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Free Will In Macbeth And Oedipus The King

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Free Will In Macbeth And Oedipus The King
Prompt 4 In fiction, generally fate is unavoidable. Fate comes true and is impossible to escape, even if protagonists of plays and books believe that they are acting on free will. Though a character may think that he or she can outsmart a prophecy, their free will is part of their fate. In both Macbeth and Oedipus the King, prophecies came true, as they were always true ahead of time. Macbeth and Oedipus both think that they were escaping their fate and downfall by avoiding the prophecies and acting on their own free will, but in doing so, their fate becomes true and occurs in what they discover to be self-fulfilling prophecies. Fate is the direct cause for Oedipus and Macbeth to fall, due to how the prophecies cause both Oedipus and Macbeth to change their normal course of actions and behave differently from most people, in order to fulfill their prophecies, and, after discovering that their fate became true, they both recognize that their perceived free will was indeed false and blame who made the fates and told them the prophecies that caused the fates to occur. Firstly, Oedipus’ fate is a very unlikable …show more content…
What they think was free will, though, ends up being them creating their own fate with self-fulfilling prophecies, which they both recognize at the end and blame who created those fates. Though fiction can offer more boundaries than the real world and prophecies are impossible, free will cannot be exactly proven. Everyone is going to be at some certain place at some certain time, and, though it is impossible to know, it is impossible to avoid. Though prophecies and fates in fiction are much more ridiculous and convenient for the plot, humans’ free wills may indeed not be free wills at all, but are actually stepping stones for fates that no one knows about
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