Ophelia is the tragedy within the tragedy—a young woman almost fourteen years old whose only agency is obedience. She lives under the thumb of her father Polonius, who forbids her to see Hamlet, and her brother Laertes, who warns her of the dangers of trusting a prince’s love. When Hamlet, feigning madness, suddenly turns cruel and rejects her, calling her a breeder of sinners and ordering her to a convent, Ophelia has nowhere to go. She cannot defend herself; she can only absorb the blow and obey. Her one act of resistance—returning Hamlet’s tokens of love—is presented to her father as further proof of Hamlet’s instability, not as her own choice.
The play uses Ophelia as bait twice over. Claudius and Polonius hide behind the arras to spy on her encounter with Hamlet, turning her into a trap. When she tries to give back his love tokens and ask what his coldness means, Hamlet viciously attacks her virtue, her sexuality, her very existence as a woman. “Get thee to a nunnery,” he spits—a phrase that contains both cruelty and a kind of sick mercy, as if the only escape for a woman in this corrupt court is to remove herself from it entirely. Ophelia hears what he says. She believes it is directed at her—at her, specifically—as if his madness, real or feigned, has somehow made her responsible for the rot in Denmark.
Her descent into genuine madness, in Act Four, is the play’s most devastating moment. She appears with flowers and fragments of old songs, speaking in half-sentences and images that seem nonsensical until you realize they are about lost virginity, betrayal, and drowning. Her death—whether by accident or design, the text leaves ambiguous—occurs offstage, reported by the Queen in language so beautiful it almost redeems the tragedy. She is buried without full Christian rites because her death was “doubtful,” and her brother Laertes, the only person who ever truly fought for her, leaps into her grave in grief. By then, Hamlet is already unmade by his own burden, and Ophelia becomes the collateral damage of everyone else’s story.
Get thee to a nunnery.
Go to a convent.
Ophelia · Act 3, Scene 1
Hamlet hurls this command at Ophelia, driving her toward despair and, ultimately, madness and death. This line is quoted because it is a turning point—Hamlet's cruelty to an innocent woman in the name of his own trauma. It shows how his legitimate anger at his mother metastasizes into misogyny and violence toward Ophelia.
My lord, I have remembrances of yours That I have longed long to re-deliver. I pray you, now receive them.
My lord, I have some things of yours That I’ve wanted to return to you for a long time. I beg you, please take them back.
Ophelia · Act 3, Scene 1
Ophelia, obeying her father's command, confronts Hamlet with the love letters and gifts he once gave her, asking him to take them back. The line matters because it is the moment Ophelia becomes a tool in the conspiracy against him, and she feels it—her careful politeness barely masks the pain of betraying him. Her attempt to return his love is an act of obedience that will break her mind.
I would fain prove so. But what might you think, When I had seen this hot love on the wing, As I perceiv’d it, I must tell you that, Before my daughter told me, what might you, Or my dear Majesty your queen here, think, If I had play’d the desk or table-book, Or given my heart a winking, mute and dumb, Or look’d upon this love with idle sight, What might you think? No, I went round to work, And my young mistress thus I did bespeak: ‘Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy star. This must not be.’And then I precepts gave her, That she should lock herself from his resort, Admit no messengers, receive no tokens. Which done, she took the fruits of my advice, And he, repulsed,—a short tale to make— Fell into a sadness, then into a fast, Thence to a watch, thence into a weakness, Thence to a lightness, and, by this declension, Into the madness wherein now he raves, And all we wail for.
I want to prove that I am. But what would you think, If I had seen this intense love growing, As I noticed it, I have to tell you that, Before my daughter told me, what would you, Or my dear Queen here, think, If I had acted like a bookkeeper or a record keeper, Or just ignored it and stayed silent, Or just looked at this love without doing anything, What would you think? No, I took action, And this is what I said to my young daughter: ‘Prince Hamlet is far beyond your reach. This cannot happen.’ And then I gave her advice, That she should shut herself off from him, Not let any messengers in, or receive any gifts. After that, she followed my advice, And he, rejected, to keep it short, Fell into a deep sadness, then a fast, Then into a watch, then into weakness, Then into lightness, and, by this decline, Into the madness he is now in, And all of us are mourning.
Ophelia · Act 2, Scene 2
Polonius defends his decision to forbid Ophelia from seeing Hamlet by outlining the cascade of consequences he believes he prevented. The speech stands out because it reveals how authority justifies itself through invented causality—Polonius convinces himself that his control saved his daughter when it actually destroyed her. His certainty about cause and effect becomes a map of the play's tragic logic.
