Hamlet's View Of Women In Hamlet Essay

The play “Hamlet” was written in the late 16th Century, where women were mainly housewives. In the play, Shakespeare writes about Hamlet who loves Ophelia but with the situation that he is in, his perspective on everything and everyone changes, especially his thoughts on women. He believes that the only thing women want is not love, but sexual interaction. There are many things that cause his behavior: his mother 's marriage, Ophelia rejecting him, and his father’s murder. Although Hamlet loved Ophelia and Gertrude before his fathers died, the way Hamlet behaves towards them afterwards shows that the circumstances impacted negatively on his view of women. After his father’s death, Hamlet’s thoughts on everything changed. He thought that life …show more content…
In the scene of Gertrude’s closet, he finally explains to Gertrude why he is upset and his thoughts of her. “You cannot call it love, for at your age/ The hey-day in the blood is tame, it’s humble,/ And waits upon the judgment: and what judgment/ Would step from this to this” (3.4.69-72)? In this scene, Hamlet is comparing Claudius to King Hamlet. In Hamlet’s eyes, Claudius is dirt compared to his father. He is asking his mother, how could she go from something so great to something so horrible? This is the first time that Hamlet actually tells Gertrude what is bothering him and why he is acting so harshly. Hamlet believes that his mother is only married to Claudius for sexual purposes. Many would say that Hamlet had the right to be upset with his mother, however in defense of Gertrude, she did not know that her marriage was what disturbed her son so much. She says, “Thou turn’st my eyes into my very souls,/ And there I see such black and grained spots” (3.4.90-91). She finally realizes her mistake that she has made. She married Claudius because she wanted to calm things down in Denmark and give the people something happy to focus on, rather than the death of their beloved king. What happened behind closed doors between Gertrude and Claudius is not mentioned in the play, however when they were in public, they were proper. They never showed signs of sex appeal. Gertrude was always …show more content…
Hamlet was emotions were very unstable and he believed so strongly that the world was out to get him. The way he treats Ophelia is a way to show that he may be actually mad. After Hamlet speaks with the ghost, he stumbles into Ophelia’s room like a mad man saying how desperate and torn up he is about her rejection. However, this is Hamlet pretending to be crazy. Later on in the play, Hamlet is speaking to Ophelia and figures out that they are being spied on and becomes outraged. He is so quick to call Ophelia such harsh names and speak cruel words, that it makes the reader question whether or not this situation has made Hamlet actually unstable. And then, when they are burying Ophelia into her grave, Hamlet shows up and realizes what has happened. He is so upset and yells “I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers/ Could not, with all their quantity of love/ Make up my sum” (5. 1. 241-243). He jumps into her grave and says he does not know what he will do without her.He is angry with Laertes, because Hamlet solely believes that no one, not even her father or brother, loved Ophelia as much as Hamlet did. He claims his love for her was so grand that Laertes’ love could be multiplied by four thousand and still would not compare. However, earlier in the play, he had been so quick to tell her to go to a whorehouse, how could he possibly love her or