Ambition holds your hand and accompanies you through thick and thin. If there is a sense of ambition within you, there is nothing that strong desire, and inner drive for success will stop for. Not even your family, your friends, social expectations, morality or the law. The power of ambition is far greater than any other human quality to exist and it will push you until you reach success. Whatever that success may be, the ambitious nature of the human species has proven time and time again that despite it being 1606 with Shakespeare, 1817 with Percy Bysshe Shelley, the present with Sophie Pascoe or the future with Andrew Niccol, ambition will not stop for anything or anyone, I will be discussing four texts today and exploring examples of the power of ambition within them. So let’s get started.
One of Shakespeare’s most famous and tragic plays, Macbeth. The main character Macbeth was once known by all as a brave and loyal soldier, a good man too filled with “the milk of human kindness” according to Lady Macbeth meaning he was too pure and good hearted to ever commit any sort of crime. But despite his roots and the person he used to be, all it took was a little provoking and guidance from metaphysical aid, or the three witches, to change which direction he steered his ambitions. Thus arose the combination of having an insatiable nature and strong inner drive for King (and retaining the title of King), only a perfect example of how ambition simply doesn’t stop for anything, especially in this case morality, what’s right and what’s wrong. Macbeth took his boost from the Witches and the prophecies made about him to becoming King by chasing it the quickest, most desperate and most selfish way he knew, killing Duncan. Macbeth didn’t think about consequences at all after deciding to do so, greed had consumed him whole and whatever was left of Macbeth was only held together by his ambition and remorse. “Will all great Neptune’s oceans wash this blood clean from my hand?” said by Macbeth after he murdered King Duncan. This is because ambition will take you to wherever you want to go, the end is where you draw the line and is why ambition can be used for benefit or for worse depending on the circumstance. It just so happens that in this circumstance, the external factors affecting Macbeth’s mental state led him to channel his ambition down a negative road, hence his short lived life. So the ambition wasn’t the bad guy, only the way his ambition was used was.
The poem Ozymandias showcases ambition in a slightly different light however. “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert.. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies”. Ozymandias now appears to just be a broken figure of the past. But even though his legs may be standing alone and his face is covered in sand, a figure of the past is certainly not the case. “My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my World, ye mighty and despair!” Ozymadias, a king of kings, wanted to rule over the whole land and be the most powerful leader of them all, and his ambition drove him to his success because he did. Ozymandias’s ambitions haven’t stopped for anything. Just because “Nothing beside remains” and the “lone and level sands stretch far away” it doesn’t mean Ozymandias’ ambitions took him to a place of failure because ambition did what it was made to do. Ambition is so powerful that even time can’t stop it. Ozymandias became the king of kings, he ruled the land, and the destruction of all his work and the empire he single handedly constructed doesn’t take away from the ambition he has inside. Even if he’s shattered in a barren land, it still doesn’t eliminate the fact that he achieved what he wanted to do, his ambition took him there, and he succeeded. He didn’t need people and peers to measure his success and power because ambition lives on forever, because you won’t. It’s unstoppable.
And speaking of being unstoppable, so is Vincent Freeman. The protagonist of the 1997 film Gattaca, directed by Andrew Niccol. Ever since Vincent was a little boy, he’s had a passion for outer space, even to his parent’s dismay. However, Vincent was born in an era of the future where making the perfect child in a test tube is seen more normal than having a baby the ‘old-fashioned way’. Which is the way in which Vincent was brought into the world. And because of this its meant that Vincent is seen by society as one thing, an in-valid. In-valids “belong to a new underclass, no longer determined by social status or the colour of your skin. We now have discrimination down to a science” said by Vincent because he’s apart of the low class members of this society, their DNA spells out their supposed fate of a dreamless and aimless life. Vincent’s father said to him “Listen for God’s sake, you gotta understand something, the only way that you’ll see the inside of a spaceship is if you’re cleaning it.” Even Vincent’s parents couldn’t support his dreams, and if they weren’t, if society wouldn’t, if doctor’s wouldn’t, who would? Himself. Vincent realised they were his personal ambitions, he didn’t need anybody else to believe in him because he was the one who truly had the desire in his heart. Vincent doesn’t accept his fate. So it was up to him to make the change he wanted to see. Jerome is a valid, he’s got the right genes and seen as a quintessential member of society, until his paralysed lower body is taken into consideration. So Vincent uses Jerome as he provides him with his identity to allow Vincent to be him and work in Gattaca. Vincent’s ambition has taken him to such lengths that he is willing to become somebody he is not so he can achieve his goals. He doesn’t define himself by his fate, instead he defies his fate and disregards all people that think he cannot succeed. “Jerome had been engineered with everything he needed to get into Gattaca, except the desire to do so” said by Vincent. Human ambition is so incredibly powerful that in some cases, it’s all you need to be able to achieve. Being genetically superior may give you a head start, but to make it to the finish line comes down to the inner drive, how badly do you want it and how far are you going to get it.
Which brings me to my last text. Stroke of fate, Sophie Pascoe’s biography with Tony Smith. It was published in 2013 but still reflects the vast majority of Sophie’s life to this day. She is a 26 year old New Zealander with 5 world records, 9 gold medals and 1 leg. Unfortunately, a clingy three year old girl and a lawn mower are only a recipe for disaster. She had been run over by their lawnmower. After a rush to the hospital and intensive surgery came the birth of New Zealand’s most successful paralympic athlete to ever exist. Even after being told she couldn’t do sport, she still didn’t let it define who she was. She quotes “it’s the best thing that ever happened to me.” Her ambitions allowed her to turn a negative into a positive. She herself had the desire to become a swimmer, the potential she has motivated how far her ambitions could take her. In the fourth chapter of her book, titled Golden Girl, the very first sentence states “one of the keys to my success is my mindset”. This is because whilst some may think she’s special because she is disabled and has one leg, I see that she’s special because despite her disability and how disadvantaged she physically is, she has an incredible inner drive within her to push herself in all aspects of life especially every time she’s turning for another lap. Sophie could have let her disability define her, she could of let having 1 leg map out the fate of the rest of her life. But instead, she channeled her ambitions to become a swimmer, and a good one too.
Ambition in all four texts was successful, ambition served its purpose and accomplished the goals of all characters or people that were in pursuit of success. This is because success isn’t achieving something good, success is what you measure it as and in this case killing Duncan was success for Macbeth, becoming the king of kings was success for Ozymandias, embarking into Space and defying the odds was success for Vincent and as for Sophie it was to become a professional swimmer and to also defy the odds. But what got all four of them to their success was their ambition. Only you truly know what your goals are and having the power and aid of unstoppable ambition by your side along with how you choose to channel that inner drive because is what will show the world who you really are on the inside. Whether it is good or bad, it’s up to you.
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