Gertrude Hamlet Character Analysis

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Many see Gertrude as a voiceless character, that she is simple minded or witless. It is important to note, that whether she is a strong character or not in the play, she is innocent of murder. She has no part in the murder of her husband, but that does not mean she is not an adulterer. Hamlet sees Gertrude’s moral offence and is disgusted by it. In Hamlet’s mind, Gertrude was guilty simply by association with Claudius. Though, would Hamlet have condemned her to the same fate as Claudius in the end? Could Hamlet have murdered his mother if not for the ghost’s intervention on her behalf? The closest we may ever come to knowing is in act three in the closet scene. Hamlet goes to his mother’s closet room when she requests to see him. This is the one scene where we get to see Gertrude’s character, yet uninfluenced by Claudius’s presence. Hamlet at this point in the play is very strongly influenced by his Superego, while Gertrude is still in a flux that her ego has not sorted out yet. She is seemingly blind to the negatives of her actions influenced by her id. Hamlet has just come from watching Claudius praying for forgiveness, his emotions and his nerves are very brittle, and he has just missed a chance to kill his uncle. Hamlet releases his pent up frustrations upon Gertrude, lashing out at her and condemning her despite the ghost’s order not to. Hamlet lashes out with his id, insulting her and accusing her, she defends with her Superego, innocent in her mind of any crimes he accuses her of. Gertrude may love her son, and she may even be simple minded, but she is not a fool. She knows well he is capable of murder in the state he is in. She cries out “Thou wilt not murder me” (3.4, 21). She is right to be afraid, as Hamlet proves... ... middle of paper ... ...his mother, but he never said he couldn’t ask her what she knew. The secrets in this play pile up too quickly. The secret affair of Gertrude, possibly with the product of prince Hamlet. The secret murder of the King. Hamlet’s secret learning and plotting to confirm the discovery of said murder. Then Claudius hatched more secret murder plots and spying, and at the end, it all added up with the entire royal family dead. To what end does that bring justice to the Ghost? To see his wife and son murdered? None. The ghost would want things to play out the way they did only if he wanted revenge on them all. And the only reason for that would be the betrayal from them all to the king. In the end, it doesn’t matter if Hamlet was Hamlet’s or Claudius, one or both of them desired him dead, and all three royal heirs shared that fate. Death by jealousy, corruption, and greed.

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