Schizophrenia is a mental illness which is best known as one that causes people to believe others are talking to them, but it is much more than that. It also consists of symptoms such as hallucinations, apathy, and paranoia. This mental illness is caused by a combination of being born with it and environment factors that trigger it, such as a traumatic event or stress. In the play Macbeth, by William Shakespeare, Macbeth goes through the story slowly losing his mind and becoming less and less human. Although many blame Macbeth for his ultimate downfall, he is not at fault because he is mentally ill with schizophrenia, which are shown through the symptoms throughout the play. While the hallucinations could be controlled by the witches, they were simply pigments of Macbeth’s twisted imagination due to his mental illness making him not guilty. During the course of the play, Macbeth sees a floating knife, the ghost of Banquo, and four apparitions that gave him advice for the …show more content…
Macbeth said he rather die than, “kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet” (Shakespeare V, viii, 33). Macbeth fighting any man that came at him in the last act was not because he thrived on the violence but because he wants to find a man who has the ability to kill him. As it was said earlier in the play, that any man born of a woman cannot harm Macbeth, which made Macbeth think that almost no one could kill him. This was not a thought out idea that he planned right after he heard the prophecy but rather an, “act on suicide thoughts impulsively and without warning” (Webmd- Schizophrenia). Suicidal characteristics like these are common among schizophrenics making it more difficult to stop them. This is the ultimate reason why Macbeth is not culpable of his ruination and it is schizophrenia that killed him in the
“Psychopaths don't sit still for science and ordinary people can't be made to think so savagely,” proving that if any normal man attempted to follow the choices of these deranged killers, he would fall to pieces, just Macbeth did (Jeffrey Kluger). Choices are what become us, and because of the multitudinous choices made throughout this play, a man lost everything he once was on his path to power. Macbeth’s descent into madness and insanity can be narrowed down to a few things, such as people and it could’ve been the Witches, Lady Macbeth, or even Macbeth himself. The Witches in Macbeth were the very ones who started the whole downward spiral that swept up Macbeth. With their predictions of his future, they implanted illusions that plagued his mind with poisonous thoughts of grandeur.
Based on my observations of Macbeth, the diagnosis for Macbeth going insane is Early Psychosis And Psychosis. The reason why I diagnose Macbeth with Early Psychosis And Psychosis because he has all the symptoms of the mental illness. One of the symptoms of Early Psychosis And Psychosis is Persistent, unusual thoughts or beliefs that can’t be set aside regardless of what others believe (NAMI). Macbeth has thoughts about
It’s almost as if Macbeth gets more insane as the story progresses. In scene II, Macbeth and his wife, Lady Macbeth agree on killing King Duncan to get to the throne. Macbeth begins to hallucinate, “Is
Lady Macbeth’s intensive compulsion tactics, I believe, made Macbeth mentally unstable which subsequently allowed for his delusional state to
Macbeth then wrote to his wife lady Macbeth and told her about the three strange witches. The test then presented itself when Lady Macbeth spoke to Macbeth about her plan to make the prophecy come true sooner. The lesson is the psychological disorders they end up attaining throughout the play as a series of events unravel itself. This paper will state why Lady Macbeth is believed to have PTSD and Macbeth is believed to have Schizophrenia,
All of this with the “combination of lack of sleep and hunger for power skew Macbeth’s reasoning (Becker). ” Overall, as the play progresses, Macbeth’s mental deterioration does with it. The hallucinations, of the dagger, Banquo’s ghost and voices all show Macbeth’s downward spiral. He started the play as an honorable man, but by the end, he becomes a broken man whose guilt eats him alive (Becker).
Macbeth’s only ambition is to keep his throne and survive. Macbeth also states, “Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts/Cannot once start me” (V.5 Fourteen-Fifteen). The case that he thought of the death of his wife so callously reveals his insatiable thirst for more power, and how he had become so corrupt that nothing else mattered but his greed. Macbeth’s downfall was clearly visible in his reactions to the consequences of his greed, showing how he slowly succumbed to his unchecked
In Macbeth when Duncan’s murder is committed by the tusted Macbeth, Macbeth is aware of the severity of his actions; “ What hands are here! Ha –they pluck out mine eyes! Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash his blood clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red” however, despite Macbeth’s will to stop the evil, his uncontrollable ambition continues to rule his conscience. Due ringleader of ambition controlling the mind of Macbeth, this causes Macbeth to possess an unhesitant murderous desire, “My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, shakes so my single state of man That function is smother’d in surmise, and nothing is but what is not” and thirst for power; “I have no spur to prick the side of my intent, but only vaulting ambition” which as result causes inexorable disastrous actions in
In Acts II and III of Macbeth, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth both start to become psychotic, making it appear as if they are both mentally estranged. However, Macbeth starts to show clear signs of schizophrenia, which can be defined as “a disorder that affects a person's ability to think, feel, and behave clearly,” in acts II and III. However, one could think this is normal for Macbeth, who starts to murder his colleagues and friends in order to become the thane of Cawdor. Nevertheless, Macbeth appears to be the more psychotic character in acts II and III. For starters, in what appears to clearly show Macbeth’s mental illness, Macbeth starts to visualize objects that are not there, or hallucinate.
(Macbeth, Act II Scene II) Voices within his mind is the first symptom of schizophrenia that Macbeth presents in the play. However, the evidence of schizophrenia within the mind of Lord Macbeth does not end after the murder of Duncan, in fact it gets seemingly worse. Soon after the murder
Schizophrenia may result in some combination of hallucinations, delusions, and extremely disordered thinking and behavior. Lady Macbeth really shows paranoid schizophrenia in Act 5, scene 1, she says “ out, damn’d spot! Out, I say! One- Two- why then ‘tis to do it.
In act one scene 7, Macbeth doubts if he should kill the king; however, his wife, Lady Macbeth, manipulates him into proceeding. It might be difficult for Macbeth, the renowned warrior, to hear his wife accusing him of cowardice. Therefore, under Lady Macbeth’s influence, as she questions his manhood, he commences the murder in order to prove to her that he is not a “coward.” This is important to note because his soliloquy shows his determination to proceed.
In the play Macbeth by William Shakespeare, neighboring characters around the central protagonist, and the lead himself, evolved from and endured many treacherous psychological transformations. Amongst the characters, none experienced a greater change in mental health to the extent that Macbeth had. Through the entirety of the play, Macbeth’s morals and perception of aspiration are hindered by greed, ambition, selfishness, and external forces. By using dramatic devices such as dramatic irony, nemesis, and soliloquies, Shakespeare is able to bring focus to the deterioration of Macbeth’s character.
Mental illness has a strange history. In the past, people have regarded mental illness as “the work of demons, external spirit forces, and poisons,”(Evelyn), and to this day the cause of mental illnesses is still unknown as they all manifest differently, though some can be described as involving “present distress or impairment in important areas of functioning. Such deviations in thought, feelings, and behavior have been recognized throughout history in all cultures”(Mental Disorders). Even Shakespeare toys around with the concept of mental illness as seen in his play Macbeth; especially when it comes to the character Lady Macbeth. When the audience reads closely between the lines, they will find three mental illnesses that Lady Macbeth has, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and Psychotic depression, and they can all be traced back to one thing: the night of Duncan’s murder.
In the fictional play Macbeth, written by William Shakespeare, Lady Macbeth and Macbeth experience traumatic visions that inevitably trigger intense emotions of paranoia and guilt for the two. Although the couple switches roles essentially in their characters by the end of the play, they both demonstrate significant similarities in their own mental destruction through the actions they make, and supernatural influences. The motif of hallucinations is utilized by characters; Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, to enhance the indirect characterization of experiencing extensive paranoia and guilt, as well as an internal conflict, highlighting the theme of corruption of one’s mind. Paranoia affected the character, Macbeth, into fulfilling his desires for