Fate vs Free Will in Macbeth
The Role of Fate in Macbeth.In William Shakespeare's Macbeth the place of fate may not be clear and distinct in the mind of the reader. This essay will clarify the notion of fate in the play.
L.C. Knights in the essay "Macbeth" explains the place of fate in the decline of Macbeth:"One feels," says W.C. Curry, "that in proportion as the good in him diminishes, his liberty of free choice is determined more and more by evil inclination and that he cannot and will not choose the better course. We speak of destiny or fate, as if it were some external force or moral order, compelling him against his will to certain destruction." Most readers have felt that after the initial crime there is ...
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future. It's this synchronizing of nature and fortune that soothsayers study, and that the witches in Macbeth know something about. We call it fate, which over-simplifies it.
He pits himself no merely against the threat of hell but also against the enmity of "Fate" (as represented in the prophecies of the Weird Sisters): come, Fate, into the list, And champion me to th' utterance. He brags to his wife: But let the frame of tings disjoint, both the worlds suffer, Ere we will eat our meal in fear [. . .]. (70-71)
In Everybody's Shakespeare: Reflections Chiefly on the Tragedies, Maynard Mack explains that the witches are associated with fate: Except in one phrase (I.3.6) and in the stage directions, the play always refers to the witches as weyard - or weyward - sisters. Both spellings are variations of weird, which in Shakespeare's time did not mean "freakish," but "fateful" - having to do with the determination of destinies. Shakespeare had met with such creatures in ...
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may crown me," remaining steadfastly confident in the witches' prophecies since they seem to represent fate, or the controlling intrusion of the supernatural into his own personal world. After the king's announcement that "We will establish our estate upon / Our eldest, Malcolm," Macbeth says, "The Prince of Cumberland! that is a step / On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap," for his scheming is seriously underway. At Inverness in Macbeth's castle, his lady, after appreciating his letter detailing the witches' prophecies, reacts with, "Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be / What thou art promised," yet she fears that her husband's nature is "too full o' the milk of human ...
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"Fate vs Free Will in Macbeth." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 16 Apr. 2011. Web. 22 Nov. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Fate-vs-Free-Will-in-Macbeth/98076>
"Fate vs Free Will in Macbeth." Essayworld.com. April 16, 2011. Accessed November 22, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Fate-vs-Free-Will-in-Macbeth/98076.
"Fate vs Free Will in Macbeth." Essayworld.com. April 16, 2011. Accessed November 22, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Fate-vs-Free-Will-in-Macbeth/98076.
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