Macbeth is a tragic hero because of his unrestrained ambition which leads him to commit many horrible acts. However, he has free will to decide how he wants to lead his own life. Although many factors have an impact on him, including the witches' prophecy and his wife's insistence on murdering Duncan, Macbeth himself is to blame for his own downfall.
He reveals that his "black and deep desires" are the reason why he wants...
Macbeth is a tragic hero because of his unrestrained ambition which leads him to commit many horrible acts. However, he has free will to decide how he wants to lead his own life. Although many factors have an impact on him, including the witches' prophecy and his wife's insistence on murdering Duncan, Macbeth himself is to blame for his own downfall.
He reveals that his "black and deep desires" are the reason why he wants to pursue his ambition. Those desires are "black" because black symbolizes something that is evil or sinful. And the desires are "deep" because they are secret and hidden from the surface.
In his soliloquies, Macbeth realizes that murdering king Duncan is wrong on many levels, yet, he chooses to ignore this because of his overwhelming ambition:
I have no spur
To prick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself
And falls on the other.
This ambition, which is his tragic flaw, will lead to his demise. Once he murders Duncan, Macbeth has free will to stop, but he chooses not to. He continues murdering many other innocent people and relying on the witches' prophecy. He stops listening to his wife and begins to plan who else he will eliminate. His unchecked ambition turns him into a cold-blooded murderer, who no longer possesses any sense of right and wrong.
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