Throughout William Shakespeare’s novel Hamlet, he presents characters like Gertrude and Ophelia to highlight the objectification and subjectivity of women set in the Elizabethan era.
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the playwright constantly objectifies women in an attempt to highlight men’s oversexualization of women and their inherited feelings of superiority throughout society. The two main female characters, Ophelia and Gertrude, are oversexualized and objectified throughout the entire play by the male characters.
Gertrude is seen as an incestuous, whore who lacks of care for anyone but herself.. Ophelia, is cast to be a naïve and ultimately clueless girl. Hamlet’s characterization of both of the lead female roles are “Words, feelings, beasts, whoredom are as interchangeable as reasonable and obedience.
That women, grief, words, and the heart should be confused with nature, guilt, and the body, while, filial obedience is equated with noble reason in opposition is what is rotten in denmark.”.
He uses whore to describe the actions she has done. Gertrude’s has sexual appetite.. The word woman connotes to “women”, “grief”, “body”, and “nature” thus them being sexualized and inferior.
Throughout the play, Hamlet is often seen as being overly interested in Gertrude’s sexual relationships. The main example of the fascination he shows is the incestuous relationship between Gertrude and Claudius.
Hamlet states his disgust when he says, “Nay, but to live/ In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed/ Stewed in corruption, honeying and making loveOver the nasty sty….” (Shakespeare III.iv.92). Hamlet’s assumed fascination with Gertrude’s sexual behavior is consistent after the death of his father and he tells Gertrude to discontinue sexual relations with him.
Due to his disgust for his mother’s actions, he develops the same attitude with all women, “Here figured as the unweeded garden of Gertrude’s sexual appetite, the incestuous ‘dexterity’ of the queen which indeed occupies the core of Hamlet’s being and denotes him truly, as a generalized sign of the bestial inconsistency of all womankind”.
Hamlet’s thoughts about his mother and the grief of his father’s death is being overshadowed by Gertrude’s “sexual appetite” and he is distracted by gertrudes sexual desires. Women are being acknowledged as “bestial” or animal-like and the attitude Hamlet feels for his mother’s actions highlights the power of opinion men have in a patriarchal society.
Gertrude’s sexual appetite can be attributed to her appeal for power. Her quick marriage to Claudius exemplifies her lust for power. Gertrude “ has outgrown the ‘heyday’ of her libido, signified here by “blood” which is regarded as the seat or symbol of erotic energy, and which has become ‘tame’ and ‘humble’. (Levin 307).
Her sexual desires quickly shift after the death of her husband and onto Claudius. Her sex drive between kings stems from a position for power.
Hamlet offers his opinion about her lust when he says, “Such an act/That blurs the grace and blush of modesty,/ Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose/ From the fair forehead of an innocent love/ And sets a blister there, makes marriage vows/ As false as dicers’ oaths—oh, such a deed” (Shakespeare III.iv.42).
Hamlet shames gertrude for moving on by taking something innocent like a flower and turning it into a blemish, something that her act has done. He accuses Gertrude of not being faithful to her husband or the marriage vows. Gertrude betrayed her husband by re-marrying very quickly.
Gertrude proves this herself by saying that the meat still hasn’t gone bad from King Hamlet’s funeral. “The funeral baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables.” (Shakespeare I.ii.180-181). In Hamlet’s sadness over his father’s death, Gertrude does little to comfort him.
Gertrude minimizes Hamlet’s feelings and sides with Claudius. Shakespeare does an effective job in painting a picture of Gertrude as a bad mother practically using her son as a ploy.. The way Gertrude acts results in Hamlet’s full disgust and distrust in women.
Hamlet shows is disgust when he says “Why, she would hang on him/ As if increase of appetite had grown/By what it fed on, and yet, within a month—/ Let me not think on ’t. Frailty, thy name is woman!—/ Would have mourned longer!—married with my uncle,/ The way Gertrude acts results in Hamlet’s misogyny towards women.” (Shakespeare i.ii.146).
Women are expected to be frail when they are around men. Hamlet viewing women as weak. Gertrude was married to Hamlet’s uncle within a month of getting with him. The author implies that an animal probably would have mourned longer than Gertrude had.. Hamlet is shaming Gertrude for moving on so fast instead of mourning his father longer.
The distrust Hamlet gets from an experience with his mother sparks misogyny and subjectivity for all other women he encounters. In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the playwright constantly objectifies women in an attempt to highlight men’s oversexualization of women and their inherited feelings of superiority throughout society.
The role of women in Hamlet is nothing short of misogynistic and subjective which coincides with that of the society of the time. Unfortunately, these same chauvinist values remain embedded into modern day which catalyzes the subjective nature many men still address women.
The men’s constant oversexualization and objectivity highlights the chauvinist injustices that parallel still in today’s society that women are still seen as inferior to men.
