Part 45: Ophelia's Terrible Awakening and Liberation

Part 45: Ophelia's Terrible Awakening and Liberation

Ophelia and Gertrude awaken from earlier naivete and become liberated from aspects of patriarchy, Ophelia from her father, and Gertrude from her husband. Consider Ophelia:

Ophelia had been excited to spend “free and bounteous” time with Hamlet [1], to be wooed by him “in honorable fashion” [2], to receive from him “almost all the holy vows of heaven” [3], probably a marriage proposal, not snares [4] to steal her “chaste treasure” [5] as her brother and father fear and suspect.

She is forbidden by Polonius to see Hamlet or receive his letters [6], but used as bait by him and Claudius for their spying [7]. Gertrude tells her that she hopes Ophelia’s “virtues” will help to heal Hamlet [8].

Hamlet does not tell her that he has spoken with an apparition like the ghost of his father, but seems to fear that those he loves most may be at risk at least of suffering purgatory for sins, apparently like his father. He tells her to go “to a nunnery” [9] to be safe from Denmark’s corruptions.

She may be more intelligent and observant than her father: she may realize that her father suspects Hamlet is mad for her love, but King Claudius suspects something more dangerous. She watches “The Mousetrap” playlet with Hamlet [10], which enacts a murderer using poison to kill a king; the murderer then woos his victim’s widow [11]. Ophelia may realize: Hamlet suspects his uncle of murdering his father. Few scholars discuss this.

Later in his mother’s closet, thinking it is his uncle, Hamlet kills Polonius behind an arras [12]. It seems Ophelia is not told that Hamlet killed her father, but she knows Hamlet was sent to England.

Free of her father, Ophelia is liberated to speak her mind, like a court fool or Hamlet’s queen regent, complaining of promised, lost love [13]. Her apparent madness may be more due to political awakening than to Freudian “daddy issues” usually cited as its cause.

Ophelia’s awakening and liberation-in-madness parallels Gertrude’s. They help one another by example.


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NOTES: All references to Hamlet are to the Folger Shakespeare Library online version: https://shakespeare.folger.edu/shakespeares-works/hamlet/entire-play/

[1] 1.3.99-102.

[2] 1.3.119-121.

[3] 1.3.122-123.

[4] 1.3.124.

[5] 1.3.35-36.

[6] 1.3.140-143.

[7] 3.1.35-40.

[8] 3.1.42-46.

[9] 3.1.131, 140, 149, 151, 162.

[10] 3.1.115-296.

[11] 3.2.289-290.

[12] 3.3.30, 3.4.10-11, 28-30.

[13] 4.5.53-71.

IMAGES:
Center: Ophélie (Ophelia), circa 1900-1905, Odilon Redon (born Bertrand-Jean Redon, 1840–1916)
Dian Woodner Collection, New York. Public domain via https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e9/Redon.ophelia.jpg

Left and right borders ("long purples"): Author photographs.


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INDEX OF OPHELIA POSTS:
My 2023 series on Ophelia, and earlier Ophelia posts:

https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2023/10/index-of-ophelia-posts-2023-series-and.html
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Disclaimer: If and when I quote or paraphrase bible passages or mention religion in many of my blog posts, I do not intend to promote any religion over another, nor am I attempting to promote religious belief in general; only to explore how the Bible and religion influenced Shakespeare, his plays, and his age.
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