Macbeth And Lady Macbeth Essay, Research Paper

Ambition, the world?s driving force to achieve their goals. Ambition is a

characteristic of human nature, which, if expressed in an evil manner, can turn

the entire person evil. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are great examples of these

types of people. In William Shakespeare?s Macbeth, they are torn apart due to

their excessive hunger for power. Both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have a driving

ambition that turns each of them into a spiral of guilt and evil. They are both

very stubborn and set in their ways this is proven when Macbeth does not want to

change his mind about killing Duncan. Their thriving ruthlessness combined is

almost unstoppable, and it is their fuel to commit the terrible deeds that they

do. Though they are similar in many ways, they also have many differences, which

include the changing of power throughout the play. The relationship between

Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is a very close but a rather strange one. There are a

lot of things that Macbeth does not understand about Lady Macbeth, that she

knows about him, for example, she knows his weakness of character and his

strengths. At the beginning of the play Lady Macbeth is the stronger of the two.

Although it was the witches who told Macbeth he will be king, it was Lady

Macbeth who uses her art of persuasion, and knowledge of Macbeths weaknesses, to

make him kill the king. Lady Macbeth uses persuasion, another factor that helps

her over power Macbeth, from their first meeting and throughout the play. She

also uses her knowledge she has of him, to add to the task of persuading him,

she knows how to get him motivated. Due to Macbeth?s lack of knowledge of his

spouse, he is unable to prevent her. Many factors like persuasion and ambition

are a big part in the couple’s relationship. Macbeth starts to take control when

he slaughters the guards. Lady Macbeth was not ready for this and for a little

while Macbeth is in control of the situation. From that point, he goes from

strength to strength and plans the deaths of Banquo and Fleance. The only

weakness shown there is that he had to get hit men to do it, he could not kill

his best friend himself. Macbeth is in control and very powerful until the

banquet scene. This is the last time in the play that Lady Macbeth is able to

become the more powerful of the two. After the banquet scene Macbeth goes from

strength to strength again, and having Macduff?s family killed is a sign of

this. When Macbeth consults the weird sisters for the last time, they trick him

to make him think that he will not be overthrown by anyone. The communication

between the couple is very strong at the beginning but as the play progresses it

alters and eventually breaks down. Well Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are a very odd

couple, despite all their differences they still have many similarities which

helps the relationship work out. If they went so ambitious towards power, they

might have ended up with a happy ending.