Blog #6 (12/2/18) 

Question 1:

The term "evil" is surrounded by a world of negative connotations. When thinking of people that I would describe as evil, Ursula, Darth Vader, Gollum, and Medusa are just a few, of many, fictional characters that come to mind. Each of them were born with 'good' hearts but eventually became known as villainous characters. For example, Gollum was a simple and kind hobbit until he found the ring that would soon make him evil. His blind ambition became his downfall as his drive for ownership of the ring drove him mad. Gollum took his first step towards evil by simply seeing something that he thought was beautiful, and wanted to have for himself. 

Ambition is a prominent aspect within the concept of evil. In William Shakespeare's play, Macbeth, this ideal is quite obvious. The main character, Macbeth, is first introduced to the audience as one who would seemingly be a 'good guy'. Macbeth soon takes his first steps towards evil and follows it by many more steps after that.

Before diving into the character of Macbeth, it is important to know the context surrounding the writing of the story. Shakespeare was very close with the royalty in England, he wrote many plays and literature works for Queen Elizabeth. After her death, he wished to maintain that close relationship with the royal families. Queen Elizabeth had no direct family to continue her bloodline, so England turned to King James of Scotland to rule and unite the two countries. 

There was much backlash from the people of England upon the crowning of King James as their king. Maybe believed that he had no business ruling their country because he was not of Queen Elizabeth's bloodline and also because he was not English. This hostility of the English people resulted in the use of force by King James in order to maintain his power. The rule by King James was one of both distaste and fear.

Shakespeare used this conundrum to his advantage and incorporated many similarities between King James and Macbeth. In the beginning of the play, Macbeth and his partner in crime, Banquo, receive a prophecy from the 3 witches which would entail the crowning of Macbeth as king of Scotland. Macbeth seemed to have brushed off the supernatural witchcraft and disregard it completely. Macbeth stated, "If chance will have me King, chance may crown me. Without my stir." (Macbeth 1.3)

That was until Lady Macbeth was told of the prophecy. She did not wish to wait and find out whether or not the 3 witches tale was of truthful manner. Macbeths ambition to please his wife is what lead to him murdering King Duncan. Ambition is typically the cause of a characters first step on the path towards an overtaking by evil. 

After killing Duncan, Macbeth begins his spiral into a mentally unstable state. The beginning of his spiral can be seen in the line, "Stars, hide your fires; Let not light see my black and deep desires." (Macbeth 1.4) Although this line was said prior to the killing of King Duncan, it marks the start to his spiral towards evil. 

The prophecy did not end at Macbeth becoming the king of Scotland. It also was foretold the Banquo's children would eventually sit upon the throne. Macbeth had a distaste for everything that had the potential to ruin his reign and strove to eliminate all of those factors. In order to eliminate that chance, Macbeth decided to kill Banquo and his child. He was successful in killing Banquo but his son, Fleance escaped the murderers. 

With a potential future ruler still at large, and the fact that he killed his best friend, Macbeth's mind starts to slowly deteriorate. This can be seen in the line, "Avaunt, and quit my sight! Let the earth hide thee! Thy bones are marrowless, they blood is cold," (Macbeth 3.4) in which Macbeth is yelling at what he says to be the ghost of Banquo. He is at a dinner with his lords and Lady Macbeth who are all under the impression that the king is going mad. 

As evil begins to grow within someone, the internal consequences increase accordingly. Their mind becomes poisoned and guided by their ambition for their highest goals, in Macbeths case, that would be unwavering leadership of Scotland. The mind begins to play tricks on its host as if a parasite is thriving within. 

However, there are most than just the internal consequences at play. These internal lead to external consequences as well. In way of Macbeth, his minds' tricks lead to him being viewed as ill and unfit to be ruler by his people. This is ironic because this judgement, which is due to his internal workings, lead to more external issues which he strives to put an end to which then inevitably lead to the worsening of his mental state.

As the evil continues to grow within Macbeth, it will be interesting to see what unfolds next.