Another factor of Ophelia’s character is the time in which the play was written. In this era (and I would say up to the 1900’s) women were always treated as being inferior to men. They were taught to obey the wishes of men as women were seen as having fewer life skills. They weren’t allowed to vote and had absolutely no role in society apart from mothering and looking after the home. In this era women were always taught to be subordinate to men, and in this Ophelia can be seen as the perfect woman in her first two scenes.
In Act 3 Scene 1 Shakespeare begins with Hamlet’s soliloquy in which he contemplates the meaning of life, with gratuitous references to death, life and suicide. “To be or not to be ……./ to die to sleep; No more.” In this, Hamlet is expressing that at the moment he is in an extremely depressed , melancholy frame of mind. This is followed by Hamlet meeting Ophelia. This meeting has been fabricated by Polonius and Claudius as they believe that Hamlet’s feelings for Ophelia are the reason for his strange behaviour. “bestow ourselves, that seeing unseen, we may of their encounter frankly judge.” Throughout the entire dialogue between Ophelia and Hamlet, Polonius and Claudius are watching.
Throughout the entirety of their dialogue Ophelia talks in an extremely formal and forced way. This is one of the clues that Hamlet realises. He can tell (due to Ophelia’s complete and utter inability to do anything that requires thought) that Ophelia is talking in a forced manner because she has been forced to do this. Her formal language is also a clue to her closeness to her father. Because of her subordinance to her father she always acts formally and respectfully to him, always willing to listen and act upon his views and wishes. So Ophelia’s formality to Polonius, and in this dialogue with Hamlet is another clue. “Good my Lord How does your honour for this many a day.” More proof of her mindlessness comes with her repeating her brother’s words. “ ……perfume left.” So not only does she have the inability to construct her own views, listen, accept and act upon her familys’ views, but adopts them as her own. It is when Hamlet begins to completely destroy Ophelia verbally that you realise he knows he has been manipulated, as he is as much talking to Polonius and Claudius (who he knows can hear) as he is to Ophelia. “Are you honest/Are you fair.” He is playing with Ophelia’s emotions, attempting to hurt her to get at Polonius and Claudius. “Get thee to a Nunnery.” Yet more verbal assault from Hamlet, but here he is attacking her sexuality, saying she is a slut. This is really as nasty as Hamlet can get, as sexual promiscuity was frowned upon extensively when ‘Hamlet’ was written as there was no contraception. Hamlet, knowing Polonius is watching asks Ophelia where her father is. “Where’s your father,” Ophelia replies “At home my Lord.”. Hamlet, knowing Polonius is there takes the offensive further attacking Polonius. “Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the fool nowhere but in’s own home.” Having attacked Polonius sufficiently Hamlet reveals how his opinion of Ophelia has changed, realising that Ophelia is void of idea, thought or comprehension, he ceases to think of her as an individual. “…what monsters you make of them” by ‘you’ he is not talking of ‘you Ophelia’ more in ‘you women’. He is also angry at his mother, hence his attack on women in general terms.
The scene ends with Ophelia’s soliloquy. Angry but confused with Hamlet’s treatment of her she never comments on Hamlet or gives the situation any interpretation or analysis, she just accepts what has happened. This is the typical Ophelia that we have come to know and accept. Just as we are getting used to her ‘thought deprived’ ways Shakespeare adds his first clue to Ophelia’s breakdown with the language in her soliloquy (the person’s thoughts/feelings at the time) beginning to break down, thus an indication that her thoughts and feelings are beginning to break down.
Act 4, Scene 5 is a peculiar scene in that this is the only scene with Ophelia’s full madness on show. Throughout the scene she continues to sing with three of the five songs linked specifically to death. I would suggest that these songs are linked to her grief over her father’s death with textual basis being delivered throughout the scene, “She speaks much of her father.” “Conceit upon her father.” Also in lines 68-70, 79, 182-183, and by the dominant death and burial motifs in the songs. “He is dead and gone,” “which bewept to the grave did not go.”
Ophelia also shows herself distressed by the ideas of death and the grave in connection with her father. “But I cannot choose but weep to think they would lay him I’th cold ground.” But the songs are of course not factual with absolutely no evidence to support what they are. What the songs connect with are the disturbed ideas that come to Ophelia’s mind released from rational control. The first song is explicitly about death and burial of a ‘true love’, which is hardly Polonius’ role. Three of the songs in their different ways are songs about lovers. “Your true love know.” And in each case (since the fifth song is ajoined onto by the fourth) a lover by whom the lady is forsaken. “Young men will do’t if they come to’t – By cock they are to blame, Quoth she, before you tumbled me, you promised me to wed.” So while it is true the songs most obviously connect to the recent death and burial of Polonius, they express on a deeper level Ophelia’s fantasies about Hamlet. The appropriateness
of the person whom the songs are sung to may also be more than coincidence. The first song about a dead but unmourned lover is sung to Gertrude, the second, a song of seduction, to the seducer Claudius, the third, and a funeral elegy to the son of the man just buried.
This scene would be my favourite part of Ophelia’s character as it adds real tension and shocks the audience (useful as the sword fight between Hamlet and Laertes is soon) due to the sheer deviance in her persona. In her former scenes she has been a melancholy, uncreative and unimaginative character with absolutely no concept of creating one’s own unique ideas, perception or thought, with the idea of initiative completely foreign to her. She has been willing to do what others want, wish or think of her. With no idea of constructing a personal view, she adopts other people’s who she regards highly (Laertes, Polonius etc). It is this sheer mindlessness that is her purpose in her first two scenes. Because of her lacking intellect and her willingness to mould around other people, Shakespeare manipulates her to make other characters more interesting and to give more analytical information about these characters. (Hamlet in Act 3, Scene 1).
Her role in Act 4, Scene 5 is to shock the audience and add tension building up to Hamlet and Laertes’ swordfight. It is the sheer change in Ophelia’s character from a quiet, passive girl with no comprehensive,
individual thought into a mad, insane lunatic with no regard for the other characters in this scene that shocks the audience so much. Although much of what she says in this scene appears at first to make no sense there is still a great deal of analytical information we get from her and about her in this scene that we get in no other. This is because only in this scene does she at last convey her own individual ideas and feelings. For the first time she shows independent thought.
