Robin
Weisman
Dr.
Hobby
English
12
Driving Miss Ophelia Crazy
When putting together the average fairy
tale, there are a few simple ingredients necessary to create an extraordinary story.
These include a prince, an innocence girl, a king, and a villain here and
there. Also, the girl eventually falls in love with the prince; they sneak
around the families, and live happily ever after. Never has Disney come out
with a movie about a princess who doesn't have all the screws tightened in her
head and goes crazy. However, there are other people who seem to believe these
“fairy tales” must follow a quite different path. When William Shakespeare was
writing the script for the timeless play Hamlet, he created a fairly
tale with quite a twist. Most of the
elements in the average fairly tale were present, however what adventures he
envisioned for his characters to go through were not. Most importantly, Ophelia was not the Cinderella and Snow White
girls everywhere aspired to be.
Although she fell for the handsome prince and had an overprotective
father and brother, in the end she become insane and eventually takes her own
life. One might begin to ponder the
thought that she made herself crazy.
However, after carefully analyzing the text it can be shown that there
are three driving forces brought upon Ophelia’s madness: Hamlet, the man she
loved, Polonius, her father, and her brother Laertes.
Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, always came off rather charming to women everywhere in his kingdom, however, the effect he had on Ophelia led her to madness and as a result, suicide. When Ophelia first realizes she might have feelings for Hamlet, she is too innocent to know how to react to what is happening in her body. Professor Charles Johnson states in an article written in 1886 that, “She is a tender little fragile soul who might have grown to her slight perfection in some neat little garden-plot of life” (2). After Hamlet intruded into the sweet mind of Ophelia, she was unable to grow into the perfect child her father had always dreamed for her to be. Because she was so innocent she could never have suddenly become mad. Jennie Carbone interpreted that Ophelia was a “young girl passionately and visibly driven to picturesque madness” (1). Through this idea of a “picturesque madness,” it shows how perfectly Ophelia was set up to go mad at the time that she did. Other sources say that “Ophelia is something worse than shallow and commonplace; she is essentially selfishnot energetically selfish perhaps, but so limited in capacity for understanding or sympathizing as to be passively selfish” (Johnson 2). While she was innocent, she seemed to have another side that broadened her emotions to the male gender.
The young Ophelia grows fonder of the prince throughout the beginning of the play and develops a passionate love for him. As shown in the 1990 film directed by Franco Zeffirelli, Hamlet followed Ophelia around in the studio, which seemed to make Ophelia uncomfortable and uncertain. As he kept using foolish tactics such as this to entice her, she little by little fell for the devious Hamlet, almost too much in fact. Whether or not Hamlet and Ophelia were involved in a relationship, not to mention a sexual relationship, is uncertain, however, it can be shown that how they acted around each other led her to believe she was mad. In some interpretations of Ophelia’s madness, she was said to be driven to madness by erotomania which can also be explained as “female love-melancholy” (Carbone 1). Another idea that may explain why Ophelia was willing to begin a romantic relationship with Hamlet is this feeling of betrayal toward everything she knows is right, and by rebelling against society she feels somewhat powerful. Feeling powerful was extremely uncommon for a young girl like Ophelia. This act of rebelling had euphoric rewards in the short time after, but as time progressed, Ophelia learned it would hurt her in the end, not to mention drive her insane.
As Ophelia’s love for Hamlet prospered deeper and deeper, Hamlet realized that he could not spend time with her and displaces her from his life, which led to the last bit of sane in Ophelia to dissipate. Hamlet realizes that he does not want marriage and children at this time in his life and decides to reject Ophelia for everything she is. Illustrated in Erickson’s informative book, “Hamlet then turns his attention to the procreation should be sacrificed by marriage and proclaims an indiscriminate revulsion” (76). His sudden reaction to this realization gives larger proof that there was some sexual involvement between Ophelia and Hamlet, because he knows that once a woman is bound to a man through sex, than she plans to marry that man and eventually bare children with them. Maggie Secara discusses in her article on women in Elizabethan England that when a woman marries, she then becomes property to their husbands and within time is expected to have his children (1). Also, Hamlet remembers what pain he has suffered through what his mother did to this father and feels that Ophelia will bring the same pain one day if in fact he goes through with marrying her. Danielle Esposito gives her opinion in her study on the nunnery scene to explain that, “As he has lost his faith in his beloved mother, he loses his faith in Ophelia because she is the other woman he loves. This is what he expresses when he questions her honesty in a rather obscure way: ‘That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty’ (1). In the end, Hamlet decides to go through with rejecting Ophelia in person bluntly in order to accomplish a full effect of rejection, which in some ways might hurt Hamlet. In act three scene one, the time when they are watching the play with the play, Hamlet speaks to Ophelia in a horrible and disrespectful manner. However, before he speaks these harsh words below he does tell her that he did at one time love her. However, Hamlet did not know at the time that these words would cause her to go mad and ultimately kill herself.
Get thee to a nunnery. Why wouldst thou be
A breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest,
But yet I could accuse me of such things that it
were
Better my mother had not borne me: I am very
Proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offenses
at
My back than I have thoughts to put them in,
Imagination to five them shape, or time to act
them
In (3.1. 121-127).
In this scene, Hamlet explains to Ophelia that she is no longer pure and must become a virgin again in order to have any value in society, hence why he tells her to go to become a nun. Philosopher Pia Sivenius argues in an article that, “Ophelia is no longer a woman, but a bearer of life, a breeder of sinners, whom Hamlet rejects with his entire being” (2). It is at this moment in the play where her madness becomes apparent to the public eye. She looses control of herself when she begins to speak of material items and their value and how she is less valuable because of him. Items she spoke about in this scene are all represented in her songs she sings out when her madness is at her peak. Through Hamlets charming enticement, deceiving relations, and pure, blatant rejection, Ophelia is driven to live the rest of her short life unhappy and mentally insane. In a situation where a young girl would normally turn to her father for nourishment, he is another element that builds Ophelia up to her madness.
Ever since Ophelia could remember, her
father, Polonius, kept her too close to him and looked out for his interests
through her decisions which contributed to Ophelia going mad. At a time in society when daughters were
their father’s property until they are married off, Polonius feels he must keep
Ophelia pure and valuable. In
Elizabethan England, children belong to their parents as if they were property
and it can be believed to be stupid to join in marriage for the reason of
loving someone, however, it might gradually emerge with time (Secara 1). Polonius was holding Ophelia back from
discovering her true feelings toward men and marriage, and by planning to keep
her as young and pure as he can; he gradually slips Ophelia to losing her
mind. In act one scene 3, Polonius is
lecturing Ophelia on marriage:
“Marry, I will teach you. Think yourself a
Baby
That you have ta’en these tenders for
true pay
Which are not sterling. Tender yourself
more dearly,
Or (not to crack the wind of the poor
phrase)
Tend’ring it thus you’ll tender me a fool
(1.3. 104-109).
Here
Polonius is reassuring Ophelia that she is still a young baby and cannot engage
in a relationship with a man whom will not be her husband. He also admits that it will make him look
like a fool if she does not follow what he says. Showing that Polonius is a dominant father, Ophelia feels restrained
from exploring the outside world.
Ophelia, being the adventurous young girl
she was, wanted to come out of shell at an early age, something her father was
not too proud of. Her interest showed
that she was falling for Hamlet. While Ophelia
is feeling this wanting towards Hamlet she is unsure at times and seems to
confide in Polonius to a certain extent.
“When Ophelia is confronted by her father Polonius about her feelings
toward Hamlet’s interest in her, Ophelia’s response is, ‘I do not know, my
lord, what I should think” (Carbone 1).
By Ophelia asking for her father’s advice, it is evident that she still
is attached to her father enough to hear his opinion on the situation. However, when the response Polonius gives to
Ophelia is not one she wants to hear she becomes frustrated with her father and
Ophelia’s path to madness continues.
Ophelia tells Polonius that he speaking to her in such words that she
feels he wants to marry her and will make her happy (1.3). Love struck, Ophelia is willing to do
anything for Hamlet. Also, she is even
more unwilling to take her father’s words into consideration if they at all
hinder her feelings to the man she loves and supposedly loves her. Polonius, being the suspicious father
attempts to find out if Hamlet really does love Ophelia. Dr. Vavra discusses the different foils of Hamlet and brings up the point that
Polonius, being the overbearing father he is, obtains a letter Hamlet wrote to
Ophelia, and persuades Claudius and Gertrude, the king and queen, that Hamlet
is mad (Vavra 2). Polonius will stop at
nothing to catch Ophelia and Hamlet to prove they are in fact having a sexual
relationship. “The moment when Polonius
expects to trap Hamlet’s ‘hot love’ (2.2. 132) is the moment when Hamlet renounces
it, breaking the bond with Ophelia by his reiterated ‘Farewell’ (Erickson
76). Polonius realizes he is right and
Ophelia sees that and becomes unstable adding to her gradual madness.
Polonius` greatest contribution to
Ophelia going mad was his death. Who
better to be the murderer than the man she loved and learned to hate,
Hamlet. In the film, the murder is
depicted as a huge mistake that Hamlet thought Claudius was behind the sheet
and that he had no intension of killing Polonius (Zeffirelli). While Ophelia was on the rise towards
madness at the time of her father’s death, this incident caused her to break
off from the sane world. Ophelia
wanders around the kingdom singing short songs to express her feelings, but is
obviously distracted from normality.
One of her first songs she sings when she sees the queen includes:
Say You?
Nay, pray you mark.
He is dead and gone, lady.
He is dead and gone:
At his head a grass-green turf,
At his heels a stone (4.5. 28-32).
Here
Ophelia is attempting to come to the realization she has lost her father and
knows how important he in fact was in her life. Telling Gertrude that he is being buried, shows that she is
attempting to come to closure with the initial shock of her father’s
death. At this point, Ophelia is
becoming so infuriated with Hamlet, and wishes for the comfort of her brother
Laertes.
Although Laertes was not in the play
a significant amount of time, his effect on driving Ophelia mad was significant
enough. When Laertes tries to help
Ophelia early in the play, he not only hurts her, but also looses trust with
his alleged friend, Hamlet. “Laertes shows his mistrust right away when he
warned Ophelia not to get involved with him” (Vavra 1). Laertes sees through Hamlet that he will use
Ophelia and warns Ophelia in act one scene three when he says:
For Hamlet, and the trifling of
his favor,
Hold is a fashion and a toy in
blood,
A violet in the youth of primy
nature,
Forward, not permanent, sweet, not
lasting,
The perfume and suppliance of a minute,
No more (1.3. 5-10).
Learning
in the future that here Laertes is correct in everything he says, however,
Ophelia begs to differ with him and pursues Hamlet for how she feels. By Laertes continuing to harass her about
staying away from Hamlet, Ophelia begins to disregard him, much like she did to
her father. As Laertes and Polonius
drive her away from Hamlet while Hamlet entices Ophelia, she is tossed up with
what she should do and succumbs to madness as the play evolves. When Laertes returns from the sea in act
four scene five, Ophelia is visibly mad and is only communicating in song. Laertes gets word of his father’s death and
his horrified reaction causes Ophelia to intensify her insaneness. The film portrays
this scene wonderfully because a real sense of distance is seen between Ophelia
and her brother. Her songs continue and
usually say something about how she loved her father and how is never coming
back.
Ophelia’s songs are soon silenced
when she drowns herself at a brook. The
queen gives Laertes the horrible news and he is distraught (4.7). Garner defends the idea of Ophelia’s
innocence in his book when he states “Ophelia’s suicide is depicted by Gertrude
as accidental ‘an envious silver broke’ [4.7.173], passive involuntary, mad” (64). All different parts of society contribute to
Ophelia’s madness, but the three that the most apparent were Hamlet, Polonius,
and Laertes.
Although she felt closest to the
three men in her life, they each helped drive Ophelia mad and eventually to death. As the play continues and the other
characters all take revenge on each other and in time all die, Ophelia leaves a
different mark in the theme of death in Hamlet. She will always remain innocent in the eyes of Shakespeare
readers and most critics. No other
story can ever have a leading lady with the qualities Ophelia carried
throughout the play. As this timeless
play continues to be read and analyzed by all walks of life, Ophelia’s madness
will be discovered. A word to all the
men out there, don’t hurt a woman who seems to be in love because she might
become a crazy woman who kills herself and blames it on you.
Work Citied
Carbone,
Jennie. Interpreting Ophelia.
Digital Elsinor.
Erickson,
Peter. Patriarchal Structures in
Shakespeare’s Drama.
Esposito,
Danielle. Hamlet’s Love for Ophelia.
Garner,
Shirley.,ed. Shakespearean Tragedy
and Gender.
Johnson,
Charles. “Ophelia.” New Englander and Yale Review Volume 45, Issue 195
(1886).
Secara,
Maggie. Life in Elizabethan
Shakespeare, William. Hamlet.
Sivenius, Pia. Finnish Literature Forum.
Varvra.
Foils for Hamlet.
<
http://curie.pct.edu/courses/evarvra/En1121/Mp3/S98/S98G81-03.htm
>
Hamlet.
Dir. Franco Zeffirelli. Warner Home Video Ltd. 1990.