Misogyny And Patriarchy In Shakespeare's Hamlet

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Hamlet is sexist. In 1603 when Hamlet, by Shakespeare, was originally published it was viewed as an extraordinary piece literature. It depicts the struggles of a young prince, Hamlet, in Denmark whose father, King Hamlet, dies and the prince’s mother gets remarried to the King’s brother about two months after the King’s death. It also depicts the prince’s love affairs with a young woman named Ophelia. The play held great relevance to the cultural and social ideals of society when it was published, but as time progressed Hamlet began to hold less and less relevance in society. Today Hamlet is an over-glorified piece that promotes dated ideas, and is completely irrelevant to the social standards of the United States. The play, Hamlet, has become …show more content…
Hamlet’s cast contains two women, the queen Gertrude and the young woman Ophelia. Ophelia appears in five out of the twenty scenes, most of which portray “Ophelia [as] a victim - a young girl without a voice or power” (Williams 2). She is seen as an object, mostly of “Hamlet’s male desire” (Showalter 1). This is even more demeaning to women because not only does she not have power or strength to stand up for herself, but Ophelia is objectified. She is considered and viewed as property, a sexualized object belonging to a male. This is teaching the young males of today that it is okay to treat women as though they are worthless and weak, and it is teaching young females that they should be submissive and that they need a male to validate them. Not only is Ophelia viewed as an object but we “…hold up Hamlet as the greatest role of all time, [blinding] ourselves to darker elements of it” (Williams 4), such as the abusive relationship between Hamlet and Ophelia. In one scene Hamlet breaks into Ophelia’s room, taking her “by the wrist and [holding her] hard” (II. i. 87). He then proceeds to stand there staring at her, giving her no explanation as to why he has just broken into her room, and then he leaves. By having the youth read Hamlet we are “smuggling in something very toxic, which licenses awful interactions between men and women in our society today” (Williams 4). We …show more content…
According to the Vanderbilt article “Hamlet expertly does a dance between being traditional and modern theatre, and it does that so well that the audience gets completely engrossed in the writing and character development of Shakespeare’s characters, which have stood the test of time”. Many believe that Shakespeare’s work is truly the greatest of all time. That he perfectly captures personas and portrays them in such a way that it is encapsulating to the reader, but there seems to be a darker truth to it concerning the sexist views and the over-glorification of Hamlet. People believe that shakespeare’s works are so extraordinary that, they are willing to set aside their morals for their own enjoyment and “we get works who immorality makes them unenjoyable as literature unless the reader or spectator temporarily or permanently relaxes his own standards of moral” (Booth 17). Even though it may only be temporary to set aside these morals, over time it is possible to lose them completely and become oblivious to the sexism occurring in the world surrounding them, like when Hamlet’s act became a part of
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