In Hamlet play Ophelia and Gertude's character

Assignment :- 1 In  Hamlet play Ophelia and Gertude's character

Name :- Rathod Nikita p.

Semester :- M. A. Semester - 1

Roll no :- 32

Enrolment no :- 2069108420190038

Paper no :- 1 ( The Renaissance literature )

Assignment topic :- In Hamlet play Ophelia and Gertrude’s character

Year :- 2018-2020

Email - id :- nikitarathod0101@gmail.com

Submitted to :- smt. S. B. Gardi Department of English. Maharaja krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University.

(1) In Hamlet play Ophelia and Gertrude’s character.

=>            In Hamlet play woman characters suffers a lot. Shakespeare gives first priority to man characters and than he gives second priority to woman characters. In Hamlet Shakespeare does not gives power and position to woman characters. And Shakespeare does not gives power or position to woman characters. And Shakespeare does not gives any powerful arguments or dialogues to woman characters. Gertrude and Ophelia becomes a tool of man chracters. Shakespeare is more emphasised on man characters. Shakespeare gives less priority to woman characters. And Shakespeare gives more opportunities to man characters. And Shakespeare gives less opportunities to woman characters. This is the main difference and contrast between man characters and woman characters.

* Ophelia's character :-

                  Ophelia is a beautiful. And she is a daughter of polonius. She truely loves hamlet. For hamlet his revenge is more important than Ophelia. That's why hamlet leaves Ophelia. She becomes a part of cludius and polonius's plan. Hamlet is play with Ophelia's real emotions. Hamlet hurts Ophelia. Hamlet's manner is changing. And he speaks to Ophelia in an insulting manner. 

                Laertes and polonius protects ophelia. They are concerns for Ophelia. That's why they gives advice to Ophelia to away from hamlet. Ophelia tells her father that hamlet is also loves her. But polonius said that hamlet will only use Ophelia for sex. Laertes also agree with his father. Both are cares for Ophelia.

             Ophelia was viewed by her father, brother and consequently the audience as a virginal native girl. Ophelia is innocent and pure hearted girl. Her innocence is emphasised when Shakespeare makes a link between Ophelia and flowers a common symbol of sexual purity. When polonius is killed Ophelia's madness develops. She starts carrying and spreading flowers. This is the first connection between Ophelia and flowers in the play. A second link is when Gertrude scatters flowers on her grave. Laertes, refers to her as 'rose of May'  and imagines violets growing from her 'unpolluted flesh'. Flowers traditionally represents new birth and then innocence and naviety. Hamlet and Ophelia both becomes blind for different reasons. Hamlet becomes blind for his father's revenge and he also does not likes that his mother remarried with his uncle cludius. And Ophelia becomes a blind for Hamlet's love.

               Shakespeare puts Ophelia's character as forward the inocence, nstive, overprotected girl that would not be uncommon in Elizabethan time. That time due to restricted rights and inferiority compared to men. Hamlet also becomes cruel for Ophelia. And also she kills herself. Hamlet is only the reason of her death. Because there is two reasons behind the death of Ophelia. First reason is Polonius's death and second reason is Hamlet's betrayal. So in both reason hamlet is medium. Hamlet wants to kills cludius but he kills polonius unknowingly. And he leaves Ophelia for his revenge. Her love became the reason of her death. So he becomes the main reason of Ophelia's tragedy. Ophelia has hardly any will of her own. Hamlet dominants the play and over shadow's nearly all the characters in it, especially the woman he professes to love.

                            When Ophelia's father polonius wants to help king cludius discover what is wrong or what is true. Both are eager to know Hamlet's reality. He asks Ophelia to use her relationship with hamlet to know the Hamlet's real intention. But hamlet is samart. He knew the cludius and polonius's plan. And he upset with Ophelia. He is angry on her. He tries to hurt her. Hamlet knew that polonius's actions and Ophelia's willingness to have her nature and sexuality used for her father's purpose.

                         She is brought up in complete submission to her father, and is always ready to to obey him without questioning. She is not complete with Shakespeare's great heroines. But she was not intended to do so. Ophelia's submission becomes evudent. When dhe first appears in the play. Her brother Laertes tells her that Hamlet's apparent love for her is merely lust and that she should be on her guard against it. She readily agrees to do so. When he has gone and her father speaks to same subject, she puts up a feeble resistance which collapses in an instant. When her father expressly forbids her to see Hamlet again, she yields without any struggle.

                        Ophelia's great dramatic moment is her appearance in disordered garments with garlands of flowers about her. She becomes mad. The pathos of her condition is conveyed in the snatches of the rhyme she signs. The theme of these rhymes is that of a girl forsaken by her lover, through either unfaithfulness of death. Her thoughts run on to the death of her murdered father, and her brother might do to avenge the murder. She leaves, and when she re-appears later in the same scene, she brings with her flowers which she distributes in kinds according to the language of flowers which she remembered for folklore. She leaves with a prayer for all Christian souls, and later we hear the Queen given a pathetic account of her death by drowning.

                               She certainly loves Hamlet and she is weak and clinging as she is, she looks to him as a support for herself  in married life. Frustration is in her love. Her state of mind is aggravated by the murder of her father. There is no support for her. She is alone. She feels loneliness. Ophelia is young and inexperienced. She lost her mother. And only her father and brother takes care of her. She brings a thought of flowers. At her burial, Laertes says that violets will spring from her flesh. "sweet to the sweets"  the Queen murmurs, as she scatters flowers on Ophelia's grave. Her love for father is deep, though mingled with fear. She gives to Hamlet all the love which her nature is as yet capable. Her brother is also gives right advice to her. So he is also important for her. Beyond these three chracters she seems to have eyes, ears for no ones. Her father and brother are anxious about her welfare because they know her to be ignorant and innocence, and if we resent their anxiety, it is becuse we know Hamlet better than they do. Her whole chracter is simple, unselfish affection. Bsturally she is uncapsble of understanding Hamlet's mind, though dhe can feel its beauty. Ophelia has been criticised for reporting to her father Hamlet's strenge visit and behaviour, for showing her father one of Hamlet's letters, for telling her father the whole story of the courtship, and for joining in a plot to win Hamlet's secret from him. Ophelia is a sensitive, impressionable, innocent, garceful.

=> Gertrude’s character :-

                         Gertrude is mother of Hamlet. She completely silent in the play hamlet. There is no explanation about her real intention. She likes Cludius or she dislikes cludius. And also cteates a confusion and raise many questions about her. She supports cludius to kills her husbsnd or she does not know about Cludius's plan to kills her husband. She marries with cludius. She is really innocent or not. These are questions raises when we read the play. She is Queen of Denmark. There is no sign of her being so, and thete are clear signs that she was not. The representation of the murder in the play arranged by Hamlet does not move her, and that is one clear sign she is not privy to the murder of her husband.  She loves to be happy, and it pleased her to see others happy. She never saw thr the drunkenness of her husband as disgusting till Hamlet told her so. Though she was untroubled by any shame at the fellings which had to it. It was pleasant for her to sit upon her throne and see smiling faces round her. She thought it foolish and unkind in Hamlet to persist in greieving for his father instead of marrying Ophelia and making everything comfortable. She was fond of Ophelia and was genuinely attached to her son.

                          There is no any explanation about her character. Her real intention is really hide in this play hamlet. It is creates suspense in the play. In play we find that all chracters has their own intention. But It is difficult to find her intention. In any scene there is no clue about her chracter. The Queen has a  little personality to set against the strong individuality of the men. She rarely takes any positive action. She is carried along by events which concern her closely but which she cannot hope to control of influence in any significant way. When we see her first, she is, characteristically, repeating the wishes of her husband that Hamlet should not return to the university. Here and throughout the play, Hamlet treats her with deference becuse she is his mother and also because the ghost has asked him to leave her alone. It seems that her thinking is fairly clear at least so far as Hamlet's state od mind is concerned. She us not convinced when polonius makes every effort to prove that Hamlet is suffering from love-madness. It may be, very likely, she says, unconvinced, in answer to a question from the king. Later she expresses ger hope that Ophelia is the cause of Hamlet's disturbance of mind, yet she carefully avoids saying she thinks it is so. Her comment on the play within the play is famous for its shrewdness. She says of the player Queen. The lady doth protest too much methinks, meaning that the player Queen assert her faithfulness to her husband so extravagantly that one is compelled to suspect it.

                             When king hamlet is died. In Gertrude marries with claudius immediately. Her this step is creats a confusion. That cludius forces her to marry with her or she is agree to marry with cludius. That is also big question. In this play there is no identity of Gertrude. We find that it is easy to judge other chracters it is really bad or good. But her silence creates trouble for her. That is she is really good or bad. It is difficult to judge her.

=> Conclusion :-

                    So Shakespeare creates a difference between woman characters and man characters. He gives only importance to man characters and he does not give importance to man characters. So this is creats difficulty for readers. In this play Ophelia and Gertrude’s character suggests the situation and role of  woman characters in Shakespeare's play. Both chracters Ophelia and Gertrude suffers alot.