Gertrude and Ophelia (Hamlet) Essay

In Hamlet, the women stumble a motion the small roles portraying their historical status at the clip. Although Gertrude is the Queen of Denmark and Ophelia is the princes retirers, they have no standing in the society and their voices argon neer heard. Their actions and fates ar swellly regulated by the mens decisions. All their lives Ophelia and Gertrude are led by the mens power they together make a weak image of dependent women at Shakespeares time.Although Gertrude and Ophelia are not well developed through out the play, their actions, language and influence on the play portray them as the obedient passive grammatical case of women. Gertrude is Hamlets mother, a queen who betrayed her husband and got seduced by the princes uncle Claudius. She remarried with him and thereafter obeyed every order from Claudius. Gertrude is objectified by Claudius, as he verbalize my crget, mine own ambition and my Queen. To him the queen is one of his possessions and not fifty-fifty list ed as the first. This suggested Gertrude is used by Claudius to get to the throne. The hasty marriage lone(prenominal) a few weeks after her husbands oddment shows her great dependence on men. Hamlets proclamation that he pass on speak daggers to her, but use none illustrate that he perceives her to be subscript, weak enough to fall foul to his words. Overall, Gertrude is the type of women that cannot survive without a man in her life, with such a weak soul she betrays her own husband and son.Ophelia is different from Gertrude. She is innocent, and nave with no experience in life. She does love Hamlet with her pure heart, but she is also too submissive to her papa Polonius and brother Laertes. As they claim Hamlet is dangerous, that Hamlets go forth is not his own and that she should fear him, she does not try to oppose him, or justify Hamlets tickers instead she tells Laertes that he shall keep the lynchpin of her memory. Polonius insults her and Hamlets love, responding to her declaration that Hamlet has of late made tenders of his affection he cries Affection? PoohDo you believe his tenders as you call them? to which Ophelia replies I do not know, my lord, what I should think.She gives all the other manful influences in her life. Later in the play, after Hamlet killed Polonius and runs away, Laertes is in France, she has no one to turn to. She depends too much on those people, now without both support she turns tomadness and finally commits suicide. All her life Ophelia is led by others and has never decided anything but her death.Hamlet was written in a time when women were not even allowed to play themselves on stage, women were seen as inferior and women were owned by men. Ophelia and Gertrude have no real Autonomy, they are at the mercy of Hamlet, Claudius, Rodrigo, and Laertes moods to define their moods, and when the men are in conflict the women suffer, which is death in this case. They are a portrait of what women in Shakespeares time were like, dependent on men and never could control their own fate. run away CitedShakespeare, William. Hamlet. Rpt. in Compact Literature Reading Reacting Writing. By Kirszner and Mandell. 6th ed. 2007.