Ophelia's Madness in Hamlet

The story of Hamlet is a morbid tale of tragedy, commitment, and manipulation; this is especially evident within the character of Ophelia. Throughout the play, Ophelia is torn between obeying and following the different commitments that she has to men in her life. She is constantly torn between the choice of obeying the decisions and wishes of her family or that of Hamlet. She is a constant subject of manipulation and brain washing from both her father and brother. Ophelia is not only subject to the torture of others using her for their intentions but she is also susceptible to abuse from Hamlet. Both her father and her brother believe that Hamlet is using her to achieve his own personal goals.

People have mostly seen women inferior to men because women have been thought of as simple-minded and could not take care of themselves. Shakespeare’s Hamlet shows how men treated and thought of women during the 1500s. There was an order most did not interfere with; however, some did. In the 1500s, women were supposed to conform to men’s wishes. Throughout the play, Ophelia first obeyed her father and brother’s wishes, ignored the social norms later, and then went mad, which caused her to never gain her own identity.

  In Shakespeare's tragedy, Hamlet, the audience finds a docile, manipulated, scolded, victimized young lady named Ophelia. Ophelia is a foil to Hamlet. Plays have foils to help the audience better understand the more important characters in the play.  The character of Ophelia is necessary so that the audience will give Hamlet a chance to get over his madness and follow his heart.

Hamlet and Ophelia were two young people in love and were supposedly driven mad by their relationship and passion for one another. When they actually went mad, it was after the death of each of their fathers. When Ophelia entered and was singing and talking to the King and Queen in Act 4, Scene 5, the King

Hamlet’s sanity has made many people question him. “Hamlet certainly displays a high degree of mania and instability throughout much of the play, but his “madness” is perhaps too purposeful and pointed

Great authors can develop the same idea in different ways. Shakespeare introduces the characters of Hamlet and Ophelia to mental illness throughout “Hamlet”. Hamlet a, Depressed and Monomaniacal Psychopath, runs off of the vengeance of his father to kill his uncle, King Claudius. Ophelia A victim of, hysteria and depression, cannot function without the support of her father and lover without this support she can loses the will to live. Shakespeare uses metaphors, gender, tone, and word choice to develop the progression of mental illness in his characters throughout “Hamlet”.

Ophelia, ever since her introduction, has been introduced to be a sweet and sympathetic person, providing the play with emotional moments, but her death was used as a bait and switch by Shakespeare towards audience members who had expected her to change the play’s somber mood to more hopeful one, which in turn makes the play even more tragic. After she had been visited by an apparently crazed Hamlet, she tells Polonius about the visit, prompting him to believe that the young prince is crazy in love, and goes out to tell the king. After it was explained to Claudius, and Hamlet’s former friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern failed to find the underlying cause of his madness, Polonius makes Ophelia approach Hamlet while he and the king hide and monitor his behavior.

           Ophelia allowed herself to become a sort of marionette in Polonius' schemes toward understanding the seemingly mad prince. While her relationship with Hamlet was on the line, she allowed Polonius to commandeer the strings that determined her actions. Polonius was determined that Hamlet's supposed madness stemmed from lovesickness for Ophelia. He convinced Ophelia that her betrayal of Hamlet was a necessary evil and she began to relay all of Hamlet's messages and attempts at communication to him. He told the king and queen:

It is in act 4 scene 5 of Shakespeare’s Hamlet where we first see Ophelia go mad. The language used to describe this event is chilling in its genius. Her madness is thought by those around her to be triggered by her father’s death, but if they listened to her they would know the truth. Ophelia is driven to madness by many different factors, the major one being her relationship with Hamlet. Towards the start of her mad episode, she says, “ So would I’a done, by yonder sun, / An thou hadst not come to my bed.(4.5.70-71)” She is talking about a woman who was tricked into having sexual intercourse with a man, a man who lured her in with the promise of marriage. It seems to be that Ophelia feels duped and taken advantage of, that she has in some way been devalued.

In conclusion, Hamlet shows a spectrum of what it means to be considered insane and how you can fake it. Hamlet faked being insane in order for him to seek out revenge more easily. He got his friends and family to think he was insane so that it could justify killing Claudius. However, Ophelia’s madness was real, due to the fact that Hamlet had just killed her father, Polonius. Ophelia did everything he told her to do and without him she felt lost with no purpose.

In William Shakespeare's Hamlet, a kind of madness ultimately infects everyone, leading to an ending in which almost every major character is dead. Two of these maddened characters are Hamlet and Ophelia, who also share a love for each other. But though their irrational behavior is often similar and their fates alike, one is truly mad while the other is not.

There are two different types of madness display in William Shakespeare's play Hamlet . Hamlet's madness was the result of Claudius killing his father and then Hamlet pretended to be mad to fool Claudius. Ophelia's madness was due to Hamlet killing her father, which caused her to be driven into a depressed state later leading to her death. Although Hamlet and Ophelia's madnesses are both extremely similar by the way came about. It is how the two characters deal with their madness that leads to the differences between them.

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet the family members of Hamlet and Ophelia induce madness through controlling and somewhat incestuous relationships, ultimately leading them to their demise. The madness that their family members bring upon them shows that, both Ophelia and Hamlet become fascinated with death/suicide, an escape from the madness. Ophelia lives a life controlled by her father and brother, she is given virtually no dominance in the play. She is assertive, always being controlled and having her feelings controlled by her brother or father. This over controlling relationship with her father and brother leads to her madness and ultimately death/suicide.

Ophelia is another character who shows signs of mental weakness throughout the play. She is also seen as someone who is weak and dependent on other people. The fuel behind Ophelia's madness was due to the fact Hamlet had rejected her. Another big event that contributed to her madness was the death of her father. The audience gets a sense that she is reliant on men, and this can be seen through her relationship with Hamlet.

This demonstrates that Ophelia cannot cope with the stress and anxiety of whether or not Hamlet lovers her or not and if she has been used by him. Ophelia one day realizes that Hamlet was treating her with no respect, and states “And i, of ladies most deject and wretched , / That sucked the honey of his music vows” (III. I . 156-57). In Ophelia’s life she listens and obey the only men in her life such as her father Polonius who will speak and Ophelia will do and listen, Laertes Ophelia’s brother who has the same role in her life as her father, but he talks to Ophelia about Hamlet, that since Hamlet is capable for his own perception but the environment he is in no state for him to marry her.