Nathan Trone's List: English-Macbeth VS Beowulf

• The King and his sons, Malcolm and Donalbain, meet a soldier who is weak and bleeding. He reports that Macbeth and Banquo have performed valiantly in the fight. His admiration of the noble yet brutal Macbeth is deep indeed:
• King Duncan is delighted at his captains' bravery, and, when Angus and Ross arrive to tell him that the Thane of Cawdor has surrendered, Duncan gladly hands over the Thane's title and all his land to Macbeth.
• Macbeth proposes that he leave early for his castle to make sure everything is perfect for the King's arrival, and Duncan happily approves. But Macbeth is really only concerned with the King's choice of successor. With ambitious thoughts racing through his mind, Macbeth again finds himself lusting after the crown: "Stars, hide your fires/Let not light see my black and deep desires" (1.4.50-1).

1 more annotation...

• Originally   a loyal and honest man, his descent into murder and   betrayal is the tale of how ambition can tarnish even   the purest of souls.

• The soldiers are sleeping, but one man keeps watch without blinking. It is Beowulf.
• He has never felt a greater hand-grip. He wants to run back to the moors, to hide in the mist, to find his own home. Even so, he cannot get away any quicker, for Beowulf has pinned his arm down.

• So Beowulf told all that he had done and seen in the land of the Danes. He gave to Hygelac the wonderful armour Hrothgar had given him.