Suicide In Ophelia

Free as a Weed

In Shakespeare's play The Tragedy of Hamlet, Ophelia is interpreted to be a weak women, who goes mad over her love for Hamlet. She was generally pictured as a young, beautiful, obedient, and pious girl; she was a girl terrified of her father, her brother, and of her lover (“Teker”). However, this interpretation is incorrect. Just as Emily Thorne said, “there are two sides to every story and there are two sides to every person, one that we reveal to the world and one that we keep hidden” (“Thorne”). Ophelia is a women who all her life has been told what to do by the men that she loves. Ophelia's father, brother, and her lover have controlled every aspect of her short life and even treated Ophelia with no respect. Although it may have seemed that Ophelia committed suicide over the loss of her loved ones, she actually committed suicide over the loss of her newly gained freedom. Exploring deeply into the play, one would uncover that in every instant that Ophelia had lost a loved one she does not show sadness. Only after her brother returns, does Ophelia truly lose her mind. During the play, Ophelia is very obedient to her father. Ophelia is willing to drop anything that her father tells her to whether she wants to or not. Polonius tells Ophelia that making herself available

Laertes ordered Ophelia to write to him while he is away, Laertes also told Ophelia to consider Hamlet’s affection just as lust instead of love, he told her that Hamlet can never love her, and that he is too high in power to ever have true feelings for her. Laertes also told Ophelia to not fall for what Hamlet is telling her. Laertes suggested that Ophelia is a very weak women and did not have adequate judgment. He told her not be with Hamlet, even though he knew that he did the same thing (I.iii.). Laertes was very hypocritical towards Ophelia during the