SOURCE: Cheung, King-Kok. “Shakespeare and Kierkegaard: ‘Dread’ in Macbeth.” Shakespeare Quarterly 35, no. 4 (winter 1984): 430-39.

In the following essay, Cheung suggests that Macbeth suffers from Kierkegaardian “dread”—a fear of the indefinite that excites anxiety and a desire for the forbidden.

Macbeth, in choosing to murder Duncan, exhibits what Kierkegaard would later diagnose as “dread.”¹ Though centuries apart, both Shakespeare and Kierkegaard are steeped in the Protestant tradition; and in both, dogma is accommodated in psychology. Kierkegaard, who quotes Shakespeare regularly to illustrate his psychological concepts, has the advantage of coming after the playwright and incorporating his insights. Partly for that reason, interpreting the playwright with the hindsight of Kierkegaard may deepen our understanding of Macbeth's seemingly irrational behavior.

The Concept of Dread seems especially helpful in answering Walter Clyde Curry's question, “By what processes does this essentially noble creature, whose will by nature desire the good or reasonable...