 Now, this past paper asks you to read the following extract from Act 1 scene 2 and answer the question that follows. At this point in the play, the Scottish army, led by Macbeth and Banquo, are fighting a Norwegian invasion and a rebel army led by Macdonald, sergeant. Doubtful as it stood, as two spent swimmers that do cling together and check their art, the merciless Macdonald worthy to be a rebel for through that, the multiplying villainies of nature do swarm upon him, from the western isles of cairns and gather glasses and fortune on his damned quarrel smiling showed like a rebel's whore, but all's too weak for brave Macbeth, while he deserves that name. Distaining fortune with his brandish steel, which smoked with bloody execution, like Valar's minion, carved out his passage till he faced a slave and never shook hands nor bade farewell with him, till he unseen him from the knave to the chaps and fixed his head upon our battlements. Duncan So, starting with this extract, how does Shakespeare present Macbeth as a powerful character? And of course, the key words in this question, so what you need to focus your attention on when answering this question is of course the extract, but you're starting with it. And then, how Shakespeare's presented, presenting Macbeth, in other words, what literary techniques are used? And of course, the main character to focus on is Macbeth and how powerful he's presented. And of course, in this extract, as we've mentioned when we're looking at it, when reading through the play, this is when the sergeant is reporting back to Duncan of how Macbeth early on is so loyal, very brave, and he's basically won the rebellion for King Duncan. And of course, King Duncan is so proud of his deeds. Now, let's look at how to answer. So, of course, as I mentioned, when you're writing an essay, you always have to begin with an introduction. It doesn't have to be too detailed. However, you do need to tie your introduction to the key words and to show what you're going to be talking about. So, let's look at the introduction. Shakespeare presents Macbeth as a powerful character through depicting him as incredibly brave and valiant in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Indeed, in the passage of the extract, we learned that Macbeth was incredibly fearless in spite of being outnumbered by Macdonald. Shakespeare does this to illustrate to us just how noble and brave Macbeth is. Hence, his downfall within the play is all the more tragic to us as the audience, as we learn that he was brave and loyal when fighting this country. Now, of course, as I mentioned, here you have to talk about, from the outset of your essay, the key words, powerful character. And then what we've done is gone on to talk about how the extract is presenting Macbeth as powerful and brave. But then the second part of this introduction talks about elsewhere in the play. We learn about and we talk about the downfall. And, of course, this is what makes it more tragic for us because he seems, from this extract at least, to be really, really powerful. Now, what this introduction does is it summarizes a nutshell what you're going to talk about. So now let's look at the different examples. Firstly, Macbeth is portrayed in the extract as a powerful character through the vivid and violent description of how he managed to kill Macdonald. We learned that he unseemed him from the nape of his chaps. And this presents a fairly gruesome and vivid image of Macbeth's skills when fighting at war. The violent verb, unseemed, portrays Macbeth as incredibly violent. However, contextually, this is used to reveal just how skillful Macbeth is as a warrior. Hence, he's conveyed in this extract as incredibly powerful as he was skilled and ruthless in dealing with the enemies of his king and protecting the state. So now, as you can see here, this is taking a quote from here, so that he unseemed him from the nape to the chaps. And of course, again, this, as I mentioned, is taken a direct example. However, in addition to taking this direct example, we then focus in on the technique. And in this case, of course, it's the violent verb describing how Macbeth bloodily killed his opponent. What we've then done is added some context. This shows how skillful Macbeth is as a warrior and of course, contextually, he was a knight and he protected his king. And of course, this therefore shows him as really powerful because he was ruthless in dealing with the enemies of king and protecting his state, which was the most important thing to do as a knight and a nobleman at the time during the Elizabethan era. Secondly, Macbeth is portrayed in this extract as being incredibly brave and valiant, as he's unstoppable in his focus on winning the war for King Duncan. The sergeant depicts him in Banquo as two spent swimmers who despite being exhausted, bravely fought against the vastly stronger army of Macdonald and one. This metaphor is powerful as it reveals that despite being outnumbered and exhausted, Macbeth still fought for King Duncan, hence this depicts Macbeth as an incredibly powerful and admirable character. And again, I've taken a quote from the passage delved into it, talked about the technique that Shakespeare is using. And of course, the technique here is metaphor and explained and linked it back to how we can see Macbeth as being powerful. Thirdly, Macbeth is portrayed as highly impressive as King Duncan appears to be incredibly peace in his determination to win the war. This is shown when King Duncan exclaims, O valiant cousin worthy gentlemen, these are planetary sentences coupled with positive adjectives, valiant and worthy, illustrate that Macbeth is really admirable and accomplishes aurea. This establishes Macbeth in our eyes as a highly decorated soldier who's very focused on protecting the state for the king, conveying him as a powerful character. So this is now my third example from the extract. So as I've mentioned, what you want to do is select three examples from the extract before you go elsewhere in the play. Now this third example again, actually, even if it's a question relating to how Macbeth is powerful, you can talk about how other characters perceive him as powerful. And of course, in this case, I've talked about how King Duncan, the king himself perceives them as powerful by using his exclamation marks. And of course, these exclamatory sentences show his enthusiasm. And I've then talked about another way that Shakespeare uses this in terms of techniques. And these are the positive adjectives, valiant and worthy. And of course, what this does, therefore, is establishes Macbeth in our eyes as a really powerful character. Now you then need to move on to the second half of the question which is to do with elsewhere in the play. Now one way to consider how to introduce this is using terms such as that being said. However, this is to show maybe perhaps an opposing perspective, or in addition, moreover, to show other agreeing perspectives, but taking from elsewhere in the play. That being said, we later find that Macbeth is easily led into committing registered by his wife, Lady Macbeth, which is a stark contrast with a brave and promising depiction of him at the outset of the play. When Lady Macbeth goes to him by questioning his masculinity, he defends himself. I dare do all that may become a man. This is a striking contrast, the previous depiction of Macbeth as we find that Lady Macbeth is able to take advantage of his insecurities and control with him into killing King Duncan. Indeed, we find the seeds of ambition which were initially planted by the witches take firm hold as we learn that Macbeth will ultimately kill the king and become ruler of Scotland. However, this hamsha presents his weakness as we learn that his inability to refuse his wife's orders as well as his growing ambition mean that his power and stature in our eyes begin to diminish. Now, when we look at this paragraph, and this is from elsewhere in the play, actually, what I have selected is quotation that show how Macbeth is not powerful as a character because we're looking now at what we call his hamsha, his fate or flaw. In other words, what makes him not powerful is the fact that he is able to be manipulated by his wife. His wife questions his masculinity and this is what causes him to stop being loyal to the king because he wants to show that he's a man. So he says I dare do all that may become a man, which of course is a striking contrast to the previous discussion of Macbeth by the sergeant. What I then mention is the notion of regicide. This is of course killing a king, which was seen as the worst sin one could possibly commit contextually in a spheath in England. And of course, the other thing that causes him to have a fatal flaw is ambition. This is what causes him to ultimately kill the king and diminish his power in our eyes. Later on in the play, Macbeth is easily led into killing the people he loves because of the power which is going to his head and his ambition is to become king and stay as king. This could show that he as a man is powerful, but he's mentally unstable and easily persuaded into doing things such as organizing the murder of his best friend, Banquo. This is seen when Macbeth tells Lady Macbeth, there shall be done a deed of dreadful note. The use of the literation of D is effective as it creates the effect of Macbeth putting emphasis on the D words to symbolize the stabbing of his best friend. This is a contrast Macbeth would see in earlier stages of the play as Macbeth would protect his friend and not let him die. This establishes Macbeth as a man of many emotions, but also as a man that's unstable. Now again, as I mentioned, what I'm doing is showing how and why Macbeth might not be completely powerful as an individual because not only does he kill his best friend because he now, once he is king, all he's focused on is just protecting his power, but this worry is encapsulated in the quote when he says a deed of dreadful note. He knows the evil that he's about to commit using the literation, showing the emphasis and the power in his words, but he still will do it, showing that he's weak when it comes to ambition. However, Macbeth could be presented as a weak character when he fights a major threat. This is when Macbeth is fighting Macduff and he says, I'll not fight with thee. This should show Macbeth is weak and scared as he knows he will lose. The use of the juxtaposition knot and fight reveals Macbeth's change of character from being strong and fearless to scared and weak. This is effective as it shows even the most dangerous tyrants can lose power and become scared. Macbeth has finally lost all that is close to him and therefore the audience can infer that Macbeth gets his sum of his power from this close to him. Now what this paragraph illustrates is towards the end of the play when he finally comes up against Macduff and he learns that Macduff was not born of woman, so according to the prophecies in Act 4 Scene 1 where he learns that the only person that can kill him is someone who's not born through woman but through a caesarean and then he just gives up, he says I'll not fight with thee and of course this shows him as very powerless because it shows that he will not, that he knows that he will lose. He has lost in the fight for the supernatural. Now let's conclude. Overall Macbeth is initially presented as a powerful character as we find that his fierce loyalty to King Duncan coupled with the bravery in war makes him an admirable character. Nevertheless as he becomes consumed with ambition and greed he descends from being an admirable character to someone who's detestable and he ultimately loses his life as a result. This essay is examined in-depth how Macbeth is powerful but to an extent and again this conclusion ties it back to the question how Macbeth is presented. It then similarly to the introduction talks about how to an extent and the essay discusses Macbeth is powerful from the beginning, however he loses this power because he becomes consumed by ambition and greed therefore the argument that's made in this essay is that Macbeth ultimately is seen as powerful but to an extent once ambition and greed take hold he then becomes less and less powerful and this is of course being illustrated through the essay.