With particular reference to Hamlet, feminist critics might explore the characters of Ophelia and Gertrude and how they challenge—or fail to challenge — the domination of male characters. Feminist critics would also be interested in exploring how the play expresses ideas about femininity that were common in Shakespeare's lifetime and how complicit Shakespeare is in Hamlet's personal misogyny. … Elaine Showalter's essay "Representing Ophelia: Women, Madness, and the Responsibilities of Feminist Criticism" explores the difficulties, even embarrassments, that feminist critics have had in approaching Ophelia. The problem is that Ophelia has tended to be overshadowed by Hamlet, even by feminist critics, who then feel the need to liberate Ophelia from obscurity. However, even liberated Ophelia is problematic for she suggests some potentially troubling connections between femininity, female sexuality, and madness.
	
	Today women have many rights. We can vote, work, and even voice our own opinions. In the past women were seen as mothers and housekeepers, always taught to respect, listen, and serve there husbands or the man of the house. In those days this was considered normal, therefore women had no choice but to obey and do as they were told. In Hamlet, Shakespeare portrays a similar relationship between women and men.
Shakespeare’s Hamlet is set in the late middle ages, in Denmark. A time in history when women were not respected and thought of as the inferior sex. There are two women characters in Hamlet; Gertrude, Hamlet’s mother, and Ophelia, Hamlet’s love interest. Magda Romanska the writer of “Ontology and Eroticism: Two Bodies Of Ophelia”, argues that Ophelia represents the typical idea of women in the nineteenth century. I agree with this, but argue that it is not the only aspect of Ophelia’s character. Ophelia becomes the bearer of Hamlet’s hatred toward the world, and is also the character of lowest status because she is an average women. Ophelia surrenders herself to the cruelty of those around her, and sacrifices her sanctity to please and conform
Even though women’s rights has evolved drastically, today and throughout history, women still largely adhere to men’s demands. Men, who withhold most of the power in relationships, tend to expanded their own power at the cost of these women, displaying that anybody in a position of power can become uncontrolled. A similar scenario of imbalanced power appears throughout Hamlet, Shakespeare portrays women as pawns in a mostly male world, due to their desire for acceptance from men, women are led to their downfall, showing that in seeking a man’s approval, they often fall victim to men’s greed and manipulation.
Misogyny is a recurring theme through the play Hamlet, written by Shakespeare. The roles of women are relegated to menial roles within the patriarchal society and such depictions are most notable by the representations forwarded by Hamlet, causing to silence the women within the play. His perspective of women has completely changed after the hasty marriage of mother Gertrude and uncle Claudius, soon after the death of his cherished father.
As well as proposing the notion of female frailty through Gertrude, Hamlet’s mistreatment of Ophelia is another way in which the play of Hamlet could be considered a strongly misogynistic one. This is seen in particular through Hamlet’s verbal taunts directed at Ophelia’s intelligence, as he sneers that she is accustomed to “jig and amble and lisp” and that she makes her “wantonness” her “ignorance.” Indeed, Ophelia is depicted as being fragile, neurotic, and generally futile, with Polonious further calling her a “baby”, and a “green girl.” Polonius seeks to hold complete control over Ophelia, and she is presented to us as being unintelligent, mute, and unable to make her own decisions; for example, when Polonious warns her to stay away from
Gender plays as much of a role in the modern day as it did in the time that Shakespeare wrote his wonderful play, Hamlet. With the men in the society often premeditating what happens in the life of the women. In the case of Shakespeare’s Hamlet we are able to see that the true nature of gender as we have characters like Ophelia,and Gertrude. As Ophelia has her life dominated by men as they are able to cloud her judgement. Shakespeare’s use of Ophelia is only to improve the stock that men have. The men around Ophilia are portrayed as clever, smart, courageous yet, always remaining to be the one that is seen as the mad and unstable women that is pushed to become. While Gertrude is a character who is an affectionate, and caring character that tries to make the best out of the situations that she is placed in. This is nevertheless, unimportant as the misogynist thoughts that the men in the play have towards her lead her. Shakespeare’s portrayal of women in the play Hamlet is that of one to serve only the men that are in the play catering to their emotional, sexual, financial and other needs that they have never able to develop. A feminist is needed in women because without this feminist identity women will be easily manipulated by men.
The topic on Ophelia and Gertrude in Hamlet and women is not just about patriarchal oppression, but also about how Gertrude and/or Ophelia demonstrate independence, even though they are victims of
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Hamlet degrades women by the means of the motif of the whore, and its parallel, the virgin. Femininity is constructed in two very opposite ways within the world of Hamlet. Hamlet’s characterization of the two most important women in his life fall in the two polarities of the spectrum, and even within the discourse of determining which side Ophelia and Gertrude fall, he never considers the possibility of a dual nature residing in either character. If not a virgin, a woman is automatically labeled as a whore in Hamlet’s mind, and this very concept extends to not only the society of Elizabethan England from the time which Shakespeare wrote Hamlet, but it also can apply to the ideology of our current society to an extent.
Ophelia first appears in Hamlet in Act 1. Scene 3 speaking to her brother Laertes of Hamlet. Within her first four lines, she reveals herself to be a strong woman when she says “but, good my brother, do not, as some ungracious pastors do, show me the steep and thorny way to heaven, whiles, like a puffed and reckless libertine, himself… recks not his own rede” (1.3 50-55). At this time period in which women are expected to be obedient, voicing these thoughts of hers, that Laertes is not in the position to give her these commands because he is a hypocrite himself, shows that Ophelia has some strong attributes. Ophelia further demonstrates her ability to appear tough in Act 3. Scene 2. during the pla...