Burn Out the Sense: Ophelias Madness - Essay Example

Your Number Burn out the sense: Ophelia's madness Shakespeare's Hamlet presents many mysteries of human behavior and many clues for the reader to interpret them. Is Hamlet truly insane, and, if so, when did he lose his mind We can point to the murder of his father and the compliance of his mother. The same issues might be attributed to Ophelia: her father is killed, a loved one betrays her, and her resulting madness is sudden. Instead, we tend to see her as a victim of Hamlet's changing regard rather than a woman who thinks and chooses for herself, as Hamlet seems to choose his madness. Elaine Showalter, in her essay "Representing Ophelia" writes that Ophelia is traditionally a blank upon whom readers throughout the ages have imposed their own beliefs about women. Hamlet's insanity is philosophical, the result of brooding upon his father's death and learning the truth about it. Ophelia's insanity is often portrayed as the result of being a woman, a person for whom emotion trumps reason, who cannot be held accountable for her actions as a result of her gender. Although this is true as Showalter explains it, modern readers can still create a new picture of Ophelia, as an intelligent woman who defies society's expectations by thinking for herself, even as others manipulate her for their own gain. Ophelia's first appearance in the play is at her brother Laertes's side; the time and place of her life requires that, if Ophelia is to be a good girl, she will always be governed by trusted men. Her brother engages in the family pastime of giving unwanted advice in long, lofty monologues. He says straight off, "For Hamlet and the trifling of his favor, Hold it a fashion and a toy in bloodnot permanent, sweet, not lasting" (I. iii. 5-8). Laertes anticipates Hamlet's betrayal of his sister, and Ophelia seems to understand what he is saying. But we can assign a degree of independence to Ophelia in his conversation; she accepts his warning lightly and then turns it around, suggesting that Laertes is giving good advice, which he himself needs to follow. When her father, Polonius, quizzes her on the same subject, she is slightly more forthcoming, but she also argues in Hamlet's favor, calling his wooing of her "honorable" (I. iii. 110) and "holy" (I. iii. 114). At the end of the scene, Polonius tells her to avoid Hamlet, and she promises to do so. Modern readers are left to wonder the men's motivations. Do they care for Ophelia, or is she a commodity whose worth could be compromised They do not trust her to make the right decision on her own, but force her into dangerous situations for their own reasons. When next we see Ophelia, she is reporting to her father on Hamlet's frightening behavior. Although she has tried to avoid him, he bursts in on her private quarters and acts crazy, grabbing her arm staring at her in a scary way. Ophelia is still behaving essentially according to expectation, coming to her father for help. She tells him she has acted "as you did command" (II. i. 108), and even Polonius believes it may be his advice that has provokes such a response. Not long after that, everyone starts to worry about Hamlet's bizarre behavior. The king, with Polonius, decides to set up a situation in which the two men can observe the young people together and determine whether Ophelia is the reason for Hamlet's madness, and in this scene, Shakespeare plants the beginnings of Ophelia's madness in Hamlet's lies and contradictions. Here her mind turns to melancholy. She sees herself "of all ladies most deject and wretched" (III. i. 158), but not before she laments the poison that infects Hamlet. Meanwhile, her father and the king disagree on the effect of their pawn sacrifice, not considering the extent to which they have really sacrificed her. Without this external manipulation, Ophelia might have been safer. Again, in Ophelia's next scene, she is forced to contend with Hamlet's changing madness, as he flirts outrageously with her in front of both of their families and actually draws her into a sexually-charged conversation that, on the outside, feels almost normal. Although Ophelia seems to be humoring him, she is not completely immune to his charm. Still, she is uncomfortable and would probably prefer not to be there. When next we see Ophelia, Hamlet has killed her father and the madness has overtaken her mind. The queen does not want to see her at all, and the king reduces her troubles, saying, "this is the poison of deep grief; it springs All from her father's death" (IV v. 75-6) without acknowledging his or Hamlet's place in the drama. Shortly after that, Ophelia is dead by her own hand, an act that takes place even as Laertes and Claudius calmly discuss the most political method of dealing with the insane prince. Showalter points out that Ophelia's actions are explained in different ways at different times, one of the common explanations being that her melancholy is the result of erotomania, wherein all her complicated emotions are reduced to a simple, typically female response to unrequited love. In this explanation, women are thought to be capable of feeling too much, and it is this surplus of emotions that poisons her mind. But the text of the play does not exactly bear this out, as we have seen. If Ophelia is suffering from Hamlet's rejection, then why would she obey her father and brother in denying him her affections as she reports in act II, scene i Why, in act III, scene i would she try to return to Hamlet the tokens of love he has given her and worry first about how his mind has been compromised before considering her own state And how could she participate, with apparent willingness, in the banter of act III, scene ii, if she suffered so much from emotional overload In act IV, scene v, her jumbled-up singing seems to refer both to love and death, but her words focus more on Polonius. She "cannot choose but to weep to think they would lay him i' the cold ground" (IV. V. 69), and references her father's death in her last two speeches of the play. Truly, it seems that Ophelia is most disturbed by the regard still held for Hamlet, despite the serious nature of his crimes. Not knowing of Claudius's plots to have Hamlet executed, it must have seemed to her unfair that Hamlet could spurn her, murder her father, and face no consequences for his actions whatsoever. She has been used, less by Hamlet than by Polonius and Claudius, but she does not have the freedom the men have to address these betrayals. We can explain Ophelia's suicide as a logical result to an illogical world, and the only action available to her in asserting her own individuality and control over her body and spirit. But this is a modern reading, as Showalter points out, as all readings of Ophelia are based on our current ideas of women. Like all the critics who have come before us, we paint on Ophelia the notions of what women think and feel, and we must acknowledge that there is no one Ophelia, but the many Ophelias created by all the possible interpretations of women. Read More