After Macbeth murders Duncan, the tone becomes even more foreboding, as Macbeth’s guilt causes him to become paranoid. At the banquet in Act 3, Scene 4, Macbeth is tormented by visions of Banquo’s ghost, leaving him panicking that “the time has been/That, when the brains were out, the man would die/And there an end.

Macbeth is plagued by insomnia and his wife, Lady Macbeth, is prone to sleepwalking. As the play develops, Macbeth becomes increasingly paranoid that his misdeeds will be uncovered. The ghost of his old friend Banquo, who he has ordered to be killed, returns to haunt Macbeth, symbolising his guilty conscience.

Macbeth’s madness has caused him to hallucinate his dead friend. After seeing the witches for a second time, Macbeth’s madness increases as he begins to think he is invincible and murders without hesitation. Lady Macbeth begins to hallucinate herself in hell because of her madness and guilt.

Madness is proven necessary in Macbeth by Shakespeare as it develops the play into an intriguing work. The important role Macbeth plays consists of a mind of uncertainty leading to his ultimate downfall. Hallucinations help to build up to the delusion portrayed in Macbeth.

The witches, the hallucinations, and his greed for power ultimately cause Macbeth’s downfall. He started the play as an honorable man, but by the end, he becomes a broken man whose guilt eats him alive. He loses his mental stability in exchange for power because his guilt will not allow Macbeth to enjoy his victories.

In the beginning of Macbeth, Macbeth is characterized as a brave soldier. Macbeth displays the characteristics of an insane character because of his foolish acts and poor mental state when he visualizes the floating dagger, speaks to a ghost, becomes obsessed with killing others and with the idea of being invincible.

Macbeth is both a victim and villain. He was victimized by his wife and the three witches. Macbeth chooses to follow the path of the witches. He is a villain, because he chooses to follow the path of the witches and decided to kill people even after Lady Macbeth told him not to.

Macbeth’s vision of a dagger hovering in the air suggests at the outset of the soliloquy that he is at the very edge of sanity, the extreme stress of his violent thoughts and internal conflict causing him to hallucinate.

At the moment Macbeth’s state of mind is one of great fear at both his thoughts and feelings and at being discovered. He also feels dread at what is to come in the future. As we know Macbeth’s future is not the best, but he is not to know that at this point in the play.

After Macbeth has performed the murder of Duncan, Shakespeare shows Lady Macbeth as the calmer, more rational of the two. When Macbeth superstitiously panics because he could not utter the word Amen, she says, “These deeds must not be thought / After these ways. So, it will make us mad” (2.2. 33-34).

The Corrupting Power of Unchecked Ambition The main theme of Macbeth —the destruction wrought when ambition goes unchecked by moral constraints—finds its most powerful expression in the play’s two main characters.

The witches told Macbeth to “beware Macduff,” and when Macbeth learns that Macduff has gone to England to help Malcolm (Duncan’s son) rally an army to return to Scotland and defeat Macbeth, he hires murderers to kill Macduff’s family, thinking that this will cause Macduff to submit out of fear and grief.

At this point, Macbeth doesn’t make any moves to kill Macduff because he thinks Macduff is no threat to him. It is only after Macduff asserts that he was “untimely ripped” from his mother’s womb that Macbeth begins to take his challenger seriously.

Why is Macbeth not afraid of Malcolm? Macbeth is not afraid of Malcom because he was born of a woman, and the witches told him that he would not be killed by a man born of a woman. Macbeth tells the doctor to cure Lady Macbeth’s mind and help her to go back to the way she was before they murdered Duncan.

Macduff defeats Macbeth Macbeth claims that he cannot be defeated because of the witches’ prophecy but Macduff then reveals that he was born by Caesarean birth. Macbeth vows to fight on and the two men battle.

On their way to attack Macbeth’s castle they cut down branches from the trees in Birnam Wood to use as camouflage. When the wood moves, one of the witches’ prophecies come true. Macduff reveals that he was born by a caesarean birth and kills Macbeth, fulfilling the final prophecy.

The three witches greet Macbeth as “Thane of Glamis” (as he is), “Thane of Cawdor,” and “king hereafter.” They then promise Banquo that he will father kings, and they disappear.

In response they summon for him three apparitions: an armed head, a bloody child, and finally a child crowned, with a tree in his hand. These apparitions instruct Macbeth to beware Macduff but reassure him that no man born of woman can harm him and that he will not be overthrown until Birnam Wood moves to Dunsinane.

The Witches’ Prophecy In this scene, we meet Macbeth for the first time. The witches gather on the moor and cast a spell as Macbeth and Banquo arrive. The witches hail Macbeth first by his title Thane of Glamis, then as Thane of Cawdor and finally as king. They then prophesy that Banquo’s children will become kings.

It is Banquo who first describes the Witches. His words in Act 1, Scene 3 depict the Witches as stereotypical hags – ‘withered’ and ‘wild’, unearthly beings (‘That look not like th’ inhabitants o’ th’ Earth’) with ‘skinny lips’, chapped (‘choppy’) fingers and beards (1.3.

Macbeth Becomes a monster Macbeth decides to have MacDuff’s family killed after hearing the prophecies. This shows that he has become a true monster. Macbeth starts to go insane after he kills Duncan, and he starts acts a lot differently then he used to earlier in the play.

Macbeth displays the characteristics of an insane character because of his foolish acts and poor mental state when he visualizes the floating dagger, speaks to a ghost, becomes obsessed with killing others and with the idea of being invincible.

Main Navigation After a battle in Scotland, Macbeth and his friend Banquo meet three witches, who make three prophecies – Macbeth will be a thane, Macbeth will be king and Banquo’s sons will be kings.

A Scottish noble and an initially valiant military man, Macbeth, after a supernatural prophecy and the urging of his wife, Lady Macbeth, commits regicide, usurping the kingship of Scotland.

Shakespeare’s Macbeth bears little resemblance to the real 11th century Scottish king. Mac Bethad mac Findláich, known in English as Macbeth, was born in around 1005. His father was Finlay, Mormaer of Moray, and his mother may have been Donada, second daughter of Malcolm II.

Macbeth is a complex character who changes throughout the course of the play. He is clearly a brave warrior and leader at the start of the drama but he falls victim to the Witches’ predictions.

According to folklore, Macbeth was cursed from the beginning. A coven of witches objected to Shakespeare using real incantations, so they put a curse on the play. Legend has it the play’s first performance (around 1606) was riddled with disaster.

Maybe. But that’s nothing compared to the hoops you’re supposed to jump through if you do say the M-word. According to the Royal Shakespeare Company’s website, the way to undo the curse is to leave the theater, spin around three times, then spit, curse and knock on the theater door and ask to be re-admitted.

If you’ve ever had a career in the arts, or know someone who has, you are likely aware that saying the word “Macbeth” inside a theatre is strictly taboo unless one is rehearsing or in the midst of performing Shakespeare’s dark tragedy. Doing so is almost universally believed to bring about bad luck or even disaster.

Macbeth. William Shakespeare’s play Macbeth is said to be cursed, so actors avoid saying its name when in the theatre (the euphemism “The Scottish Play” is used instead). Actors also avoid even quoting the lines from Macbeth before performances, particularly the Witches’ incantations.