Macbeth Essay

In the story “Macbeth,” by William Shakespeare, many themes are shown in the story. Guilt is demonstrated throughout Macbeth numerous times. Macbeth is an ambitious man that kills the king of Scotland to take over the throne. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth’s lives were ruined from their guilt, when it could have been avoided by thinking of the consequences. Lady Macbeth and Macbeth experienced guilt in different ways.

Lady Macbeth does not feel guilt at first, but eventually she feels regret. This happens when she says, “still all the/perfumes in Arabia will not sweeten this little hand” (V.i.51-52). She knows that her guilt will not go away. Nothing she could do would get the smell off her hand. In other words, she could not take back her actions. Lady Macbeth said, “Who would of thought the/old man had so much blood?” (V.i.58-59). This means that she did not expect the guilt from what she had done. It was implied that she had much guilt from what she had done. Since she could not live with all the guilt, she committed suicide.

Macbeth started experiencing gilt after murdering King Duncan. A quote from Macbeth, “Macbeth does murder sleep” (II.ii.35) shows his guilt from the murder. It means he can no longer sleep. He would stay up all night regretting what he did. He also says, “ Will all Neptune’s ocean wash this blood/clean from my hands?” (II.ii.59-60). He will never get rid of the guilt he obtained. He believes he will feel the guilt for the rest of his life. He could have avoided this guilt if he was not ambitious.

Shakespeare shows the consequences that occur with guilt. Guilt was shown in Macbeth by blood representing guilt and by Macbeth’s insomnia. As proven in Macbeth, guilt will always come back to the people that do wrong.