Shakespeare’s plays dramatize the difference between the opposite and antagonistic moral emotions of shame and guilt, the moral value systems those emotions motivate (shame ethics vs. guilt ethics), and the shame and guilt cultures that are organized around those feelings and the values they inspire. His shame-driven personalities in their preoccupation with honor and dishonor differ from his guilt-ridden characters who feel compelled to punish themselves, but both are driven to violence. The difference lies in the object of violence, namely, others or the self. With Othello and Lady Macbeth he also shows how the same person can experience both emotions but at different times and with opposite results. Through his plays, by his focus on the actions and thoughts of his characters, Shakespeare shows us in vivid terms the relationship of both shame ethics and guilt ethics to violence.