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2 days ago · At the beginning of the play, Macbeth is depicted as: Brave and noble: before Macbeth appears on stage, the audience are given a positive impression of him as a fearless and noble soldier through the Captain’s report. For example, he is described as “brave” and “like Valour’s minion”. He is also praised for his brutality on the ...
Aug 8, 2019 · Although we can find precursors to Macbeth in the murderer-turned-conscience-stricken-men of Shakespeare’s earlier plays – notably the conspirator Brutus in Julius Caesar and Claudius in Hamlet – Macbeth provides us with a closer and more complex examination of how a brave man with everything going for him might be corrupted by ambition ...
- Act 1: Scene 2
- Act 1: Scene 7
- Act 2: Scene 1
- Act 2: Scene 2
- Act 2: Scene 3
- Act 3: Scene 1
- Act 3: Scene 5
- Act 4: Scene 1
- Act 4: Scene 3
- Act 5: Scene 8
Mythological
This is an allusion to Lady Fortuna, the Roman goddess of fortune, who the Captain references as behaving like Madonwald’s “whore” on the battlefield.
Religious
This is an allusion to Golgotha, the place where Christ was crucified.
Religious
The term “heaven’s cherubim” is an allusion to an angel of heaven.
Literary
This is an allusion to an adage about a cat that likes fish but not wetting her paws.
Mythological
This is an allusion to Hecate, the Greek goddess of magic, witchcraft, ghosts, necromancy, and the night and moon.
Historical
This is an allusion to Tarquin, a Roman prince who raped Lucretia, a Roman wife, in her bed at night.
Mythological
This is an allusion to Neptune, the Roman god of the sea.
Religious
This is a biblical allusion to Pontius Pilate publicly washing his hands to absolve himself of any guilt for Christ’s crucifixion.
Religious
This is an allusion to Satan, also called Beelzebub, or one of the seven princes of Hell.
Historical/Political
This is an allusion to the Gunpowder Plot against King James I.
Mythological
This is an allusion to Medusa, a Greek monster with snakes for hair who could turn men to stone.
Historical/Political/Literary
This is an allusion to Mark Antony and Julius Caesar, two famous Roman politicians and leaders of the Roman Republic, as well as a reference to Shakespeare’s play Antony and Cleopatra, in which a soothsayer predicts Antony’s fortunes would be lesser than Caesar’s.
Religious
This is an allusion to Macbeth giving his soul, or “mine eternal jewel,” to Satan, the “common enemy of man.”
Mythological
This is an allusion to Acheron, a river in Hades in Greek and Roman mythology.
Mythological
This is an allusion to the harpies, the half-human, half-bird monsters in Greek mythology who tormented people.
Religious
This is an allusion to doomsday, or the end of times as described in Abrahamic religions.
Literary
This is an allusion to an old folktale about a Roman soldier on the losing side of a battle who kills himself to avoid being killed by his enemies.
Mythological
This is an allusion to Cerberus, a three-headed hound from Hell in Greek mythology.
Learn more about the characters of Caesar, Portia, Brutus and Cassius, with photo galleries and study grids to complete. We explore key questions for each character and link to further analysis of their language.
In this scene, the audience understands how all of the other characters view Macbeth, which develops their understanding of his character. The audience also learns of his promotion to the Thane of Cawdor, which improves their view of Macbeth’s stature.
Macbeth is full of "the milk of human kindness," is frank, sociable, generous. He is tempted to the commission of guilt by golden opportunities, by the instigations of his wife, and by prophetic warnings. Fate and metaphysical aid conspire against his virtue and his loyalty.
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Theme #1. Ambition. Ambition is one of the major themes in the play, Macbeth. In fact, ambition is also one of the themes of Julius Caesar, but Macbeth shows excessive ambition and its working. Macbeth, though not overambitious in the beginning, becomes ambitious when he hears prophecies of the witches that he would become the king.
