Macbeth

‘Although Macbeth was written more than 400 years ago, it is still worth studying today because of its timeless themes, exciting plot, strong characters and vivid language.’

William Shakespeare's works have been around for more than 400 years, and even though his words may be old, they are still works of literary art that have aided the study of English students around the globe. An example of a play would be the infamous Macbeth that uses timeless themes, a climatic storyline, in depth characters and the poetic use of the English language to captivate his audience both in the past and present times alike.

Macbeth is worth studying today as the play analyses how other outside forces can easily change the path of ones desires and decisions. The witches’ intrusion, Lady Macbeth’s decisions all affect Macbeth greatly. He goes from being praised as a noble soldier to a traitor and corrupt king. In the play, Macbeth commits many terrible crimes, however he is not solely responsible for them all. These outside factors manipulate his decisions and are responsible for his downfall at the end. Much alike in the present, the many hardships and adversity faced by those can change the choices and aspirations we hope for revealing the timeless themes within the play.

There are many other timeless themes evident as the play portrays the idea of blind ambition, corruption of power and the deceiving appearances depicted by the characters. The corrupting power of unconstrained ambition causes Macbeth to brutally murder Duncan against his judgement and afterward stew in remorse and distrust as ‘every noise appals’ him. Although, once Macbeth had the taste of power, he was willing to kill anyone and everyone including the ‘young fry of treachery,’ who was Malcolm’s son. Macbeth also put his own desires before the good of Scotland, and in the end, is destroyed by his ambition revealing that power and glory often leaves one in devastation.

Shakespeare also manages to...