맥베스의 불안

Abstract

Macbeth is a king who feels endless anxiety. Generally anxiety has two types: one type is triggered by the unstable conditions in which someone lives, and the other is triggered when someone confronts the death. Unstable conditions can cause people to evade death, thus inducing him to live an unoriginal life, while the death anxiety invites him to confront himself, leading to increased self-awareness. Macbeth has these two types of anxiety. However, except for one moment in his life, his main anxiety has the unoriginal orientation. Therefore, his life is self-oriented. His world is narrowed to his strong concern about maintaining his kingship. Therefore, he has no intention to construct a better or more moral society even though he is a king. Therefore, he has only been concerned about his kingship, which leads to many killings of his kin. His interest is only himself, which is represented by his struggle to keep his position, such as by visiting the witches, killing Banquo, massacring Macduff’s family and fighting against Young Siward and Macduff at the end of the play. His reduced interest in Lady Macbeth and the world surrounding him is also another manifestation of his concern for himself. His uncontrollable fixation on himself is wholly the product of his inherent anxiety. In other words all the actions of Macbeth result from his anxiety about his life and his position. Macbeth has one moment of insight into his own life, that is, his monologue in which he says life is short and signifies nothing. At this moment he confronts himself and his death and his anxiety takes on ‘original’ characteristics. He is divested from his unoriginal anxiety at this moment. However, this moment is very short-lived and he returns to his unoriginal attitude about life, as clarified by his fights with Young Siward and Macduff just after he confronts his inner self. His fighting with Macduff is his desperate effort to keep his position as king and shows that he is still dependent upon the witches’ futile prophesy. This proves that Macbeth, instead of being a tragic hero who reaches an insightful awareness of his life, death and anxiety, is a person who is unaware of the deep motives for his actions, who is inundated with unoriginal anxiety, and who finally loses himself.