In many tragedies, the tragic hero is often brought to his downfall by his tragic flaw. This trend holds turn in William Shakespeare’s, Macbeth. More specifically, throughout Macbeth, the audience is demonstrated to a high degree that one’s heroic and admirable traits, which can contribute to great success, can also contribute to great destruction. For Macbeth, the tragic hero, his traits of ambition, manliness and bravery are among his numerous traits which led to his downfall. The trait which arguable was the seed of Macbeth’s downfall was his ambition.
Despite ambition helping Macbeth achieve great success, it also led Macbeth to perform a series of actions which crippled him. Imagine that Macbeth’s gradual fall from grace was a road which …show more content…
By following through with the murder of Duncan, and becoming king, Macbeth broke his morals. Not only this, Macbeth had sinned. At the time, social ranks were believed to be chosen by God. To alter what God had ordained and increase one’s social rank was considered to be a sin. By abandoning his values and going against what God had planned, Macbeth had begun a change in character completely opposite to the honest and just man he was. More importantly, Macbeth had taken his first step down the road to destruction. Macbeth’s next step down this road was trying to reverse fate and prevent the inevitable. Once becoming king, Macbeth realized his family would not continue to reign on the throne, which was prophesied by the three witches. Instead of accepting fate, Macbeth decided to fight it: “Rather than so, come, fate, into the list/And champion me to the utterance!” (3.1.75-76). As a result of his increased ambition, Macbeth decided to try to reverse fate and fight the inevitable, and killed Banquo, who’s family line Macbeth thought would proceed on the throne. Murdering Banquo was the point of no …show more content…
However, this was a large factor to his destruction. The first consequence of his constant attempts to prove his manhood was being tricked into killing Duncan. At first, Macbeth was completely against murdering Duncan. However, Lady Macbeth, his wife, manipulated him into thinking that he was breaking a promise to her, which a true man would keep. Not only this, Lady Macbeth directly challenged Macbeth’s manliness,
Despite ambition helping Macbeth achieve great success, it also led Macbeth to perform a series of actions which crippled him. Imagine that Macbeth’s gradual fall from grace was a road which …show more content…
By following through with the murder of Duncan, and becoming king, Macbeth broke his morals. Not only this, Macbeth had sinned. At the time, social ranks were believed to be chosen by God. To alter what God had ordained and increase one’s social rank was considered to be a sin. By abandoning his values and going against what God had planned, Macbeth had begun a change in character completely opposite to the honest and just man he was. More importantly, Macbeth had taken his first step down the road to destruction. Macbeth’s next step down this road was trying to reverse fate and prevent the inevitable. Once becoming king, Macbeth realized his family would not continue to reign on the throne, which was prophesied by the three witches. Instead of accepting fate, Macbeth decided to fight it: “Rather than so, come, fate, into the list/And champion me to the utterance!” (3.1.75-76). As a result of his increased ambition, Macbeth decided to try to reverse fate and fight the inevitable, and killed Banquo, who’s family line Macbeth thought would proceed on the throne. Murdering Banquo was the point of no …show more content…
However, this was a large factor to his destruction. The first consequence of his constant attempts to prove his manhood was being tricked into killing Duncan. At first, Macbeth was completely against murdering Duncan. However, Lady Macbeth, his wife, manipulated him into thinking that he was breaking a promise to her, which a true man would keep. Not only this, Lady Macbeth directly challenged Macbeth’s manliness,