Macbeth as Tragedy Essay

Shakespeare’s Macbeth is often considered one of literature’s greatest tragedies and is said to reveal much about human nature. Do you agree or disagree that the play conveys much about humanity or about the human experience? What, if anything, does the work suggest about human beings or society? Support your views with textual details and analysis. In your response, address how Macbeth’s subject matter, themes, form, or other literary elements might (or might not) be characteristic of tragedy. How do tragic qualities of the play contribute (or not) to the story’s larger message(s)? Macbeth has always been a play of interest in any age groups. I remember this play in my high school but then which school does not get involved with this play. I do agree with the statement that Macbeth reveals much about human nature. Macbeth reveals the dark side of human nature; ambition, hunger for control and power, it shows us the aftermath that it leaves behind. The play suggests the dark tendencies that lives within many of the human beings in our society; the need to succeed and annihilate their obstacles at any cost: human beings are opportunistic. Macbeth shows us how far a person will go to in order to realize their own ambitions; even to commit a killing. Free will exists in humanity and everyone has the potential for good and the commit evil deeds. The Macbeth’s lust for power and greed ends up in grim tragedy. Macbeth starts off as a hero; a brave warrior in the battlefield, standing behind his king and protecting his land. This is what makes Macbeth a tragic hero. â€Å"Tragic hero: A main character who acts with courage but falls from high standing into catastrophic circumstances because of a weakness of character or serious misjudgment. (Clugston, 2010, page. 4. 4, para. 3). Lady Macbeth is willing to lose her soul in order to push her husband’s faith to be king a reality and sooner; she asks the gods to remove all compassion and femininity and replace with cold and ruthless qualities; this symbolizes the darkness of human nature. The Macbeth’s had it all but failed to recognize it due to having their dark ambitions take over them; consuming them and this is the tragedy. The literary elements are the motifs, they are the hallucinations and violence; these motifs lead to tragedy end of the Macbeth’s.