Paul Wiles' Essays


Macbeth as Villain: Determinism & Self Determinism

Part I - Part II - Part III - Part IV

by Paul Wiles

In terms of the development of Shakespeare’s themes, “Macbeth” can be seen as a broader, more satisfactory analysis of the concept of Evil than the plays preceding it. It was not enough for him to present us with a type, a mere representation of evil after the fashion of devils and damned ones found in Morality plays. Even the presentation of a spirited and lively Richard III did not penetrate into the evil of the inner man, rather choosing to approach him from the outside by providing the audience with an easily identified follower of Machiavelli.


If one sees Macbeth as in Italianate villain, one can gain insights into both Shakespeare’s critique of Machiavelliani and, to a lesser extent, the hero.


The impact of Machiavelli’s writings was considerable in the sixteenth century and was an important fact presented to Elizabethan culture. Man had been taught, through the impact of Augustinian ideals on religious thinking, that he was essentially good and that evil was merely an aberration from good resulting from a perverse will.

Thus the maintenance of a moral and political ordered framework was necessary to preserve the good by keeping Will in check. Machiavelli, then in this world which was confronting sixteenth century culture, that “how we live is so far from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done will rather seek to bring about his own ruin than his preservation”. This, in itself, was a platitude, but what was novel was that M accepted it and gave “moral” considerations little importance.

Reactions to this tended towards either a blind conservatism or loyalty to traditional values on the one hand, or towards an espousal of the new faith that is equally uncritical, on the other (compare the tracts repudiating M with Marlowe’s apparent relish in portraying a character like Barabus as an indication of this.