Ophelia's drowning is the consummate representation of an eternal retreat into the feminine, trading an individual voice for eternal silence in union with feminine essence. In turn, her death expresses the danger of reducing an individual to his or her gender and disregarding the voice of the marginalized.
Grief-stricken and outraged, Hamlet bursts upon the company, declaring in agonized fury his own love for Ophelia. He leaps into the grave and fights with Laertes, saying that “forty thousand brothers / Could not, with all their quantity of love, / make up my sum” (V.i.254–256).
Ophelia's character is important in the story because she represents femininity, and Hamlet is able to act out his aggression towards his mother on Ophelia. Although she is really a naïve and innocent girl, Hamlet believes all women are manipulative and use their feminine nature to take advantage of men.
Ophelia's death symbolizes a life spent passively tolerating Hamlet's manipulations and the restrictions imposed by those around her, while struggling to maintain the last shred of her dignity.
She died because of her virtues, while others perished because of their faults. She did nothing wrong, but so many wrongs were dealt to her. Therefore, it was these factors, especially the loss of her father, which caused her to become mad and seen as a tragic figure.
Tragic flaw: Ophelia has no control over her mind, body, and relationships, she doesn't think for herself.
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. RALPH: Gertrude describes how her clothing spread out over the surface of the water, keeping her afloat for a moment, while she sang songs of praise, or perhaps hymns.
It is likely that Hamlet really was in love with Ophelia. Readers know Hamlet wrote love letters to Ophelia because she shows them to Polonius. In addition, Hamlet tells Ophelia, “I did love you once” (3.1. 117).
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.
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.
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.
Ophelia has limited opportunities as a woman in a patriarchal society and this is what separates her from Hamlet, who has the freedom to change his own fate. Ophelia needs to be obedient and is not allowed to express herself and her true feelings.
By this point, Ophelia would be well aware of her pregnancy, and well aware that she would soon begin to show outward signs of it.
Why is Hamlet shocked by Ophelia's funeral in Act 5, Scene 1? He is astonished that the priest will not honor her with full rites. He is devastated by her death and stunned to see physical proof of his loss. He is enraged to see Claudius mourning when ultimately he caused her death.
Her death is "doubtful" (V. L227) because she is as bereft of motivation as she dies as is the infant being baptized. Whatever "intention" leads to her drowning, the church seems to rule that she has "Too much of water" (IV. vii.
Shortly after his return, Ophelia is found dead by the cause of drowning. Laertes believes Hamlet is to blame not only for his father's death, but also for Ophelia's death because the death of her father is ultimately what drove her to killing herself.
So she has resolved that at the moment of informing Laertes of the sad event she must urge that it was purely accidental, while to lessen the bitterness of it she will assure him that the death was painless, Ophelia's mind having too far gone for her to feel 'her own distress.
Hamlet acts out against Ophelia as a result of her rejection and denounces all women, showing his insanity. Save your time! Hamlet exhibits his madness to Gertrude when he confronts her about her marriage to Claudius.
Hamlet is at first courteous to Ophelia, but suddenly he turns on her: he denies having loved her, asks where her father is, attacks womankind, and tells her she should enter a nunnery.
Hamlet, Laertes tells Ophelia, is of a higher rank than she and cannot choose with whom he will spend his life. To protect her heart and to safeguard her honor, Laertes asserts that Ophelia should reject Prince Hamlet before he deflowers her.
Ophelia gained the character of an invalid as a result of her insanity, and the intrinsic passivity of her death intensifies her sensuality. She lay still in the water like a mermaid, wearing a flowy white gown, entirely at the mercy of the onlooker's gaze.
While it is evident that Ophelia is grieving over the death of her father, Polonius, as Horatio says of her “She speaks much of her father, says she hears / There's tricks in the world, and hems, and beats her heart” (4.5.
In Act 4 Scene 7, Queen Gertrude reports that Ophelia had climbed into a willow tree (There is a willow grows aslant the brook), and that the branch had broken and dropped Ophelia into the brook, where she drowned.
He has recently died but visits Hamlet as a ghost during the play. Polonius is a counsellor to the new king and queen. He is Ophelia and Laertes' father. Laertes is the only son of Polonius and brother of Ophelia.
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. During the play, he treats her very badly.