How does Shakespeare present Ophelia Essay

In hamlet Shakespe ar presents Ophelia as a helpless girl, who is continu in ally manipulated by the men about her for their own gain. In many of his other plays the women are presented as unattackable and admirable people who play major roles in the live of the protagonist, much(prenominal) as Lady Macbeth in Macbeth. In critical point, however, Ophelia becomes a very distinguishable role-she is conveyed as a lesser to the men round her. She is continually manipulated by her father, Polonius, her brother, Larertes and juncture, the supposed love of her life. Her sweet and innocent nature results in her strikemly dependent on the man in her life to tell her how to be feel. critical point shows a very different style in Shakespeare writing, no eternal is the women controversially given obligingness by the male character, but is quite shown in a more traditional mere pawn for their fathers, brothers and lovers. Ophelias relationship with her father is less then the trad itional intimate unity expected. Instead it shows a controlling man, obsessed with what others think, and a daughter reverential of her fathers wises. Polonius becomes convinced that Ophelias relationship with Hamlet forget result in the diminish of his families honour, and to him, the respect others have for his families re getation is very important.He indeed begins to pressurise Ophelia into breaking off any understanding between herself and Hamlet. Shakespeare uses these characters and their interaction to present a more traditional view of how a char should act toward the men in their lives during this time period. I personally do not see her as a week character, but quite see her as a women with no other choice than to respect and obey the man who has looked after her all her life. Their relationship is a mothy one, with little compassion between the two, but apparent respect on Ophelias behalf.Her brother too becomes set against her love for Hamlet, believing that she will ruin herself for Hamlet, yet he will never actually marry her, due to her lower social standing. During the actual play, Larertes is the only man who conveys to her that he actually cares for her, but we can see clearly that he recollects her uninterrupted open regard for Hamlet will reduce their familys nobility. He too adds to the pressure put on her to distance herself from Hamlet. Hamlets strategic plans towards Ophelia are probably the most conniving and vicious.He not only manipulates her uniform love for him, but also toys with her emotions throughout, making her play exactly how he wants. He uses the courts knowledge of his relationship with Ophelia to get deeper affect in his darn to avenge his father and kill the king. He evolves Polonius theory that Hamlet is barbarian with love for Ophelia. When she returns Hamlets love letters and other tokens of his affections in act terce scene I, Hamlet seizes this moment to cement the beginning of her descend into fu rore in both Ophelias eyes and in Polonius and Claudius as Hamlet is aware they are watching this encounter between the two ex-lovers.He appears troubled and hysterical as he denies giving her anything and laments the dishonesty of beauty. Confusingly, he claims to both have loved, and never loved her. As he leaves she mourns the nobleman mind that has now lapsed into apparent madness. Hamlet believes that by audience this fight between Ophelia and himself, Polonius and Claudius will think he is now crazy and thus not fear him, making Claudius more vulnerable. Hamlet, Polonius and Larertes all put pressure on her to do what they want, they all use her to gain themselves and they all have little regard for her genuine love for Hamlet.Her heart begins to range over her head and as a result of being caught in the crossfire of all the men in her life Ophelia goes crazy, unable to cope with the filtrate and contradiction. Finally, she kills herself finding no place in the situation f or her own feelings. Hamlet is the least idealistic of Shakespeares plays, with women being presented in a more realistic view, rather than an idealistic outlook on society where women have more control over their lives and arent controlled by the men some them.Ophelia is presented in a more traditional feminine way, relying on men around her. This fits into Hamlet, and makes the play appear more legitimate, due to the emotion involved in the twisted love story. Still, I do not believe she is weak, but instead love struck and susceptible to manipulation by the men closely involved in her life. Many critics have argued that she is a dismal character, which no one can admire, but I see her as instead, a woman who is young, weak and naive to the world around her.