In
, it is difficult to determine what Shakespeare is saying about ambition.
On one hand, ambition in and of itself does not seem to be all that bad, but on the other,and 's
ambition quickly turns to violence.
For an example of benign ambition, take ,
who acts ambitiously when meeting :
My noble
partner
You greet with present grace and great prediction
Of noble having and
of royal hope,
That he seems rapt withal: to me you speak not.
If you can look
into the seeds of time,
And say which grain will grow and which will
not,
Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear
Your favours nor your hate.
(1.3. 54-61)
Seeing that Macbeth is speechless, Banquo
hopes instead to hear of his own fortune. Crucially, Banquo never commits violence in order to
gain what he desires. In fact, Banquo seems to be the moral center of the play until he is
killed by Macbeth's assassins.
Perhaps it would be helpful to differentiate
between ambition as exhibited by Banquo and violent...
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