Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th President of the United States will be his ultimate vindication moment. He was convicted in a New York court, fought a hard-fought campaign during which his opponent declared, “We’re not going back,” and now here we are.
January 20th is also a day that signifies the victory of ambition. It’s not always clear whether Trump’s deepest ambition is to lead the country or simply stay out of prison, but Trump has essentially been in power since leaving the White House in 2021. We have approached the quest to return as everyone’s business.
Trump’s electoral success, alarming to some and exciting to others, has forced us to reconsider the question of ambition. What explains this constant urge, this ruthless determination to attack and crush the enemy? How can a 78-year-old man maintain such dedication to political struggle when he clearly wants to do financial transactions and play golf?
Shakespeare, as always, offers us a possible explanation. Few people understand ambition and portray it as powerfully as this great playwright. He knew that in the worst case scenario, immoral ambition could be fatal.
This, of course, is the central theme of his play Macbeth and the inspiration for my latest book. In this work, I examine various aspects of ambition, both good and bad, and select lines from the play that touch on each type of ambition.
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Early in Act 1, Lady Macbeth wonders if her husband has “the right thing” to rise to the top.
“…you’re not great.
Art is not without ambition, but it is not without ambition.
Illness should accompany it. ”
She worries that Macbeth lacks some kind of murderous instinct. He ultimately proves her wrong, but with (spoiler alert) fatal consequences for both of them. The troubling idea is that Lady Macbeth is probably only half right when she describes intense, compulsive commitment, or, in her words, “sickness” as an essential element of success. We all know powerful people, like President Trump, who have reached great distances because of their “crazy” impulses.
Many people, perhaps especially British people, struggle with ambition because they don’t know the right level or intensity of ambition for them. The decisions we need to make in our lives are recognizing what is truly important to us and knowing when we have achieved enough. This isn’t about “be careful what you wish for.” Rather, you need to think carefully about what you want.
The Liz Truss Affair
One British politician who would have benefited from brushing up on her Shakespeare is Liz Truss. The former Conservative cabinet minister and prime minister (albeit briefly) may have realized that reckless ambition for the top job could spell disaster. In her case, sheer willpower and ambition seem to have been no match for ability and judgment. This was a dangerous imbalance.
Because she continues to believe (and still does) that she has been grossly wronged by her critics and opponents, she issued a suspension letter demanding that Truss stop accusing Truss of collapsing the economy.・I instructed my lawyer to send it to Prime Minister Starmer. The letter said Mr Starmer’s comments were “false and defamatory”.
Unfortunately, given that she fired a top civil servant at the Treasury Department and (in a departure from normal practice) failed to ask the Office for Budget Responsibility to evaluate her budget plans, the economic turmoil in October 2022 and , the subsequent market reaction will likely not be very convincing.
Liz Truss: I always dream big. EPA/Andy Lane
It’s difficult to ascertain what Truss’ motive is. Does she truly believe that she has been wronged and is an innocent victim of a mysterious “deep state”? Or is she simply using the president-elect’s favorite tactics (ridiculous but distracting legal tactics) to gain support from Trump supporters online in order to keep her name in the news? I wonder? Either way, her ambition still burns brightly and she feels no shame.
Perhaps Truss is responsible for what my colleague Professor Laura Empson calls “erratic achievers” – professionals who strive to achieve more, sometimes at great cost to themselves and others. This is a very) extreme example. Leaders should be aware of this phenomenon (although some bosses lack confidence in themselves and overachieve their sense of accomplishment). Good leaders avoid creating a culture where “unstable overachievement” is required as a universal norm of behavior.
Ambitious to the right level of ambition
“Where ambition ends, happiness begins,” said the 20th century Catholic monk Thomas Merton. That may seem like an extreme view. Without healthy ambition, nothing good will happen. Business will not get better and society will not function better. What we must avoid are harmful excesses.
We can and should achieve more. Our natural talents and hard-earned abilities should be put to use. Michelangelo is said to have said: “For most of us, the greater danger lies not in setting our goals too high and failing to achieve them, but in setting our goals too low and achieving our goals.”
We look at highly ambitious things, sometimes with admiration and sometimes with fear. But the best ambitions seem to mean working for the common good, not the selfish pursuit of personal glory. As far as Trump is concerned, we’ve seen this movie before. He divides the audience, to say the least. I’m sorry if I don’t see him as a positive role model.
