In the story of Hamlet, Ophelia is an innocent, nave little girl that put too much trust in the men in her life. She is a very young teenager who lost her mother, possibly at birth. She has a father Polonius and a brother Laertes who have gone to great measures to shelter her from the harsh realities of life. She starts off with great potential, having the prince Hamlet as a boyfriend and the hopes of possibly becoming the queen one day. Tragically, the opinions and desires of Polonius and Laertes easily mold this beautiful and simple-minded woman. The willingness to obey her father and broth...

• Word Count: 1081
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

"Crazy" is a word not easily defined. What one person considers abnormal behavior, another might just consider eccentricity. It is difficult to determine when a person has gone from simply acting on impulse and not thinking rationally to truly becoming "mad." This is a subject explored thoroughly in William Shakespeare's play, Hamlet. The plot of the play centers around the supposed madness of its title character, Hamlet, but he is not the only character who displays irrational behavior. Hamlet, Laertes, and Ophelia are all loyal children who exhibit varying degrees of madness after their fath...

• Word Count: 1204
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

Through out the play, Shakespeare uses a number of soliloquies to outline the thoughts and feelings of Hamlet, the plays protagonist. The soliloquies reveal the innermost beliefs of the character and offers an unbiased perspective as it is merely Hamlet talking to the audience, albeit not directly, and not to any other character. Hamlets first soliloquy is delivered in Act 1, Scene 2 as Hamlet struggles to come to terms with the death of his father and the remarriage of his mother to his uncle Claudius. Hamlet is depressed and longs for death, he even considering suicide, "O that this too too ...

• Word Count: 574
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: High School

... try to prove this ambivalence in each chapter as a connecting thread. I will work from the general to the specific. I will start with a general analysis of the topic related to Shakespeare's text. Next I will describe and try to explain the particular elements of Haitink, Hall and Bury's adaptation and ... or not the fairies are allegories or actual beings, either way, they influence the lives of the humans. In Macbeth and Hamlet the supernatural world also affects the human world. Macbeth's foul crimes are inspired, or perhaps even caused, by his encounter with the witches ... could be ...

• Word Count: 9832
• Approx Pages: 39
• Grade Level: High School