If Gertrude is guilty of any involvement in the murder, she manages to portray a state of ignorance to any evil doing very successfully. This is most apparent when Hamlet finally confronts her in an attempt to read into her involvement in the death of his father:
A bloody deed? Almost as bad, good mother,
As kill a king and marry with his brother.
Gertrude’s response to this is rapid, “As kill a king?” As she delivers this line she wrings her hands, displaying a very real sense of shock not only to the accusations of her son but also to the introduction of the possibility that her new husband had murdered the first in order to win the crown and the Queen’s hand in marriage. A knee-jerk reaction such as this may display innocence rather than any involvement in the murder herself.
This is a view shared by many a leading critic, perhaps most notably A. C. Bradley, who not only agrees to the thought of her response to the accusations being genuine, but also goes on to defend her character as a whole:
The queen was not a bad hearted woman, not at all the woman to think of murder… She loved to be happy… It pleased her to see others happy.
This view is shared partially by other, more modern critics such as Rebecca Smith. Unlike Bradley, Smith concedes that Gertrude can be held responsible for a share of the evil found in the play, especially concerning the actions of the play’s male characters, however Gertrude at no point displays any powers of manipulation:
Although she may have been partially responsible for Claudius’s monstrous act of fratricide and … may have been indirectly responsible for making a ‘monster’ of Hamlet, Gertrude is never seen in the play inducing anyone to do anything at all monstrous.
Smith does not seem to hold Gertrude responsible for the power she seems to hold over Hamlet and Claudius, writing “Gertrude prompts violent, physical and emotional reactions from the men in the play”. Throughout the remainder of this critic’s paper and the entirety of the play, there is very little evidence to suggest that there is any conscious attempt by the queen to warp the perspectives of any of her fellow characters. However Smith does note the limitations inherent with the text concerning Gertrude’s character.
It is entirely possible that it is an act and the wringing of her hands may be a display of nerves rather than shock. If you were to look at any modern production of the play, you would most likely be presented with a Gertrude who oozes power and confidence, who throughout stands as the puppeteer of her husband Claudius. This is visible in the 1996 movie production of the play by Brannagh.
During the performance of the play in the previous act, we see signs from Gertrude that not only does she recognise the events of the play, which bear a striking resemblance to the tales of the Ghost, but also the possibility that Hamlet may at this point know of what happened; “The lady doth protest too much methinks.” The line displays arrogance in the character of Gertrude. She flirts with Hamlet’s emotions and almost mocks his attempts to force a rise out of her.
From this, it would have been easy for Gertrude to raise her guard against Hamlet; she has plenty of time between these two incidences to prepare herself for an accusation, so that she could give the most guiltless response. This itself is backed up by the manner in which the Queen converses with Hamlet in Act three Scene four. Despite her quick responses to her accuser, the formal manner in which she talks with her son, a member of the family you would expect her to be at ease with, suggests very much that she is putting on a performance:
Gertrude: - Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
Hamlet: - Mother, you have thy father much offended.
Gertrude: - Come, come you answer with an idle tongue.
Hamlet: - Go, go you question with a wicked tongue.
It strikes me that Gertrude is trying to put Hamlet onto the back foot as to cover up for her own actions. Throughout the scene we see the pair joust for the upper hand as the accusations and innuendos fly back and forth.
If from all of this evidence we accuse Gertrude of having some form of involvement in the murder we accept that she is an evil character; we accept the testimony of the ghost on the grounds that there is more evidence for him existing than there is for him being a silhouette of reality conceptualized by Hamlet’s insecure mind. It is then necessary to deduce how involved she was in the murder; whether she was simply a spectator to Claudius’ actions, or whether she was in fact the driving force behind the operation, which would place her at the very centre of the evil found in the play.
Gertrude stands as a very limited character with few lines compared to the other main characters in the play. This is most likely due to the fact that all female characters in Shakespeare’s plays were played by young boys, they were given fewer lines than the more experienced male actors as they were simply not as good and so their involvement in the play was kept to a minimum. Because of this there are key pieces of evidence left out which would be invaluable for gaining a more detailed profile on the character. For example, there is no information on the nature of the relationship between Gertrude and Hamlet Senior; there are few clues as to whether it was a happy relationship, whether both parties were faithful and thus there is no information on any motive for Gertrude to want the King dead.
Should the accusations, made by the Ghost, of an adulterous relationship between the Queen and Claudius be true then the relationship between them may be described as incestuous. Usually any form of adulterous or incestuous relationship would have been generally highly proscribed, however there a some exceptions and once the fact that this takes place within a Royal family, where throughout the ages there have been examples of mandatory martial union of royal siblings, it may be suggested that the original audience wouldn’t have seen too much wrong with the actions of the Queen. The audience of the time would have been highly religious and so many would have been familiar with the passage from Deuteronomy which also serves to condone the actions of Gertrude:
If brothers are living together and one of them dies without a son, his widow must not marry outside the family. Her husband's brother shall take her and marry her and fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to her.
Deuteronomy 25:5-6
If we refer back to Act two and the play within the play, we see two very different reactions from the current King and Queen. It is the King who folds under the pressure put upon him, calling for lights and storming from the room before the play had reached its climax, whilst the Queen managed to stand strong. This may be seen to show the Queen’s innocence, as the audience of Shakespearian times especially would expect these roles to be reversed and the King to be the stronger of the two characters. It is however consistent with Shakespeare’s habit of writing strong female characters into his plays, the most obvious example being Lady Macbeth, who also drove her lover to regicide. This may be the reason behind the common stage portrayal of Gertrude to be the strongest of the pair.
I feel that this is the most likely conclusion that can be drawn from the limited evidence provided to us by the text on Gertrude. Due to her over bearing role in her relationship with her husband Claudius, I feel that she must have knowledge of the circumstances of the King’s death. I believe that it is she who drove Claudius into his actions which in turn leads on to any other evil actions carried out later on in the play, including those carried out by Hamlet in vengeance for his father. Therefore, assuming this to be true, all evil can be traced back to Gertrude, which places her at the very centre of evil.
1,890
Bibliography
Film: - HAMLET (UK, 1996), Director: Kenneth Brannagh
Production: - HAMLET (Nottingham Playhouse, 2004), Director: Ninagawa
Text: - HAMLET, Editor: Edwards, P
Bradley, A.C., Shakespearian Tragedy, Macmillan (1904)
Holy Bible: New International Version (1973)
Smith, R., A Hart Cleft Twain: The Dilemma of Shakespeare’s Gertrude
