SARAH: Ophelia made a wreath of flowers and attempted to hang it on the branches of the willow. While doing so, she slipped and fell into the brook.
In this way, Ophelia's drowning, surrounded by flowers with her last breath in song, is her surrender to her overwhelming femininity. In an ironic twist, her watery suicide, which plunges her into the impersonal eternal female essence, works to remind the characters of her humanity and individuality.
Some see Ophelia's death as an accident; others see it as a suicide resulting from the accumulation of a series of unfortunate events: her rejection by her boyfriend, her father's murder, and her possible pregnancy.
Answer and Explanation: In the play Hamlet, Ophelia dies by drowning.
Ophelia's final words are addressed to either Hamlet, or her father, or even herself and her lost innocence: “And will a not come again? / No, no, he is dead, / Go to thy death-bed, / He never will come again. / … / God a mercy on his soul. And of all Christian souls. God buy you.” Next, she drowns herself.
The penultimate scene of the play begins with the two clowns digging a grave for the late Ophelia. They debate whether she should be allowed to have a Christian burial, because she committed suicide.
Their particular form of madness was more related to hysteria -- an affliction which was considered to be particularly feminine. Clinically speaking, Ophelia's behavior and appearance are characteristic of the malady the Elizabethans would have diagnosed as female love-melancholy, or erotomania.
Laertes must have been clued in to Ophelia's pregnancy. Polonius inadvertently admits to such a claim. Polonius's knowledge is revealed when Hamlet discloses that he knows Ophelia, his lady love might be pregnant. Check out the words that Hamlet uses when he confronts Polonious.
She is a young noblewoman of Denmark, the daughter of Polonius, sister of Laertes and potential wife of Prince Hamlet, who, due to Hamlet's actions, ends up in a state of madness that ultimately leads to her drowning.
It would have been risky for Shakespeare directly to portray pre-marital sex between aristocratic characters, but Hamlet gives us reasons to suspect that at some point before the beginning of the play, Hamlet and Ophelia have had sex.
In the context of the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare many possibilities can be identified that pertain to Ophelia's sudden death. Ophelia's death was triggered by her mental breakdown due to the loss of her father.
His verdict was, as is evident from the text, that Ophelia, like any other Catholic in good standing with the Church, was entitled to Christian burial, either because her death was accidental, or, if wilful and deliberate, was due to her insanity: and one bereft of reason is according to the teaching of the Church, ...
Ophelia is a character from Shakespeare's play “Hamlet”. Upon finding out that her crush (the eponymous Hamlet) accidentally killed her father, she suffered a mental breakdown and while walking through woods collecting wild flowers and singing haunting songs, she fell into a river and drowned.
In the movie, Ophelia does not die. Instead, after realizing that Hamlet's quest for revenge against King Claudius could prove hazardous to her own health — and deducing that she is pregnant with Hamlet's baby — Ophelia fakes her drowning death.
While she lives in the same patriarchal society that demands that she subjugate herself to her father and her brother until she is married, Ophelia has fallen in love with Prince Hamlet. There is strong evidence that she has even had sexual relations with him.
Suddenly, the funeral procession for Ophelia enters the churchyard, including Claudius, Gertrude, Laertes, and many mourning courtiers. Hamlet, wondering who has died, notices that the funeral rites seem “maimed,” indicating that the dead man or woman took his or her own life (V.i.242).
Tragic flaw: Ophelia has no control over her mind, body, and relationships, she doesn't think for herself.
Naomi Watts plays Gertrude and Mechtild, and the two characters are sisters. Mechtild was considered a witch because she had a miscarriage. The death of her baby was thought to be the work of the devil, and so she was to be burned at the stake. Interestingly, the child was Claudius'.
As he has lost his faith in his beloved mother, he loses his faith in Ophelia because she is the other woman he loves.
Such an unforgiving attitude towards suicide might be the reason why Shakespeare never confirms exactly how Ophelia dies. We know that she drowns, but since her death takes place offstage it is unclear whether her final actions are accidental or intentional.
Turns out Ophelia's mom was killed thanks to "being close to the royal family" (Corgi attack, probably), which caused her dad to shut down emotionally.
During their argument Hamlet accidentally kills Polonius, Ophelia's father. Hamlet will not tell anyone where Polonius' body is. Claudius sends him to England but he doesn't arrive. Ophelia's brother, Laertes, comes home and finds Ophelia has gone mad with grief.
Ophelia uses flowers as symbols of her deep sorrow and grief. She is very upset because her father, Polonius, has just been killed by Hamlet. Being a sensitive and intelligent young woman, Ophelia needs to express herself, and she does so by passing out flowers to the court in her seeming mad state of mind.
On top of this, Hamlet, who Ophelia loved, was also the perpetrator of her father's death. These events eventually lead for Ophelia to commit suicide, who Hamlet grieves over and feels guilty, regretting what he said of not loving her and killing her father.
Ophelia is Polonius' daughter and Laertes' sister. Hamlet has been in love with her for a while before the play starts and has given her several gifts during their courtship until her father warns her away from him and tells her not to see him anymore.