Running head: CONSTRUCTING MEANING IN LIBERAL ARTS CONSTRUCTING MEANING IN LIBERAL ARTS 2 The Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth exposes how human beings are weak. The play relates the way human beings are greedy and are not contented with what they receive from the society (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, (2009, Pp. 3, Act 1). This role between human beings and society are also described in the works of Sigmund Freud. Freud’s theories primarily focuses on how humans are constantly denied to fulfill what they seek, accusing the society and its role as being the blame for it. Doing a comparison between both works, Shakespare also try to understand the human being and their role in the society. Freud comes with three key principles: the id, ego and superego. They all work together, allowing people to communicate with their exterior world. Macbeth demonstrate this in his weakness and in the quest for power. The human being is portrayed evil when Macbeth kills King Duncan just because he wants to take over the throne. Due to guilt and shame of betrayal, Macbeth finally commits suicide and he goes to eternal darkness. In this book Shakespeare is trying to show his audience the evil nature of human being and the way they are discontented with their own status (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009, Pp. 5, Act 3). Freud in other hand, says that often we have nothing which is more exact than experiencing the behavior we have and the character that we posses. Shakespeare demonstrates that the super-ego of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth at some point, will punish them for acting in a bad way against their own morals and instincts. In this play Macbeth involves himself in everything that is dark. For example; murder, manipulation, deceit, lying, disloyalty and disobeying the higher power are mostly portrayed in the play (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009, Pp. 3, Act 1). All these actions, should be considered part of the “id” of the Macbeth, in other words, according to Freud, each one of his acts portrays an unorganized part of his personality structure that constains a human’s basic, instinctual drives. Those instincts are present in the source of the body wants, needs, desires, impulses, and aggressive drives. The darker element of human beings, in the play, shows the defeat of one’s own being and eagerness to rule. Every wrong done by Macbeth and his companion comes out in a dangerous way. The play shows that every individual has the power and ability to perform something that is good and evil by the choices they make. Freud on his analysis of the human psyche explains that every single human lives in a struggle between their ego and super-ego.This struggle usually put them in a difficult situation where they have to chose between doing what is right or doing what their own instinct demands. Macbeth’s greed and bad decision making led him to lose every possession he had owned by working hard. He ...

1. Running head: CONSTRUCTING MEANING IN LIBERAL
ARTS
CONSTRUCTING MEANING IN LIBERAL ARTS 2
The Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth exposes how human
beings are weak. The play relates the way human beings are
greedy and are not contented with what they receive from the
society (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, (2009, Pp. 3, Act 1).
This role between human beings and society are also described
in the works of Sigmund Freud. Freud’s theories primarily
focuses on how humans are constantly denied to fulfill what
they seek, accusing the society and its role as being the blame
for it. Doing a comparison between both works, Shakespare also
try to understand the human being and their role in the society.
Freud comes with three key principles: the id, ego and
superego. They all work together, allowing people to
communicate with their exterior world. Macbeth demonstrate
this in his weakness and in the quest for power.
The human being is portrayed evil when Macbeth kills
King Duncan just because he wants to take over the throne. Due
to guilt and shame of betrayal, Macbeth finally commits suicide
and he goes to eternal darkness. In this book Shakespeare is
trying to show his audience the evil nature of human being and
the way they are discontented with their own status

2. (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009, Pp. 5, Act 3). Freud in
other hand, says that often we have nothing which is more exact
than experiencing the behavior we have and the character that
we posses. Shakespeare demonstrates that the super-ego of
Macbeth and Lady Macbeth at some point, will punish them for
acting in a bad way against their own morals and instincts.
In this play Macbeth involves himself in everything that is
dark. For example; murder, manipulation, deceit, lying,
disloyalty and disobeying the higher power are mostly
portrayed in the play (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009,
Pp. 3, Act 1). All these actions, should be considered part of the
“id” of the Macbeth, in other words, according to Freud, each
one of his acts portrays an unorganized part of his personality
structure that constains a human’s basic, instinctual drives.
Those instincts are present in the source of the body wants,
needs, desires, impulses, and aggressive drives.
The darker element of human beings, in the play, shows the
defeat of one’s own being and eagerness to rule. Every wrong
done by Macbeth and his companion comes out in a dangerous
way. The play shows that every individual has the power and
ability to perform something that is good and evil by the
choices they make. Freud on his analysis of the human psyche
explains that every single human lives in a struggle between
their ego and super-ego.This struggle usually put them in a
difficult situation where they have to chose between doing what
is right or doing what their own instinct demands. Macbeth’s
greed and bad decision making led him to lose every possession
he had owned by working hard. He depicts to us how men are
very hungry to get power which drove him to kill his own
cousin and who was also the best friend to him. Macbeth’s act
of disloyalty is a big flaw in his character trait and part of his
human nature (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009, Pp. 2).
At some point, Macbeth demonstrates doubts and some remorse
for his deeds, yet he was also concerned about his own safety
that he would not be caught. This shows how human beings are
because they only want to promote their self interests

3. (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009, Act 2). During the
plot, it is evident that Macbeth is having difficult in dealing
with his emotions and it is clear that he is overwhelmed by self-
doubt, paranoia, and fear.
Macbeth has been used by Shakespeare to demonstrate to the
audience that decisions made by them and actions can easily be
influenced by simple aspects of human nature like greed, hunger
for power that some individuals seem to possess or own which
can easily be manipulated by some evil. Freud should call those
aspects as instincts which usually act according to the pleasure
and seeks immediate gratification of any impulse.
The play Macbeth gives emphasis on different behavior and the
sides that human beings are in and portrays that all people have
the ability of doing what is good or bad by choosing what they
are interested in and the decisions are what makes the outcome
of an individual in future years. In Act one, Shakespeare
portrays the weakest part of man as the biggest background for
this dangerous play. Macbeth became more engulfed in greed
and he would not stop to gain what he believed was his rightful.
He knows that his thoughts of murder was wrong, however,
Lady Macbeth was a womam completely in touch with her id
and completely out of touch with her super-ego and, thus, ego
conviences him through bullying and tears that he should kill as
planned.
The witches portray to the society how the unnatural is
like. Witches may not be mistaken for evil people that only pay
a visit to the world. They are the dwellers of the world that
resemble human, but in them human are distorted unnaturally.
Macbeth is implying that he is not used to feeling this way he
had when all his hair and body was overwhelmed at the time he
was about to kill the King.
After Banquo goes to retire to bed, Macbeth hallucinated,
spotting a bloody knife in the air and where he convinced
himself it was a night of hallucination. In this place, nature
seems dead and as people go to sleep so nature also do the
same. In this play Shakespeare is trying to show how nature and

4. unnatural have been broadly used as reigning theme in the play.
We also have the theme acquiring power by man. Destruction is
realized when the ambitions goes unnoticed by the moral
limiting constraints that establishes the most powerful
expression in two main characters of the play. Macbeth has been
courageous who is not naturally affiliated to committing evil
deeds, yet he strongly dreams about getting power and advance
in the society where at the end he becomes frantic, and with
decayed morals (Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009, Pp. 2).
The theme of cruelty and masculinity can be traced in the
play where Macbeth focuses on the issue of gender. Macbeth the
lady manipulates her man by firmly questioning his manhood
and wishes that she lacked sex which is not contracted by
Macbeth when he says that a woman like she needs to give birth
to only boys. The play demonstrates that women are source of
violence. The prophecies of the witches stimulated Lady
Macbeth to be more violent in the play.
The other theme that emerges in the play is that one that
shows the relationship of masculinity and cruelty. Macbeth
rotates on the issue of gender. Macbeth the lady manipulates her
man by firmly questioning his manhood and wishes that she
lacked sex which is not contracted by Macbeth when he says
that a woman like she needs to give birth to only boys. The play
portrays women as a source of violence. The prophecies of the
witches stimulate Lady Macbeth to be more violent in the play
The play also rotates on the issue of kingship and Tyranny,
where Duncan is portrayed as a ruling king and Macbeth turns
out to be a tyrant. The distinction between the two kinds of
leaders is displayed in the conversation that occurs when
Macduff was with Malcolm in England. This case helps to
display the theme of kingship and tyranny which two separate
types of ruling in any society (Shakespeare, Mowat, &
Werstine, 2009).
Hallucinations together with visions occur each time in the
play and it reminds of Macbeth together with his wife joining
together in blameworthiness for the maturing of body size. In

5. his imagination, when Macbeth wanted to murder Duncan, he
saw the knife moving in the air. He also sees the knife brooded
with blood and moving towards the bedroom
of the king. in this case, the knife represents the direction and
act where Macbeth is about to embark on it thus, depicting the
theme of violence in the play. The play is famously known for
its violence nature. A murder takes place off stage, but we can
see that all over the play characters displays to the audience
description of carnage. Banquo, Duncan, Duncan’s
chamberlains, Lady Macbeth and Macduff’s son all of them
come to bloody ends showing that the play is very violent
(Shakespeare, Mowat, & Werstine, 2009).).
Freud primarily focuses on how humans are constantly
denied to fulfill what they seek where he accuses the society.
Regarding understanding man, Freud comes with three key
principles to use namely, id, ego and superego. They all work
altogether, allowing people to communicate with their exterior
world. Freud says that often we have nothing which is more
exact than experiencing the behavior we have and the character
that we posses. Freud says in the play that the ego must be
developed because we are not born with our egos. He observed
that an infant at the time of breastfeeding does not distinguish
the ego from the external world since it gradually learns in
various stages (Freud, 2010).
Freud argues out that human’s id is very different; it
carries impulses in their mind and seeks delight and
gratification of the canonic self as men. He trusts that egotism
is the vital part of humankind for many reasons. First is out of
id, egotism and superegotism, the egotism is the important part
of the body that relates to the outer world. It considers the
outside environment around us, blocks the exact impulses by
trying out and getting the solution. The ego is the one that is
directly shaped by civilization and is the one responsible for our
suffering and pain. Our violent drives are all represented by
culture, thus they make our most pleasures attainable. Freud
describes how the human psyche develops and their way into the

6. culture through the art that was to be produced (Freud, 2010, Pp
11).
The highest significant role of Freud in the world was in
his study of the unconscious. Caring less of the validity of his
opinions, he led the world know what our understanding is. Id,
Ego and superego were the important key elements of this
theory. Freud gave theory that it is out of this that yields sex
together with death drives. These are desires that man has to
learn to suppress but they fail, then they will be destroyed by
the world. The superego refers to the far organized part of the
mind which guides the individual on what to do (Westerink,
2009).
He uses religion to keep the culture that bound together yet
it maintain peace. Judeo-Christian religions were especially
effective because they taught believers that by repressing their
instinctual urge, would be appreciated in the eternal life.
Civilization itself stacked to the idea that it was no good to
even express your sexuality and violent desires (Freud, 2010).
References
Freud, S. & Strachey, J. (2010). Civilization and its discontents.
New York: W.W. Norton & Company.
Shakespeare, W., Mowat, B. & Werstine, P. (2009). The tragedy
of Macbeth. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.

7. Westerink, H. (2009). A dark trace Sigmund Freud on the sense
of guilt. Leuven: Leuven University Press.