Macbeth’s Fault or Lady Macbeth’s Fault

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People tend to point fingers at people a lot. In this case, the question is “who is to blame for all the killings?” Most say Lady Macbeth because of her disturbing thoughts, words, and actions. But Macbeth is the one who murdered. Macbeth is ambitious in killing and is well enough to make his own decisions, so putting the blame on Lady Macbeth does not make sense. In Macbeth no one is to blame and he is truly the one at fault. Lady Macbeth seems like the right person who the most at fault. It is true that Lady Macbeth is the one who tells Macbeth to murder Duncan, and with her words in her aside, “unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty,” (I.v. 391-392) along with many other horrible scenes Lady Macbeth gives. It gives the audience a purpose to accuse her for all the murders. Lady Macbeth is argued to be in control of Macbeth. John Turner, coauthor of two books on Shakespeare, says, “Until her sense of time dissolves and Macbeth seems crowed already,” (Johnson) which shows that the image of Macbeth being King and having power is driven by Lady Macbeth’s ambitiousness. This is not entirely true. Lady Macbeth does have an ambition for power but not to the extent to be killing everyone. She only wanted Duncan off the throne, she was not aware of the other men in authority, such as Macduff, suspecting her and her husband. She was not paranoid like Macbeth, which is why he killed so many people. It’s reasonable to argue that Lady Macbeth was the influence; therefore she is to be at most at fault. She also was not the one to kill Duncan and the other people, Macbeth did. There is only one other person to blame for the bad things. Macbeth starts out seeming not like a person that could kill his ... ... middle of paper ... ...ow Duncan doesn’t have to worry about anything. This scene clearly shows that Macbeth is very capable of rationing the things he did, to take your sin and justify it to make yourself feel good is not a simple thing. When things are bad, they’re just bad; there’s no justification. Macbeth is at fault not Lady Macbeth. Surroundings don’t influence bad decisions. It gives thought but at the end of the day, it’s up to the person to make the decision regardless of the influence. Lady Macbeth has bad points but did not physically commit any crime nor did she force her husband to do the killings, she just persuaded him well, but Macbeth has the option to refuse his wife, yet instead he killed Duncan and many more. Works Cited Johnson, Vernon Elso, ed. "Shakespeare's Macbeth." Social Issues in Literature: Power in William. San Francisco: Greenhaven, 2009. N. pag. Print.

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