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Final paper on

“Macbeth”

By William Shakespeare

Name: Most. Tasnim Jahan Sadia

ID: 2111466615

Submitted to: Dr. AQMA Rahman Bhuiyan

Course Title: ENG 338

Section: 1

Spring 2024
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Fate vs. Freewill in Macbeth by William Shakespeare

Macbeth is a play by William Shakespeare (1564-1616) which was written in sometime around

1606-1607. It was originally published in the 1623 First Folio. Macbeth is considered as a classic

dramatic tragedy in the world of literature. Shakespeare holds a special place in the history of

English literature. His writing is exceptionally lyrical, insightful, and possesses a remarkable

quickness of thought (Spencer et al.). The play Macbeth was written during the Jacobean era and

the King of England at the time was King James I. King James I of England was James VI of

Scotland. The story of this drama has some similarities with the real life story of Macbeth of

Scotland. In dramatic tragedies, the protagonist is seen as perfect from all angles but has one

tragic flaw. That tragic flaw is what makes the protagonist meet their tragic end. In the play

Macbeth, the character of Macbeth has similar traits. He is a brave warrior who is admired by the

King because of his skills in the battlefield. King Duncan was fond of Macbeth. But the tragic

flaw of Macbeth is that he leaned over to ruthless measures in order to satisfy his ambition. In

the beginning of the play, the readers can see that Macbeth and Banquo met three witches. They

made a prophecy for Macbeth that he would become the King. After hearing that Macbeth

became very ambitious about becoming a King and when he realized that he would not be able to

inherit the throne from Duncan through mere succession, he decided to murder King Duncan and

then ascend the throne. He eventually descends into madness and paranoia as he continues to

indulge into more vicious acts. He resolves to committing heinous crimes in order to achieve his

objectives and at the end, being overly ambitious, he brings on his own demise as he gets killed

in the battlefield by Macduff. The major themes of this play are supernatural forces, ambition,

betrayal for power, guilt and the notion of fate vs. freewill. These themes are intertwined with

the thesis of this research paper and the elaborated discussion about them would help to support
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the thesis here. The thesis for this research paper is that resolving to corruption and betrayal for

quenching the thirst of power leads to ultimate destruction.

When it comes to supernatural forces in Macbeth, the first thing that comes to the mind of the

readers is “the Weïrd Sisters”. The three witches that interacted with Macbeth and Banquo are

called the Weïrd Sisters. They were the ones that made prophecies for Macbeth. The first

prophecy they made was for Macbeth and it was, “You will become Thane of Cawdor, you will

become Thane of Gleams, you will become king.” (Act 1, scene 3). When Macbeth learned about

the prophecy of him becoming the King, he did not take the words of the witches that seriously.

Because he was nowhere near the line of succession for the throne, so he was a bit skeptical

about the prophecy. He already had the title of the Thane of Gleams. But later on the Thane of

Cawdor got executed for treason and Macbeth got the title of Thane of Cawdor. When he noticed

half of the prophecy coming true, he started to think that he might have a chance to actually

inherit the throne. He got very ambitious about being the king and was thinking of ways he could

make that ambition of his to come true.

In act 1, scene 3, when the three witches was making prophecy for Macbeth; his friend Banquo

was also present there. After hearing them making prophecy for Macbeth, Banquo got curious

for his future as well and asked the witches to make a prophecy for him. The prophecy Weïrd

Sisters made for Banquo was, “You will be happy but not as happy as Macbeth, you will be

greater but not as great as Macbeth, your descendants will become king.” (Act 1, scene 3). After

hearing that Banquo was never fated to become the King, he got a bit disappointed. According to

prophecy for Macbeth, he eventually became the King. Later on in order to know about the

possible threats about his reign as King, he asked the Weïrd Sisters for another prophecy and

they said, “None of women born shall harm you, beware Macduff, you will be undefeated until
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Burnam wood marches towards Dunsanain hill.” (Act 4, scene 1). Macbeth was trying to shape

his fate based on his freewill and to make that happen the prophecies of the Weïrd Sisters played

a very important role. Because if he never knew heard about the prophecies, he might not have

the heart to make the decisions that he made throughout the play. The prophecies have a great

impact on how the story of Macbeth unfolded and how he met his demise.

It is necessary to consider the witches who introduce the tragedy as its founders in parts. They

appear to be in control of the future and have knowledge of the present's fate as they stand far

away from the war and anticipate a future encounter with Macbeth (Ide 338–39). The three

witches did not make prophecies for Macbeth because they were his well-wishers. The original

case was actually the opposite. The witches wanted to manipulate Macbeth and make his life

chaotic. They planted a seed of ambition and greed into his heart. But the way Macbeth turned

out to be at the end, his own acts and decisions are to blame for that.

Ambition is one of the major themes in this play. Macbeth was always very loyal to the King but

after learning about the prophecy of him becoming the King got him ambitious about it. He told

his wife Lady Macbeth about the prophecy and she was more than thrilled after hearing that she

might have a chance to become the Queen. Lady Macbeth was more looking forward to making

the prophecy come true compared to Macbeth. King Duncan was in reign at the time and the

king suddenly made an announcement that his son Malcolm would be his successor. After

hearing that Malcolm was next in line for the throne, Macbeth got anxious and the only way he

could see to get the throne was the murder of King Duncan. He told his wife about it and Lay

Macbeth instantly agreed with the plan to murder King Duncan. But Macbeth started to hesitate

to actually conduct the act. At that time Lady Macbeth started to question about Macbeth’s

manhood. She said that he would be less of a man if he did not have the courage to murder the
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King and become King himself. Hearing her questioning about his manhood, Macbeth made up

his mind to murder King Duncan.

The protagonist of Macbeth is a man whose character flaws both helped him rise to power and

ultimately sealed his doom. Macbeth's ambition directed him to murder and deceit. Even though

Macbeth was subject to external forces, it was his conscious decision to choose evil that started a

violent, unstoppable, and horrific series of occurrences. It's true that Shakespeare has outlined an

extremely bloody course for the fall from grace of a once-respected and noble figure, and

Macbeth's demise is rendered all the more horrifying by the massive use of imageries about

blood and death (Huber 20-21). Even though he became the King as he desired, he could not

enjoy himself of the luxuries but he kept being anxious about his throne being taken away from

him. He chose the path of evil when he could have lead a good life being a loyal warrior who

was admired by the King. But his overly ambitious dreams and greed for power ruined him. If

his wife had not pushed him while questioning his manhood when he was hesitant about

murdering the King; he might have been saved from the tragic demise that he faced at the end of

the play. But he brought his own doom upon himself. When he realized where he went wrong, it

was already too late to turn back. He had already tainted his hands by the blood of innocent

people that had done nothing wrong to him. He assassinated them because of his insecurity about

ending up losing the throne. He had to taint his soul with blood in order to achieve his goals and

this is why he could not even think about losing his crown because he had to pay a huge price for

all that.

Macbeth betrayed King Duncan for power and started to resolve to heinous acts as he was trying

to make sure no one would be able to take the throne from him. As mentioned before, the

witches made a prophecy for Banquo that he would never be a King but his descendants were
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destined to be the King. When Macbeth became the King after murdering King Duncan, he was

afraid that if Banquo’s descendants were destined to ascend the throne then it might mean that

his own descendants would not be the heir to the throne. In order to make sure that Banquo’s

descendants never have the chance to rule the Kingdom, he hired assassins to kill his whole

family. The assassins succeeded in murdering Banquo but his son fled before they could kill him.

Banquo’s son was then nowhere to be found throughout the whole play. Banquo was Macbeth’s

very close friend and Banquo used to trust Macbeth. But Macbeth’s obsession for the throne

made him kill his close friend. Later on, Macbeth went to the three witches to know more about

his fate so that he could make sure to avoid the threats for his throne. In the prophecy of act 4 the

witches told Macbeth that none of women born would be able to harm him but they told him to

beware of Macduff. After hearing the prophecy, even though Macduff had never done anything

to Macbeth, he assassinated his whole family. Macduff was about to get killed with his family as

well but he escaped. Because of this Macduff held grudges towards Macbeth and joined hands

with Malcolm in order to defeat Macbeth and get his revenge on him for the assassination of his

family. From being a loyal warrior to the King, to being a ruthless monster; Macbeth went

through a vast change of personality. In the beginning he was hesitating to murder King Duncan

for the throne, but later on he was not hesitating even for once while he made the orders for the

assassination of so many innocent lives. The people Macbeth betrayed in order to keep his throne

safe from all threats, they never originally tried or planned to harm Macbeth. But in order to

change his fate according to his wishes, he ended up killing so many innocent lives and making

an enemy out of them.

After committing such heinous crimes, both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth were getting

succumbed by their guilty conscience. After killing Duncan, Macbeth’s hands were smeared in
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blood and he could feel his conscience getting smeared in blood as well. But Macbeth’s guilt did

not make him stop with all the bloodshed but the opposite. Macbeth’s guilt came to him in the

form of paranoia. He kept losing his mind and kept killing more and more innocent people. In act

3, scene 4 of the play, Macbeth was hallucinating about seeing the ghost of Banquo and Macbeth

said, “Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold. Thou hast no speculation in those eyes.”

(Act 3, scene 4). The guilt building up in his sub-conscious mind was making him hallucinate

about that. Lady Macbeth was very ambitious about being the Queen. To her, the title of the

queen meant that she would be the most powerful woman in the entire kingdom. But after

actually becoming the queen, she could not truly enjoy the power. It was because her heart was

filled with guilt. When Macbeth stabbed King Duncan to death, it was Lady Macbeth who took

the bloody spear and smeared the blood onto the sleepy and drunk chamberlains so that the

blame of murdering the King would fall onto them. The whole plan of killing King Duncan was

originally from Lady Macbeth. Being overwhelmed by guilt, Lady Macbeth started to

hallucinate. She would see her hands stained with blood and keep washing her hands over and

over to wash off the blood. But the stain of blood got engraved in her mind out of her guilty

conscience. She eventually lost her mind and then committed suicide because she could not take

it anymore. Even though Lady Macbeth took measures to murder the King in the heat of the

moment by being overly ambitious, she eventually got hit by guilt and caused her own demise.

The connection between fate and freewill is the most important theme in this play. There are a lot

of debates about two things related to this. One group of people would say that life is controlled

by fate. On the other hand, another group of people would say that fate actually depends on the

life decisions made by man. In this debate, both the groups should be considered partially right.

Because fate and freewill are interconnected. There can be times when one would want to run
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away from fate but still would end up being caught up by it. And there are situations where

people are able to shape their fate according to their freewill. There are both the examples in the

play Macbeth. The first one we can discuss about is how Macbeth succeeded in shaping his fate

based on his freewill by murdering King Duncan and ascend the throne. It was next to

impossible for him to become King unless he killed King Duncan. So, here Macbeth used his

freewill and achieved his fate to be a King. On the other hand he was trying his best to avoid his

fate of facing death by the hands of Macduff. He tried his very best to avoid it by giving an order

of assassination for Macduff and his family. But Macduff succeeded in escaping death and ended

up killing Macbeth. On one hand, Macbeth successfully achieved his desired fate through his

freewill, and on the other hand no matter how much he tried he could not escape his fate.

Another example can be about Oedipus that he tried his best to avoid his fate but ended up

getting caught up by it instead. There are times and situations that would allow people to choose

their fate based on their will and there are times when everything goes out of hand. So, people

need to have the ability to choose wisely and not resolve to evil measures. Because resolving to

evil path will eventually end up in demise.

In conclusion, it can be said that Fate is an unavoidable force but one can shape it by their

freewill. Resolving to heinous actions in order to shape fate paves the path to one's own demise.

The path Macbeth chose to shape his fate caused his downfall and his fate unfolded based on his

own actions. He got overly ambitious, caused the deaths of innocent lives. He got his retribution

for resolving to criminal activities in order to achieve his goals. His actions and the result he got

from them goes along with the thesis that resolving to corruption and betrayal for quenching the

thirst of power leads to ultimate destruction. Reading this play there might be some questions

raising in the minds of the readers that how are people supposed to understand whether they
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would succeed in shaping their fates or not. Because on one hand Macbeth succeeded in shaping

his fate and on the other hand he failed miserably. There are no right or wrong answers to this

questions because there are always going to be debates about it. But one thing people can do is at

least try to shape their fates, and not use any drastic measures for that. Because destruction is

inevitable if one chooses the path to evil.

Works cited:

a) Shakespeare, William. Macbeth. Wordsworth Editions, 1992.

b) “About Shakespeare’s Macbeth | Folger Shakespeare Library.” Folger,

www.folger.edu/explore/shakespeares-works/macbeth/about-shakespeares-macbeth.

c) “Macbeth.” Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, www.shakespeare.org.uk/explore-

shakespeare/shakespedia/shakespeares-plays/macbeth.

d) Spencer, Terence John Bew, et al. “William Shakespeare | Plays, Poems, Biography,

Quotes, and Facts.” Encyclopedia Britannica, 29 May 2024,

www.britannica.com/biography/William-Shakespeare.

e) Huber, Eugene R. “A Note on Blood, Ambition, and Guilt in MACBETH.” Bulletin of

the New York Shakespeare Society, vol. 2, no. 4, Oct. 1983, pp. 20–21. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/26352471?read-now=1&seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents.

f) Ide, Richard S. “The Theatre of the Mind: An Essay on Macbeth.” ELH, vol. 22, no. 3,

1975, pp. 338–61. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2872708?read-

now=1&seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents.