Contrast an Elizabethan and a modern audience's understanding of Hamlet's views".

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Danièle Evans

29.12.01

'Hamlet thou hast cleft my heart in twain'

"Most productions present Gertrude and Ophelia as sympathetic victims of Hamlet's cruelty.  As your starting point, refer to either the closet or the nunnery scene, and, paying close attention to the language, show how it reveals the interaction between Hamlet and the women characters here and throughout the play. Contrast an Elizabethan and a modern audience's understanding of Hamlet's views".

        As the main female characters in the play, Ophelia and Gertrude are subjected to the worst of Hamlet's madness. 'Hamlet' depicts the popular Elizabethan viewpoint and treatment of women which is palpably clear from Hamlet's contemptuous and disrespectful behaviour. This is especially obvious in both the nunnery and the closet scenes, primarily from the language and exchanges between the characters.  

        The 'nunnery' scene, mainly focusing on the exchange between Hamlet and Ophelia, is structurally similar to the later 'closet scene' of Act 3 Scene 4. 'Soft you now', says Hamlet as he catches a glimpse of his former love, 'The fair Ophelia', a comment which is instinctively tender. Notably, it also echoes his description of Ophelia at her grave, in Act 5 Scene 1, where he openly declares his love for her, admitting that 'forty thousand brothers/Could not with all their quantity of love/Make up my sum'. It is also at her grave that Hamlet demonstrates his devotion to Ophelia, as he jumps into the grave, showing the only tender interaction with her that we see.

        Hamlet quickly becomes suspicious at Ophelia's stiff nature, and interrogatively asks her, 'Are you honest?', 'Are you fair?'. Hamlet castigates Ophelia further; 'Your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty', which is slightly ironic because she is doing the opposite by allowing herself to be used as Claudius' tool, letting him and Polonius eavesdrop on their conversation. He goes on to say that 'Time gives it proof', at which point he could be thinking of either Gertrude or Ophelia, because, in his disgust with Ophelia's betrayal, like Gertrude, he begins to focus on her sexual depravity. When Ophelia tells him a direct lie about Polonius' whereabouts, Hamlet is understandably furious, not only at Ophelia, especially if he loves her as much as he claimed to at her graveside, but also at those he assumes to be listening.

        Furthermore, Hamlet orders Ophelia to 'go thy ways to a nunnery' which could be read as sarcasm, implying that women cannot be trusted and belong in a brothel, or that he wants to protect Ophelia from temptations which may lead her into a world of corruption. The latter explanation is echoed when Hamlet warns her that 'We are arrant knaves all, believe none of us' and 'thou shalt not escape calumny'. Ophelia's response is limited; Shakespeare does not allow her character to develop, and she does little more than show her misapprehension of Hamlet's accusations and insults. In a rare monologue, she is allowed to express her grief at Hamlet's 'ecstasy', before her own madness scenes. It is tragically ironic that Hamlet's madness is feigned which contributes to Ophelia's impending insanity, which is real.

         Hamlet seems completely untroubled at using Ophelia, and if he is in fact feigning his madness, then his ruthlessness and readiness to implicate her in his quest for revenge are revealed, as she is genuinely distressed. She is sincerely sorrowful over Hamlet's fall from the perfect Prince into the depths of insanity, and her image of perfection is lost forever as she says he has become an 'unmatched form and feature of blown youth/Blasted with ecstasy'. Even to an Elizabethan audience, Hamlet's behaviour would seem cruel, but not shocking, because as with any society, tyrannous husbands and men existed.

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        We first meet Hamlet in Act 1 Scene 2, in the company of Claudius and Gertrude after their marriage. Hamlet's first words are an aside, and as a first impression of his character, he seems furtive and devious. Gertrude appears to be rather insensitive as she tells her son, 'all that lives must die', hardly words of consolation. Hamlets responds by saying that, 'But I have that within which passes show/These but the trappings and suits of woe', which is perfectly respectful, but with an air of resentment at her apparent lack of grief. In Hamlet's first soliloquy a few ...

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