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Hamlet And Ophelia's Empathy Essay

398 Words2 Pages

Of all the characters in the play, Gertrude and Ophelia deserve empathy more. They are the only two people who are sincere, truthful, and free from pretense. While other characters are plotting and scheming against each other, they perceive the situation or the people they are dealing with naively.

Beautiful, affectionate, impetuous and decisive Queen Gertrude, however, is not intelligent. She could not make the proper judgment about other people. She deserves the empathy more because, firstly, her own son Hamlet does not love her, respect her or care for her. He even believes she has betrayed Old Hamlet. Based on that motive, Hamlet is disrespectful towards her and always treats her like a guilty person. As a result, she lives in pain until she dies. Secondly, unlike other characters in the play, “she is sincere, truthful, and free from hypocrisy.” Her sincerity eventually kills her, because she does not think that Claudius would commit such a crime. …show more content…

At the same time, like another young lady in the Elizabethan time, she has to respect and obey her father unconditionally. Her father’s words are the defining rules and laws for her. In this way, Ophelia was torn between her love to Hamlet and her obedience to her father. The two forces are too overpowering and too contradicting that, eventually, it turns her to insanity. Helpless and desperate Ophelia is, she could not heal herself or protect herself from

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