Ambition And Greed In Shakespeare's Macbeth

There are many different themes displayed in Shakespeare's famous play Macbeth. Many of these themes play with nature, the supernatural, and fate. From ghosts to horses eating each other the play uses symbolism, language, and characters to portray these themes. During the play the audience learns of several themes such as ambition, guilt, fate versus free will, nature versus the unnatural, and how things are not always as they seem.

Greed and ambition are traits that everyone has. Depending on how much of that greed and ambition the person has will determine their outcome. Greed is the intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth, power, or food and ambition is a strong desire to do or to achieve something, typically requiring determination and hard work. Ambition can be seen as a good thing when used toward good goals. For example, a student being ambitious to get an A-plus on a test. Greed is intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth, power, or food, therefore, when combined with ambition, it can lead toward evil personalities. Which is displayed in the play “Macbeth” in Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, their desire to kill Duncan and become king and queen. However, their plan quickly unraveled and lead to Macbeth’s downfall. The person that was responsible for Macbeth’s downfall was Macbeth himself due to his inability to say “no” to Lady Macbeth and……...

Both Shakespeare's Macbeth and Ridley Scott's gladiator, cleverly establish the unfavorable effect and repercussions of the blinding ambition through antagonists Commodus and Macbeth. Macbeth transforms from a noble soldier to a tyrant ruler due to his unbridled ambition to become king. Likewise, gladiators ruler Commodus, is depicted as ambiguous as he is controlled by his irrepressible ambition, instigating his undoing. Through both texts, antiheroes 'Maximus' and 'Macduff' render the great chain of being. Through techniques, the composers acknowledge how ambition can often result in having adverse consequences.

Death, insanity, despair: these are the consequences of ambition gone awry. Devastating downfalls can befall a heroic character if they are too ambitious. Ambitious characters are common in literature, and the consequences of their ambition are often the moral or lesson of their stories. Ambition can be a negative thing and it can lead to negative events, and for that reason, it is the biggest character flaw heroes have in Anglo-Saxon literature.

As a result, she stated the following, “Come you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood.” Through this she begs the spirits to take away any sympathy within in her in order to have the wit, desire, and drive her husband lacked of in order to become royalty. Through Lady Macbeth, Shakespeare shows there’s no such thing as impossible on the way to getting what one wants. In addition to giving up her femininity, Lady Macbeth also sacrifices her morals by convincing her husband to kill the king, when failing to do so; she states, “When you durst do it, then you were a man.” In other words she convinces Macbeth to kill King Duncan, despite knowing what a horrid crime that was. The struggle to go through anything standing in her way caused her to lose herself as well as her sanity. After realizing what she had caused, she began to lose her mind. She would constantly see her hands covered in blood by those who had been murdered along the way. Unable to get rid of the image in her head, led her to eventually commit suicide.

The Influences of Desire Desire means what people really want to do or to have in deep of their heart, sometimes it doesn’t show on their face. Desire can be people's ambitions, freedom of love, or a strong body. Here is an example for ambition, in Shakespeare’s "Macbeth”, the character Macbeth grows his desire of power after he heard from the three witches that he will be the next king soon. His ambitions, the desire of power influenced him so much that it turned him into an evil person.

Macbeth has made choices throughout the play with greed and unchecked ambition and In Demons unchecked ambition and greed is sung about. In line 15 the lyrics written are “ No Matter what we breed we still are made of greed this is my kingdom come.” The lyrics connect to the play because in Macbeth, Lady Macbeth and Macbeth both plan to kill for royalty and Macbeth turns into this terrible tyrant that goes on a killing spree towards anyone that stands in the way of what he wants which is a mix of unchecked ambition and greed. Any reader reading the play knows that at a certain point in time there is no way that Macbeth could avenge his sins and regain his somewhat moral self from the beginning of the play.

Ambition is a strong desire to do or to achieve something, typically requiring determination and hard work. In Williams Shakespeare 's Macbeth the characters Lady Macbeth and Macbeth have a strong desire to ascend the throne and they are determined to do whatever it takes in order to achieve this goal, including deceiving and killing those they are closest to. The zeal of ambition predominately persuades both characters actions in Macbeth. Lady Macbeth portrays how the forces of ambition strike her to instil a powerful drive in her husband, also how she demonstrates an overweening pride and lack of morals in order to reach a goal and lastly how ambition leads Macbeth to betray those cares about most.

Ambition is, to desire to obtain more than you have and desiring it now. Ambition can develop the necessities that are essential to becoming successful. This ambitious behavior can also create negative actions, resulting in failure. This attribute can be named as a universal human trait. The Tragedy of Macbeth, Macbeth Murder Mystery, and Why Read Shakespeare?, are examples that involve this universal human trait. Although ambition can benefit people, it can eventually lead to misguided judgment if not properly controlled.

After Macbeth said that he sent three murders to kill Banquo. He did this because he thought that Banquo would be a potential problem for him when he would have the throne. Macbeth does not want to Banquo to interfere by exposing the witches’ prediction about him being king to the public. This is what drove him to commit the murder of Banquo. In conclusion, this scene illustrates that Macbeth’s ambition would make him do anything to get the throne.

‘Macbeth’ is a tragic play written by William Shakespeare in the sixteen hundred, it dramatizes the physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those who seek power through the character of Macbeth. ‘The Pursuit Of Happyness’ likewise is a film directed by Gabriel Muccino who portrays a man named Chris Gardener who through his hard work and dedicated ambition goes from living on the streets to a rich stockbroker. In Macbeth and pursuit of happiness, both authors explore how ambition can…. (thesis). Macbeth's ambition is portrayed in a negative light as it is aimed to gain power and status, however, Chris ambition is pushed by his desire to gain happiness and a better future for him and his son. Similarly, both characters endure toxic spousal relationships that help them to tap into their ambition but it leads to different portrayal of ambition. Macbeth and Chris eventually both face the outcome of their ambition for Macbeth it being his doom where else for Chris it being his success. Shakespeare and Gabriel Muccino explore the theme of ambition through the protagonists of both plays.

Ambition is a quality within every human, however it sometimes drives people to partake in totally unnatural actions. As illustrated in William Shakespeare's Macbeth, some forms of ambition can push people into becoming a person very sinister and evil. The ambition which Macbeth and Lady Macbeth encounter within Shakespeare's play not only drives them to become ruthless killers, but is the cause of the two characters meeting their demise. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth turn away from the honest and gentle people they once were and instead become "the dead butcher and his fiend-like queen." ( V, sc viii, 69)

In his book On the Sublime and Beautiful, Edmund Burke said, “…God has planted in man a sense of ambition…” (Bartleby.com). Burke contends that a man’s ambition is the passion that drives him toward perfection. Ambition is an innate desire to improvement, but how is the word actually defined? The word ambition means “an ardent desire for status, fame, or power” (Webster 2).

One might say that a person's actions will tell you everything you need to know about that person, “actions speak louder than words,” and that no matter what you say, your actions will speak for you. For instance, in William Shakespeare's play Macbeth, Macbeth was tempted into committing gruesome actions in order to gain power. Despite influences from the witches and Lady Macbeth, Macbeth was the most responsible for taking the lives of so many close companions and becoming a traitor to all. One might reason that Macbeth was responsible mainly for the deaths of his companions first, because of his greed for the crown which had caused him to murder King Duncan, despite his wife’s interference Macbeth's own conscience led him to committing this

The story of Macbeth is about how a man’s ambition for power and control lead to his downfall. In the story, Macbeth’s ambition is further pushed by his wife, a prophecy, and witches. Do Macbeth’s actions make him an evil person? Or should one separate his wrong doings from his character?