Macbeth acts as a warrior throughout the play, despite being disloyal to the crown. Even when he knows that he is going to be defeated in the final few scenes of the play, he still stands up to face Macduff and dies a warrior's death.

We see that Macbeth is heavily affected by guilt in the first half of the play, but this soon fades towards the final scenes.

Macbeth is a character who is heavily controlled by his wife, Lady Macbeth, throughout the beginning of the play. This changes as Macbeth becomes more powerful.

Macbeth is introduced as a valiant war hero at the beginning of the play. His gruesome victories on the battlefield win him great honour with King Duncan. This introduction warns the audience of his violent nature, which appears throughout the second half of the play.

His acts of violence in battle at the beginning of the play are praised by the king, lines such as "Valour's minion" and "Bellona's bridegroom" emphasise Macbeth's heroism. These murders are particularly graphic; ""unseam'd him from the nave to the chops, / And fix'd his head upon our battlements". The murders further on in the play are much less graphic, but are treated as tyranny and evil; "Not in the legions / Of horrid hell can come a devil more damned / In evils to top Macbeth".

Though his first murder (King Duncan) is a moral struggle, he has no problem committing murders throughout the rest of the play. This trait is particularly notable in the final scenes, where he murders Young Siward, a child, with his own hands and without second notice.

It is clear that Macbeth is ambitious from the start of the play, he fights for the king and already has the title of Thane of Glamis when he is introduced in Act 1. However, it is also clear that he doesn't do much to act on his ambition, as shown by his reluctance to kill Duncan.

It is the witches who heighten Macbeth's sense of ambition in their prophecies, he is filled with confidence when the first of the prophecies comes true, and this pushes him to murder Duncan.

Though he is ambitious, Macbeth is also filled with self-doubt in the first half of the play. Once he kills Duncan, he doubts himself and is filled with guilt. Throughout the second half of the play, he is much more assured and confident. The only time we see his self-doubt is when he briefly considers killing himself instead of dying in battle.

	Created by Antonia Blankenberg over 7 years ago

Learn about the main characters in Macbeth with this helpful study note. This note details the main traits of the protagonists and charts how their behaviours change as the action unfolds.

Macbeth Main Characters Analysis