The Character of Banquo in "Macbeth"

Sketch the character of Banquo

The character of Banquo has been conceived as a foil to that of Macbeth. He is, like Macbeth, a brave soldier and a successful General. Both Ross and the wounded soldier praised both Macbeth and Banquo as brave and courageous Generals.

Banquo is essentially honest and noble man. He is also tempted like Macbeth, but he does not give way to temptation. Like Macbeth, Banquo is also ambitious, but he does not act to realize his ambition. According to Stopford Brooke, Banquo is the noblest character in the play. Macbeth pays a high tribute to his nobility:

Our fears in Banquo

Stick deep; and in his royalty of nature

Reigns that which would be feared; it is much he dares

And, to that dauntless temper of is mind,

He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour

To act in safety.

Because he has no guilty conscience as he is not ‘startled’ like Macbeth, by the prophecy of the witches. He remains quite calm and unaffected by their words. He understands their true nature, and says,

But it is strange:

And often times, to win us to our harm,

The instruments of darkeners tell us truths,

Win us with honest trifles, to betray us,

In deepest consequence.

He is a noble, honourable man and when Macbeth tells him that, if he will cleave to his counsel, “it shall make honour for you”, he replies,

So I lose none

In seeking to augment it, but still keep

My bosom franchised and allegiance clear

I shall be counseled.

However, it will be wrong to say that he remains honourable throughout. He is essentially honourable, but thoughts of guilt do enter his mind. That is why A. C. Bradely regards him as, “more truly than Macbeth, the victim of the witches”. Banquo alone knows of the prophecy of witches. He alone suspects Macbeth but still he does nothing to bring him to book. Moreover, he accepts Macbeth’s accession. He goes to Scone for Macbeth’s coronation. In one of Banquo’s famous soliloquies he reveals that he fears that Macbeth has, “played most foully” for the throne, but still he does not speak a word against him and the reasons is….

If there come truth from them –

As upon thee, Macbeth, their speeches shine –

Why, by the verities on thee made good.

May they not be my oracles as well,

And set me up in hope.

The poison of the witches has worked upon him, and the innocent man of the earlier scenes gives way to temptation. His punishment comes more swiftly. The early death saves him from any further fall. He could get no time to act for fulfilling the prophecy of the witches.

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The Character of Lady Macbeth

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The Character of Lady Macbeth

Lady Macbeth is one of the most famous and frightening Shakespeare’s female characters. The most outstanding feature of her character is her iron-will and determination. When we first see her, she is already plotting Duncan’s murder. She is stronger, more ruthless and more ambitious than her husband.

With all her iron will, self-control and singleness of purpose make her a little inhuman.  She has no pity for the old king Duncan. She has no consciousness of the treachery and baseness of the murder. She has no sense of the value of the lives of the wretched grooms on whom the guilt is laid. She has no shrinking from the hatred and condemnation of the world, and no fear of consequences in this world or the world to come. All these aspects of this woman character make us feel that she is utterly inhuman. Coleridge rightly said, “She evinces no womanly feeling, no wifely joy, at the return of her husband”. Malcolm calls her “the fiend-Queen” and all the critics have called her “the fourth witch”.

As soon as Macbeth returns from the battle victoriously, she goes straight to the point without any greetings of wifely joy at his return and permits him to speak of nothing else. She assumes the direction of affairs, animates him by picturing the deed as heroic, and overcomes his resistance by presenting him with a prepared scheme, which shall remove from the terror and danger of deliberation. She rouses him with taunts and “chastises him with the valour of her tongue”. She persuaded and compelled Macbeth to go ahead to do the deed as “her eyes are fixed upon the crown and the means to it”.

Lady Macbeth has immense courage, will-power, and self-control, but she is totally lacking in imagination. She fails to understand her husband’s real character, interprets her moral scruples as mere cowardice. So, she instigates him to do the crime. If we look beneath the surface of Lady Macbeth’s character we find that even in the earlier scenes, there is ample evidence to show that she has feminine weakness and human feelings, which account for her later breakdown. We must remember that she knows that her husband is infirm of will that he is “too full of the milk of human kindness” and, therefore, she sets herself to counteracting his infirmity.

However, the realizations of their hideous crimes come to her soon after the murder. She begins to sink into disillusionment and depression.  The glory of her dream soon fades away. She is exhausted with sleepless nights. She exclaims:

Nought is had, all is spent,

Where our desire is got without content.

Disillusionment and despair prey upon her more and more. Though, She takes practically no part in the action but she gradually recedes into the background. The readers get the pathetic spectacle of the sleepwalking scene – the culmination of a long process of decay and dissolution. As she walks and talks in her sleep, she relives the crimes that she has helped Macbeth to commit, thus revealing guilty secrets. She rubs her hands desperately as though trying to wash guilty off. Finally she sagged to death in a miserable condition.

The awe and grandeur of Lady Macbeth’s character evokes pity in the minds of the readers in the last scenes of the play.

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The Death Trap - H H Munro (Saki)

The Death Trap – ‘Saki’ (H.H. Munro)

The one act play “The Death Trap” revolves around the conspiracy against the reigning prince of Kedaria, prince Dimitri, who turns the table on his assassins at the end of the play. Prince Dimitri, the young ruler of Kedaria, has rivalry with Prince Karl, who desired to capture the political power of Kedaria by murdering the reigning prince. So, Dimitri’s enemies hatch a plan to assassin him and they are waiting for the right moment to execute it.

Three Military Regiments namely Andrieff Regiment, Lonyadi Regiment and Kranitzki Regiment guard the Prince Dimitri, the reigning Prince of Kedaria. Dr. Stronetz, a faithful physician, is also very loyal to the prince Demitri. The Kranitzki Regiment is being loyal to the enemy and the three officers of this Regiment, Colonel Girnitza, Major Vontieff and Captian Shultz are all set to murder Prince Dimitri as soon as the loyal Andrieff Regiment leaves from its duty. These officers of Kranitzki Regiment are disloyal to prince Dimitri but very loyal to Prince Karl, who is willing to kill prince Dimitri and want to become the king of Kedaria.

When the play “The Death Trap” opens where three guards of Kranitazki Regiment are seen plotting the assassination of Prince Dimitri so that Prince Karl can ascend the throne. The conversation among the three disloyal guards reveals that they are openly conspire to murder the prince.  They are very aware that the Prince Dimitri is already suspecting them. Yet, they go ahead with murder plan because they are being backed by the political support of Prince Karl.

Following the conversation between the Prince Dimitri and his loyal physician Dr. Stronetz, we get to know that Prince Dimitri came to power at his very young age when he did not know anything about the rules of governance or responsibility. This shows his helplessness, which is now an advantage to his enemies.

Prince Dimitri is well aware that he is “trapped” and that his own guards are plotting to kill him. This is a painful realisation for him. He also knows very well that he would be killed at any moment as soon as his loyal Andrieff Regiment leaves. He has no weapons to defend himself. No one is allowed to see him except his friend and personal physician Dr. Stronetz. Out of kindness and loyalty Dr. Stonetz devices a clever plan as a physician. Instantly, he asks the Prince to remove his robes for a fake of physical examination, which will help him to fool the officers of the disloyal Kranitzki Regiment. His efforts are only temporarily delay the murder of the Prince. But this delay helps the Prince to take revenge on disloyal officers.

However, the hard truth behind the physical examination of the Prince reveals that he is really suffering from an incurable heart disease. This is another shocking realization to the Prince. He decides to commit suicide instead of being killed in the hands of his disloyal guards. He requests Dr. Stronetz to provide him a phial of poison, which can kill him so that he can invite his death as a ruler without being killed. Dr. Strontez gives him a phial of poison. But as final act of revenge, when death is inevitable to him, the Prince Dimitri wants to die only after punishing his enemies. So he mixes the entire phial of poison in a bottle of wine and invites the three officers for a final drink.  He shares the poisoned wine after drinking it himself. It is a sight of pity for the Prince but at the same time he shows a clever act of revenge. The Prince thus overcomes his helplessness by his intelligence even though he cannot avoid his own death.

Thus the title of the play “The Death Trap” projects how the Prince and his helplessness becomes the ‘death trap’ to the officers of Kranitzki Regiment as result to their disloyalty.

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Sketch the Character of Macbeth

The Character of Macbeth

Macbeth, the nearest cousin of Duncan, the king of Scotland, is a brave warrior and an able General. Before he actually appears on the stage in the initial scenes of the play, he is introduced to us through the eulogy of the wounded soldier and other noble man, Ross. He has been depicted as a great valour in suppressing the revolt of the treacherous Macdonald and his ally the Norwegian King. He is referred to as  ‘Valour’s minion’, and ‘Bellona’s bridegroom’. The king calls him a ‘peerless kinsman’, and others call him ‘noble’ and ‘honourable’. All these remarks make it clear that Macbeth is capable of considerable physical prowess that any danger leaves him fearless and undaunted. 

Macbeth, thane of Glamis, later thane of Cawdor, a brave and successful military leader, and potentially good and great man, wins general admiration as well as the particular gratitude of King Duncan. After meeting with three witches, he succumbs to their tempting prophecies. He was ambitious by nature, and this tendency of ambition might have been strengthened by his marriage with Lady Macbeth, a woman of iron will and determination. Ambition held before him the glittering crown of Scotland as a desirable object. The play makes it clear that the two – the husband and the wife – must have frequently talked and discussed on the possibilities of securing the crown of Scotland.  This ambition is now further stimulated by present circumstances, which made Macbeth a treacherous killer.  He kills the King Duncan who has come to his castle as guest for mere want of fulfilling his ambition.  

After murdering King Duncan and declares himself the King of Scotland, Macbeth precedes further crime-to-crime. He suffers from a sense if insecurity and fear of retaliators. He is afraid of Banquo for knowing his secrets and he must make the throne secure for himself and for his children. So, he hatches a plot to kill his close friend Banquo and his son Fleance on the pretext of inviting them to a royal banquet. The murder of Banquo does not bring him peace. Further, he kills Macduff’s wife and child when he comes to know that Macduff has left Scotland for England to express solidarity to Malcolm. Thus Macbeth embarks on a career of crime, and descends lower and lower into very depths of Hell. The flood of evil in his nature is now let loose, and he becomes a tyrant, a terror to his country: 

                        Each new morn

                        New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows

                        Strike heaven on the face.

Malcolm describes him thus:

                         I grant him bloody,

                         Luxurious, avaricious, false deceitful,

                         Sudden, malicious.

In the very depths of crime, a gleam of his native love of goodness is over shadowed with a touch of tragic grandeur, which rests upon him. He has embraced evil but he does no glory in it or makes his peace with it. He is not a child of darkness; the faces of evil that assail him fail to make him their own. He retains till the last his humanity and his conscience. Hence it is that we pity him and sympathize with him.

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Day of Atonement - Margaret Wood

Day of Atonement – Margaret Wood

The one–act play “Day of Atonement” by Margaret Wood describes the themes of redemption and forgiveness as its central motif. The play focuses on the background of the Nazi holocaust in Germany at the time of World War II. The play unveils the life and experiences of the Jacob’s family and their association with the German doctor, Dr. Kraus. Jacob, along with his wife Marthe and their children Otto and Ilse are the Jewish victims in Nazi oppression. The Jacob’s family continued to live in Germany even after the end of Nazi holocaust. The time of this play takes place after twelve years of their horrifying experiences of the Nazi oppression.

During their life in Germany they get acquainted with a German doctor named Dr. Kraus, a surgeon who is bent on serving the poor and helpless Jews. As part of his service he successfully operates Ilse who is suffering from tuberculosis. Jacob and Marthe are thankful to the doctor for saving the life of their daughter. But Otto, Jacob’s son, does not like the doctor. He knew that Dr. Kraus had indulged in torturing Jews in Nazi concentrate camps.  When Otto realizes that Dr. Kraus is visiting them, he suddenly goes out of the house telling his parents that he is going to his friend, Moishe’s house.

On the night, When, Dr. Kraus visits Jacob’s family to tell them about the success of Ilse’s operation and her further improvement. Jacob and Marthe want to share their happiness and express their gratitude by serving wine to Dr. Kraus for helping their daughter to recover form illness. Otto re-enters the scene while Dr. Kraus is in their house. He argues with his parents when they scold him for not greeting Dr. Kraus who is considered as their ‘guest and benefactor’.  In a fit of anger Otto discloses Dr. Kraus’s cruel activities in concentrate camps to his parents. He reveals that this doctor used to carry out experiments to see how much pain the human body can withstand without actually dying….’ by conducting “surgery on the healthy’ and ‘operations to mutilate the strong’. Further, Otto exposes that the doctor’s real name was Holtz and not Kraus who worked as a doctor in the Nazi concentration camps and indulged in such cruel and criminal activities. But for the past twelve years Dr. Kraus is trying to make amends for his past crimes by extending his services to the helpless and poor Jews as he was being influenced by the speeches of Carl Baecke.

The character of Carl Baecke further reinstates the themes of redemption and forgiveness. Carl Baccke, a Jew of the Theresienstadt camp changed the life of Dr. Kraus. He used to hold meetings everyday in any one of the huts at nights though his wife and four sisters died in another concentrate camp. The Nazi’s thought that he was planning a revolt. One night Kraus slipped into the back of the hut. The hut was crammed with the poor Jews. Carl Baecke bowed to him when he saw Kraus enter the hut. He was giving lectures on philosophy from Plato to Kant. It was then that he realized that they (the Jews) were great people. Moreover when the war was over, the Russian commander handed the doctor and other Nazis to the Jews to avenge their crimes. But then it was Carl Baecke who helped the doctor to escape from the middle of the Jewish mob. These incidents changed the attitude of Kraus towards the Jews. From then onwards the doctor was trying to redeem himself and atone for his past crimes.

When Otto disclosed the identity of Dr. Kraus and his past, Jacob tries to lighten the situation. In spite of knowing about all this cruelty toward Jews, Jacob and Marthe wholeheartedly forgive the doctor. When Otto argues with Jacob on killing the doctor, Jacob says that he neither forgets nor forgives nor he will take revenge. Further he states that any good Jew wants to avenge the dead though Otto is bent on taking revenge. Otto decides to kill Dr. Kraus for all his wrongdoings but his parents vehemently oppose him from doing such an act. The doctor tells Jacob and Marthe that he is surrender before the court. Jacob requests the doctor to escape from the house but Dr. Kraus willingly steps out of the house where he is caught and shot by the Jews.

The Jews waiting outside the house of Jacob kill the Dr. Kraus. Otto feels a bit softened at the death of the doctor and he joins his father in reading the Psalms of David in the Bible. Though Jacob and Otto stands as opposite poles till the end of the play, they reconcile with each other at the end of the play.

The play thus stands as a poignant expression of themes of redemption and forgiveness.

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