Hello Friends,
This blog is my response to the task assigned to us by our Prof. Dr.Dilip Baradsir in thinking activity about Macbeth.
Here let's have a look at "Macbeth" from Australian adaptation of William Shakespeare. It was directed by Geoffrey Wright, filmed in Melbourne and Victoria, was released in Australia on 21 September 2006. Wright and Hill wrote the script, which although it uses a modern day Melbourne gangster setting - largely maintains the language of the original play. 'Macbeth' was selected to screen at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2006.
In a cemetery the Weird sisters, three school girl witches, are destroying and defacing headstones and statues, which close by Lady Macbeth weeps beside a headstone marked "beloved son" and Macbeth stands by. The three witches plan to meet with Macbeth later, and leave the cemetery.
Macbeth leads Duncan's gang to drug deal with Macdonald and his men. In a gunfight between the gangs, all of Macdonwald's gang are killed. While chasing two gunmen, Banquo and Macbeth are led to the Cowdor Club. They seize the club and kill the owner.
Duncan hands the club over to Macbeth, and Macbeth and Banquo celebrate by drinking the club's alcohol and taking pills found on a table. During this drug trip Macbeth meets the three witches, who prophesy that he will soon be in Duncan's position with control over the gang. He tells his wife this, though she doubts he has it in him to take over Duncan's position. Later when she learns that Duncan will be dining and staying at their house, she plots with her husband to kill him.
Lady Macbeth drugs Duncan's bodyguards, and while they sleep Macbeth takes their knives and kills Duncan, framing the guards. Macduff comes to Inverness and finds Duncan murdered in his bed. Before the bodyguards can profess their innocence Macbeth shoots them. Malcom, Duncan's son, immediately suspects Macbeth as having something to do with his father's death and flees.
After Macbeth is hailed as the new leader by most of Duncan's gang Macbeth sends two murderers to kill Banquo and his son, Fleance. The murderers kill Banquo, but Fleance escapes. Macbeth holds a celebratory dinner, and after learning that Banquo has been killed, sees a vision of Banquo's ghost at the dining table. Macbeth is becoming shaken by his desire for power. Lennox, Ross and others suspect Macbeth of killing Duncan and Banquo.
Macbeth finds the three witches in his house and he asks them of his future. He is told to fear Macduff, but no man "of woman born shall kill you." Later it is revealed that Macduff is not a natural birth, but a caesarean section, which is not of woman born. He is also shown a vision of Fleance being hailed as gang leader. These prophecies enrage Macbeth, as does the witches' quick disappearance, and he has the murderers go to Macduff's home and brutally kill Lady Macduff and her son.
Lennox and Ross go to tell Macduff who has gone to his uncle Siward. Malcom convinces him that Macbeth has gone much too far in his quest for power and must be stripped of his leader status.
Lady Macbeth has become more insane, reimagining the evening of Duncan's killing and tries to wash off his blood from her hands. A doctor sedates her, and Macbeth appears indifferent to her instability. He prepares for the impending attack from Macduff, Lennox and Ross. Lady Macbeth commits suicide in a bath tub by slashing her wrists, enraging Macbeth. The two murderers, realising the unlikeliness of surviving the attack, swiftly flee Dunsinane leaving Macbeth with only Seyton, his main bodyguard, and two others. The murderers run into Macduff and his associates at the edge of Burnham Wood and are shot.
Malcom leads his men to Dunsinane where they ambus the house and a gunfight ensues. Macbeth is chased to the cellar where he faces off with Macduff and is stabbed in the stomach. He stumbles upstairs to his bedroom, where the body of Lady Macbeth lies and dies at her side. As Macduff leads Fleance, now the inherited gang leader, from the house Macbeth's "tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow" speech is heard.
● Fate: The play is tragic, Macbeth lets his ambition become so important to him that he starts killing people, even his best friend to get what he wants.
● The witches are symbol of evil, and Shakespeare uses this fear of the devil to give his plays an additional eerie atmosphere and haunting effect.
● Like in his other plays, Shakespeare uses supernatural elements in Macbeth and Hamlet to emphasize the powerful influence it could have on the characters in the story and how no one is immune to otherworldly forces.
A Study of Fear rather than Ambition
The hero of a Shakespearean tragedy is always an exceptional individual both, socially and personally, and Macbeth is no exception in this respect. He is a brave, heroic warrior and the king refers to him as his 'peerless kinsmen'. But like the other tragic heroes he also has his own 'tragic flaw', a dominant trait of character which compels him to act in some particular way. This 'tragic flaw' proves fatal for him in the circumstances in which he is placed. In the case of Macbeth, the tragic flaw is his vaulting ambition. He yearns for the crown of Scotland; it seems that he has often discussed the matter with his wife, who is equally ambitious, if not for herself at least for her husband. It is this evil within him which makes him start at the prophecy of the witches, and also to think of murdering Duncan, his relative, his king, as well as his guest for the night. Not only has Macbeth vaulting ambition for himself he is also ambitious to found a dynasty of kings. This makes him war with the future. His war with the future is symbolized by the child or baby, and baby images recur with great frequency and the witches show him apparitions of two children, and a number of kings, who are descendants of Banquo. Therefore, he decides to wage a war against the future and defeat the prophecy of the witches. Banquo is brutally murdered but his son Fleance escapes, thus symbolizing the truth that the future would always elude him and so to war with the future is futile. However, he fails to realize this truth and the murder of Macduff's wife and children soon follows. He rushes on his bloody career till the very end. He and his queen both die childless, defeated by the future.
Besides his vaulting ambition, which makes him a ruthless murderer and a thorough villain, he also has weakness of will. That is why he yields to the suggestion of the witches, and Lady Macbeth called, 'the fourth witch', is able to overcome his resistance by 'the valour of her tongue'. She taunts him and thus succeeds in persuading him to act against his better judgement and commit the murder. He understands clearly the full enormity of the crime, yet because of his lack of will power, he yields to his wife and commits the murder.
Besides his vaulting ambition and weakness of will, Macbeth also has the imagination of a born poet. Macbeth is essentially a melodramatic tale of murder, but it is raised to the level of pure tragedy by the poetic imagination of its central figure. His poetic imagination makes him see visions of the terrible consequences of his crime and its intensities, its horrors. In the words of A. C. Bradley, 'This bold ambitious man of action has, within certain limits the imagination of a poet an imagination on one hand extremely sensitive to impressions of certain kind, and on the other hand, productive of violent disturbance both of mind and body. Thus he is imaginative, he is inclined to be superstitious and, therefore, profoundly influenced by the predictions of the witches. Criminal thoughts are at once aroused. Secondly because he is imaginative, he is deterred and horrified at the thought of crime. His imagination is the handmaid of his conscience and honour; it conjures up images which alarm and horrify.
Macbeth's imagination is pictorial and it is in conflict with his ambition. As he hurries from crime to crime his soul never ceases to bar his advance with shapes of terror or to clamour in his ears that he is murdering his peace and casting away his eternal jewel. Palpable dangers leave him unmoved, what terrifies him is always the image of his guilty heart or bloody deed, or some other image which makes him see the blood stained dagger just before the narrator, which makes him hear cherub in voices crying out against the murder or conjure up visions of naked new born babes blowing the horrid deed in every eye. It is this poetic imagination which makes him hear his voices pronouncing upon him the doom of sleeplessness. It is this imagination which makes him see ghost of Banquo with twenty gashes on his head, and the blood stained dagger.
This conflict between his imagination and his ambition results in heart rending spiritual anguish: his soul gradually falls to pieces and that is the real tragedy. Whenever, his imagination is stirring, we feel suspense, horror, and pity, but as soon it is dormant, these feelings vanish and he becomes a brutal, pitiless murderer. This is so because the will to live is mighty in him. He is not prepared to lose the glittering prize, the worldly power despite his sleepless torture, and the scorpions in his mind. He fails to understand his own true nature, and interprets his sleepless torture as resulting from a sense of insecurity and the fear of a retaliation. Hence his ruthless career of crime despite inner remorse, and, hence his gradual descent into Hell. It's an engrossing spectacle, and psychologically it is perhaps the most remarkable exhibition of the development of a character to be found in Shakespeare's tragedies. We admire and pity the man, while we condemn and abhor the murderer. Macbeth is never completely dehumanised despite his manifold crimes, and despite his crimes he never loses our sympathy.
Macbeth is a complete work of art, and tragedy in it results, not from any single cause, but from a number of causes acting and enacting on each other.
☆ CONCLUSION ☆
Ambition in 21st century is good. But for that one has to work hard in the right direction. But when one's feeling, desire to achieve that ambition goes beyond limit, when one becomes too much ambitious and loses the difference between good and bad, what is right and wrong, when emotions are overwhelming, then this ambitious mind may lead to destructive results for self and others. So better is that we need to remain calm in all circumstances and do our best.
"Start where you are
Use what you have
Do what you can"
"Trust in God
He is with you always.
He'll sustain you and
He'll help you."
The lesson we learn from "Maceth" is that when we harm somebody physically, mentally or emotionally then we have to be ready for the consequences.
"Action and reaction are equal and opposite in direction." Newton's Third Law
When we harm someone or disturb their life in any way, then our mind will lose the stability, the peace of mind and we will have sleepless nights. So better is that we should be satisfied with what we are, with what we have and we are capable of achieving.
Yes, we do find this play "Macbeth" relevant in our time. It depicts the pschology of human mind. Today also people are ambitious and that also to a very great extent. We see there is cut throat competition in 12th science. Students are rushing like bees to get admissions in various fields like medical, engineering, pharmacy, etc. But alas, not everyone is able to get what they long for. Then in such circumstances one should not feel disheartened but instead move on in life. Life gives us many opportunities.
"We are paste with great opportunities brilliantly decided as impossible situations, break the door and grab the opportunity."
2083 words
Works Cited:
1. "Macbeth (2006 Film)." - Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 27 Oct. 2020, en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macbeth_(2006_film). Accessed 19 Dec. 2020.
2. "Macbeth." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 14 Oct. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macbeth. Accessed 19 Dec. 2020.
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