Comparative Analysis of Ophelia and Juliet as Tragic Heroines - Research Paper Example

Comparative Analysis of Ophelia and Juliet as Tragic Heroines Introduction Various types of female actors often act in most of Shakespeare’s plays thus showing how he views women as well as their position in Shakespeare’s time. Some of the female characters in Shakespeare’s have characteristics of the tragic heroine. Characters such as Ophelia (from Hamlet) and Juliet (from Romeo and Juliet) are tragic innocent women. These female characters portray their tragic characters at the beginning of the plays and lastly die after they lost their innocence. In contrast to Shakespeare’s presentation of female characters who are a heroine, the treatment of these innocent characters is comparatively atrocious since their lives are terminated to signify the loss of their heroine traits. What do these two women tragic heroine? This essay purports to give a comparative analysis of these two characters to show why there are referred to as the tragic heroines. Time and place setting The time and place setting of the Hamlet play takes place between 14th and 15th century or 13th to 14th centuries. The play setting is the royal Elsinore place in Denmark city. On the other hand, Romeo and Juliet play takes place in Mantua and Verona city over a period of four days. The other entire scene except Act five Scene one takes place at Verona. Although the writing of the play took place in between 1591-1596, the play was set between 13th to 16th centuries. During these periods, women were unable to make any decisions since they were supposed to obey the men’s decision-making Ophelia (from Hamlet) and Juliet (from Romeo and Juliet) are among the female characters in Shakespeare who have heroine character, and they pass through similar life situations (Shakespeare and Laurel 34). Ophelia and Juliet are stereotyped in a similar way (as children). The readers initially encounter with Juliet when Capulet is discussing Juliet’s tender age with Paris claiming that she is not mature enough to be married. “… I have said before: / my child is yet strange in the world… Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride” (7-11). Similarly, Ophelia’s first introduction stereotypes her as a child. Polonius counsels Ophelia and warns her about her love with Hamlet, “Marry, I will teach you: to think yourself a baby” (104). Despite these two characters being treated like children, they seem to be the tragic heroine in most of their actions. Ophelia’s role in Hamlet play seems to be highly complex. Shakespeare represents her as loyal, gentle, and obeying character who acts as a supporting character (Stanton 67). She is in love with Hamlet, although he seems not to consider her in any of his life goals and plans. She is not supposed to raise any “voice” and does according to Hamlet, although her death affects some of the essential characters such as Hamlet. However, having no “voice”, some of her integral roles portray her as a tragic heroine (Gorman and William 58). Ophelia’s tragic heroine depends on how the readers interpret her role. Ophelia’s fundamental heroine is that she seems to care and wear her emotions and feelings without any buffer. In addition, Ophelia is loyal to her family as well as to her lover Hamlet hence portraying his heroine character (Bradley 76). Ophelia is quite active when it comes to defending herself. It was rare for a woman during the Shakespeare time to defend herself to her parents, especially a father and her husband after marriage. She obeys her father without any compliment when warned about her love with Hamlet, “I shall obey, my lord” (36). We also see the heroine character of Ophelia through the life of Hamlet. It is through her that the readers witness the life evolution of Hamlet or his devolution to a person convinced that females are whores; meaning that females who seem good are full of sexual desire and corruption (Shakespeare 34). She also seems to do according to her will of loving Hamlet. She portrays this when her brother warns her to stop seeing Hamlet. Ophelia says, “I shall the effect of this good lesson keep…” (45). It is true that Ophelia is just kidding her brother and she is not willing to follow her advice. This is evidence that Ophelia is a tragic heroine since she stands to his decision and her brother cannot change her decisions (Clamon 56). On the other hand, Juliet similar to Romeo throughout the play makes her transition from adolescent stage to an adult. In her case, there is a sense that her status forces her to mature at a faster rate. The emphasis of her youth, despite the fact that she matures quickly she is a tragic heroine (Naden34). Although she is obedient and quiet her inner strength enables her to mature at a faster rate. When her mother tells her to marry Paris because of his appearance and richness Juliet says, “I’ll look to like, if looking liking move” (97). She later meets Romeo, falls in love with him, and decides to marry him secretly since her mother insists that she should marry Paris. Capulet insists his rights and claims that he should marry her daughter to Paris threatening her daughter with public shame and losing her inheritance. Due to tragic heroine character, she decides that she should rather die than marrying a man she does not love. This is evident when she says; “if all else fail, myself has the power to die” (244). However, during this time, when she totally disagrees with her parent and becoming the most isolated by her parents, the nurse also betrays her trust and advices her to comply with her parents’ decisions and forget about Romeo and marry Paris (Adams, William and Alison 15). Juliet even exposes her love with Romeo when they kiss in front of people at the feast. She looks loving, strong, loyal, and witty just like Ophelia. She teases her lover Romeo by making use of poetry, love to express how much he loves her, “you kiss by the’ book” (110). This shows how her courage and thus she not willing to comply with her father’s decision to enter into an unwanted marriage. Although loving Romeo is going against her parents’ due to her tragic heroine character, she is the one who proposes that they should marry (Burdett and William 43). This is evident in the balcony scene when she later suggests that they should marry. Juliet’s decisions in the forth Act to marry Romeo rather entering into a marriage she predicts will arouse challenges since she does not love the man her parents suggests that she should marry increases, supports the notion that she is a tragic heroine (Shakespeare and Irving 45). Despite the dangers she is aware she will face due to disobeying her parents, she plans what to do. Conclusion Although the lives of Juliet and Ophelia end in a tragedy manner, they psychologically walk on different roads. For instance, Ophelia acts as a puppet throughout the entire play (Chellappan 23). Although she stands out as a heroine, most of her deeds are under control of Polonius and Hamlet. Although she has some aspects of the tragic heroine, she seemed to have been dying very long ago even before being physical death, which makes her mentally and insane. On the other hand, Juliet can make her own decisions and stand by them. Juliet is in several ways more heroin than Ophelia. She is more courageous than Ophelia to make her own decision and stand by those decisions, even when her parents suggest that she should marry Parris. According to this comparative analysis, it is logic to conclude that the two characters are tragic heroine. 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