The Juxtaposition of Hamlet Characters - 1658 Words

To completely understand how someone is, the reasoning behind their person, you have to take into account the people around them. In William Shakespeare’s play â€Å"The Tragedy of Hamlet†, Ophelia and Laertes represent different aspects of prince Hamlets traits that further the understanding of his behaviour, thoughts, and over-all character. Laertes and Ophelia, like Hamlet, are children of murdered fathers. This connection helps create a link between the three that sends them passionately to their end. Ophelia has an important relationship and entangling affair with the prince. Hamlets and Ophelia’s actions in time lead the young women into a deep grief, and eventually an even deeper lunacy. Her burning emotions and truly mad mind†¦show more content†¦Hamlets treatment of Ophelia reflects his feelings for women. â€Å"Hamlet views Ophelia as he considers his mother- a passionate voluptuary whose fragrant sexuality is a poisonous and destroying force. The image of poison which †¦ Laertes sees in Hamlet, [Hamlet] sees in †¦ Ophelia.† (Alexander 136). Because Hamlet feels betrayed by the woman he called mother, who married so quickly after his father’s death, he paints all women as pictures of distractive feebleness, stupidity and bawdiness. â€Å"Hamlet therefore sees Ophelia as a threat to his memory, his dedication, to the task of revenge, and to his whole existence† (Alexander 129). Hamlets resentment toward women is also directed at himself. In his only soliloquy before learning of his father’s murder, Hamlet shows what he thinks of his grief and his mother’s actions: â€Å"Frailty, thy name is woman† (I.ii.148). Seeing all women as one entity of frailty would prove Hamlet to be someone who was very narrow minded, but he says: â€Å"†¦I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious; with more offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us†¦ † [III.i.133-140] Comparing himself to the weakness that he sees in women shows that Hamlet is making â€Å"†¦anShow MoreRelatedComparing The Novel Atonement By Ian Mcewan And The Play Hamlet By William Shakespeare1428 Words   |  6 Pagessimilar and contrasting features of their characters in order to addresses varying issues within the texts. These issues within the text In the novel Atonement by Ian McEwan and the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the writers’ use of juxtaposition is used to accomplish a more profound understanding of the internal relationships of the characters and external relationships with the other characters in the texts. 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