Part A What role do you think the witches play in advancing the theme of fate versus free will? Write a strong thesis statement and support it with
examples from the text.

answer

thesis statement: macbeth exercises his free will to attain the goal suggested by the witches prophecy.
macbeth has ambiguous thoughts about the witches prophecy. he acknowledges the prophecy may have some truth since he because thane of cawdor:
this supernatural soliciting
cannot be ill; cannot be good:— if ill,
why hath it given me earnest is success,
commencing in a truth? i am thane of cawdor:
at the same time the prophecy forces macbeth to contemplate the act of murdering the kind:
if good, why do i yield to that suggestion
whose horrid image doth unfix my hair,
and make my seared heart knock at my ribs,
against the use of nature? present fears
are less than horrible imaginings:
my thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,
shakes so my single state of man, that function
is smother’d in surmise; and nothing is
but what is not
while macbeth struggles to understand the prophecy, his ambition moves him down the path toward kingship. macbeth ultimately makes the choice to murder duncan to fulfill the prophecy.