The Place of Destiny, Fate, Free Will and Free Choice in Macbeth Essay

The Place of Fate in Macbeth Shakespeare was wont to employ the supernatural force of share throughout his sad play Macbeth. Let us examine in this essay what we mean by the above statement. In Everybodys Shakespeare Reflections Chiefly on the Tragedies, Maynard Mack explains that the witches are associated with fate Except in one phrase (I.3.6) and in the stage directions, the play always refers to the witches as weyard - or weyward - sisters. Both spellings are variations of spiritual, which in Shakespeares time did non mean freakish, but fateful - having to do with the determination of destinies. Shakespeare had met with such creatures in Holinshed, who regularly refers to the supernatural agents with whom Macbeth has dealings as the three sisters, or the three weird sisters, i.e., the three Fates. (185) L.C. Knights in the essay Macbeth explains the place of fate in the decline of Macbeth One feels, says W.C. Curry, that in proportion as the good in him diminishes, his l iberty of chuck up the sponge choice is determined more and more by evil inclination and that he cannot choose the better course. Hence we speak of destiny or fate, as if it were some external force or moral order, compelling him against his will to certain destruction. Most readers have felt that after the initial crime in that location is something compulsive in Macbeths murders and at the end, for all his valiant fury, he is certainly not a free agent. He is like a bear even to a stake, he says but it is not only the besieging army that hems him in he is imprisoned in the world he has made. (102) In Fools of clipping Studies in Shakespearean Tragedy, Northrop Frye stresses the connection between the witches and fate The... ...ey, A.C. Shakespearean Tragedy. New York Penguin Books, 1991. Coles, Blanche. Shakespeares Four Giants. Rindge, NH Richard R. Smith Publisher, Inc., 1957. Coursen, H. R. Macbeth a Guide to the Play. Westport, CN Greenwood Press, 1997. Frye, Northrop. Fools of Time Studies in Shakespearean Tragedy. Toronto, Canada University of Toronto Press, 1967. Knights, L.C. Macbeth. Shakespeare The Tragedies. A Collectiion of Critical Essays. Alfred Harbage, ed. Englewwod Cliffs, NJ Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1964. Mack, Maynard. Everybodys Shakespeare Reflections Chiefly on the Tragedies. Lincoln, NB University of Nebraska Press, 1993. Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Macbeth. http//chemicool.com/Shakespeare/macbeth/full.html, no lin. Wilson, H. S. On the Design of Shakespearean Tragedy. Toronto, Canada University of Toronto Press, 1957.