Meeting The Three Witches In Macbeth

686 Words2 Pages

Meeting the three witches is the key reason why Macbeth embarks on the journey of his downfall. After a victory in battle, Macbeth and Banquo are walking in a forest when out of nowhere they meet the three witches. These three witches give him three prophecies: “All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Glamis! All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor! All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter (Shakespeare pg.17)!” Banquo also receives a prophecy: that his children will be king. Alarmed, Macbeth presses the witches for more information, however, they vanish without a trace. Macbeth, obsessed with these prophecies, realizes that he is only the Thane of Glamis, not Cawdor, and definitely not king. However, straight after, Macbeth …show more content…

In the play, we see very little to no hesitance or guilt from Macbeth about killing Banquo. Straight away we see Macbeth plotting to kill him- no internal conflict. This shows that by now, Macbeth has repressed his conscience. Macbeth is so driven on making sure that Banquo’s prophecy doesn’t come true, that he hires assassins to kill Banquo and his son. After the deed is done (Banquo’s son escapes), Macbeth feels at rest, however, he then starts to hallucinate about seeing Banquo’s ghost. He goes crazy in front of all the nobles and starts screaming and a non-existing person. At first, he keeps up his emotional barrier and he tells the ghost, “thou canst not say I did it. Never shake thy gory locks at me (Shakespeare pg.103).”His guilt finally overrides his emotional barrier, and Macbeth starts to go insane. Once Macbeth stops suppressing his emotions, he becomes a madman. Killing Banquo pushed Macbeth into a mental state where all the guilt was felt. After killing Banquo, Macbeth goes on to do more actions based off his guilt and insanity caused by killing Banquo. The mental demise of Macbeth could perhaps been avoided had Macbeth not crossed the line by killing

Open Document