the different exam questions down through the years on Macbeth and give those a study.

analyse this

It's okay, I would be pretty pissed off too if I was from Douglas...

The gloves are off!!! I love stirring up ****:p

Rozabeez

You have to feel kind of sorry for him though, he lost his mind really, didn't he? I mean the witches picked him as their victim at the beginning and his fate was mapped out, all of us have a weakness and his was ambition, which the witches and his own wife, the woman who's meant to love him for who he is, played on. Macbeth didn't originally WANT to commit the murder of Duncan, but Lady.M pushed him and pushed him until it seemed like a case of do it or lose the one person he truly loves. Then the guilt of what he did, well it drove him crazy. He became obsessive over his thrown because of what he had to do to achieve it, therefore did what he had to in order to maintain it.

Yes, Macbeth killed his best friend and some innocent people, but that wasn't the REAL Macbeth, that was Macbeth AFTER he went sort of crazy. You have to feel sorry for someone that lets others push him into destroying his own life so much so that his own sense of guilt disappears.

Well that's my opinion anyway.

JSK 252

Great contribution to the thread, you have a problem with enthusiasm or something? the 'murder and treason' part is a line Macduff has in the play soon after he discovers Duncans body. If you disagree, say so and say why, or keep quiet and keep us all happy. If you're pissed off, keep it to yourself or lash out on someone WITH REASON. It's okay, I would be pretty pissed off too if I was from Douglas...[/QUOTE]

Whats the problem with Douglas? Is it below you or something. No need to be like that. Its uncalled for.

Douglas and Rochestown ( where I live) is the best place to live in the Cork region if I may say so.

Rozabeez

I don't think he was being quite serious you know...

analyse this

I have taken some of this from an answer I had written before Christmas and I have manipulated it relevant to the present discussion:D

We all have our own inherent 'vaulting ambition', whether it be monetary or sexual, or even spiritual. We hall have some lustful desire that lurks within us. But, what differentiates the good from the bad are those who choose to ignore their own ambition for fear of retribution and the consequences deriving from their moral offences, and those who succumb to their ambition for their own personal gratification. Now, many argue that Macbeth did not succumb to ambition, rather, it was thrust upon him, or, even better, he was thrust upon it. The witches do not compel Macbeth’s will to do evil- but they do arouse his passions and stir up a vehement and inordinate apprehension of the imagination which so perverts the judgement of reason that it leads his will towards choosing the means to the desired temporal good. Indeed, his imaginations and passions are so vivid under this evil impulse from without that, ‘nothing is but what it is not’. Macbeth’s reasons are so impeded that he judges ‘these solicitings cannot be evil cannot be good’. The Wierd Sisters’ prophecies are morally neutral. The evil they purvey becomes actual for Macbeth only when he submits to it by an act of his own free will. Therefore we cannot attribute all the blame for Macbeth’s predicament to their equivocations. While they may have set the wheels of fate in motion, Macbeth has been only too willing to derive the meaning most favourable to himself,

‘Glamis and Thane of Cawdor:
The greatest is behind’

Thus while we may sympathise with Macbeth for being the victim of the lies and trickery of the witches, it is he who submits to these lies, thus contributing to his own downfall. Therefore our sympathy with his character is reserved.

What people need to remember is that Macbeth was not a weak character. This is immediately apparent in the description of the battle in the earlier part of the play. He is too stubborn a man and too proud a warrior to allow himself to be manipulated. Especially by a woman! UNLESS!! Unless he wanted to be manipulated! Yes, I agree Macbeth was the victim of external forces (witches and L.Macbeth). But, it was he who, not only allowed himself to be victimized and tricked by these external forces but desired it.

It might be said that the absence of Lady Macbeth’s external force has the same strength of impact as its presence and has a similar detrimental effect on Macbeth’s character. After Duncan’s murder Macbeth appears to break free from the chains of Lady Macbeth’s control. His evil deeds are therefore no longer as influenced by any external force and are purely brought about by his own evil desires and ambitions. This highlights that while, in the past, Macbeth’s evil was prompted by the external forces of the witches and his wife, his evil after the murder of Duncan is brought to life by his own free will. This suggests that Macbeth, regardless of the external forces, was an evil character, thus reducing what little sympathy we had for him. Also, by highlighting the fact that Macbeth’s actions are no longer swayed by this external forces, would suggests that Macbeth is largely responsible for his own downfall. While Duncan’s murder, which was brought about by the influence of the witches and Lady Macbeth, may have aroused suspicion of Macbeth, it was Banquo’s murder, which was carried out by Macbeth’s own free will, that led to the revolt against him. Therefore we can say that his defeat is inevitable, not because of the external forces and the evil purveyed by them, but because of his own inner evil.

Thus we can say that Macbeth shows little courage against the external forces as he is only too willing to submit to their evil. However, ambition is such a powerful vice, that we cannot totally blame him for succumbing to their prophecies, as he is only human. The prospect of power and glory could seduce any of us. Of course, the particular methods he employs to achieve this power is so heinous, that no excuse can justify his actions.

Whether or not Macbeth showed courage towards the end of the play, against these external forces, is debatable. It depends greatly on what one’s definition of courage is. Courage can be described as the ability to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty or intimidation. It can be divided into "physical courage" — in face of physical pain, hardship, and threat of death — and "moral courage" — in the face of shame, scandal, and discouragement. While it is evident that Macbeth displayed no moral courage throughout the play, it could be argued that he displayed physical courage during the revolt against him. Despite the overwhelming of Macbeth’s downfall, and even though he had been completely deserted, he still fights like a true soldier. Of course, it could be argued that Macbeth only fought because he thought he was indestructible, embolden by the witches’ promise. He still decides to fight when he learns that Macduff is the exception to the witches’ promise, that no man of woman-born should kill him, and would rather die with his boots on, than ‘play the Roman fool and die on mine own sword’. Again it could be argued that it was not courage that Macbeth displayed, to die fighting, but rather that he was too proud and arrogant a man to take his own life, the same pride and arrogance which caused the death of so many innocent victims, and which ultimately brought him to this very situation.

In my opinion, while Macbeth’s physical courage may ignite a degree of sympathy as he rallied against overwhelming odds, I believe that this sympathy is somewhat limited by the absence of the more admirable quality of honorable courage.


While external forces had a powerful impact on Macbeth and his subsequent behavior, I genuinely believe the Macbeth himself was responsible for his own downfall, in the manner in which he submitted to these external forces, and his inner obsession to remain king by any mean, fair or foul.

I accept that the external forces in Macbeth’s life were so powerful that they had a significant role in his predicament. However, I postulate that the strength shown by Macbeth, throughout the play, highlights a persona that is capable of choosing the road he wishes to follow. Macbeth choose to submit to the external forces in order to fulfill the prophecy,

‘Thou shalt be king hereafter.’

dan719

Rozabeez wrote:

You have to feel kind of sorry for him though, he lost his mind really, didn't he? I mean the witches picked him as their victim at the beginning and his fate was mapped out, all of us have a weakness and his was ambition, which the witches and his own wife, the woman who's meant to love him for who he is, played on. Macbeth didn't originally WANT to commit the murder of Duncan, but Lady.M pushed him and pushed him until it seemed like a case of do it or lose the one person he truly loves. Then the guilt of what he did, well it drove him crazy. He became obsessive over his thrown because of what he had to do to achieve it, therefore did what he had to in order to maintain it.

Yes, Macbeth killed his best friend and some innocent people, but that wasn't the REAL Macbeth, that was Macbeth AFTER he went sort of crazy. You have to feel sorry for someone that lets others push him into destroying his own life so much so that his own sense of guilt disappears.

Well that's my opinion anyway.

Have to disagree.The witches never asked/advised Macbeth to kill Duncan, it occurs immediately to him only 'the thought which is yet fantastical'. So did his wife 'the raven himself is hoarse that croaks the fatal entrance of duncan under my battlements note the use of possevive adjective by lady macbeth. It is she that has control over her husband not the withces, yet I feel much more sympathetic towards her, viewing her mental illness and suicide as a redemption of sorts. Macbeth rather has an obvious tendancy to violence fron the play's beginning 'till he faced the slave...and unseemed him from the nave to the chaps'. He is immoral, always choosing that option which is most obviously wrong and he uses the tools of deception more keenly then even the witches, who are supposed to be the embodiment of all evil in the play. Consider his discussions with Banquo 'forgive me, my mind was wrought with things already forgotten' and when asked about the weird sisters 'I think not of them'. He is certainly not driven mad, rather there is a cruel sanity about him, he recognises his own immorality and evil nature 'I am in blood steeped so far...'.
And as for his 'bravery' at the plays end, I feel the killing of yet more innocents hardly makes him worthy in our eyes.

P.S to play the equivactor as it were (to argue both sides of the scales:D )......Duncan; ineffectual ruler whose shortsightedness leads to his death and plunges Scotland into disorder 'the earth was feverous and did shake' or rather a victim of circumstances beyond his control a true holder of the title 'God's annointed'?

analyse this

P.S to play the equivactor as it were (to argue both sides of the scales )......Duncan; ineffectual ruler whose shortsightedness leads to his death and plunges Scotland into disorder 'the earth was feverous and did shake' or rather a victim of circumstances beyond his control a true holder of the title 'God's annointed'?

Shortsighted perhaps. But also morally true to himself and his people. Is being too trusting a bad thing? I suppose it depends on what you view as rightful kingship?

Rozabeez

But the witches were said to use prophecies to play on the minds of people, I believe they were fully aware of what would happen.