Gertrude from Hamlet

How would you feel if your mother chose your murderous uncle over you? Gertrude puts away all her motherly instincts to improve her relationship with Claudius. She also needs Claudius as a supporter otherwise; the kingdom would most likely fall apart. If Gertrude knew about the plan to kill her son Hamlet, she would have ruined it. It is shown throughout the story how weak and evil Gertrude really is. She is no mother to Hamlet, she is just someone who she gives orders to.
Prince Hamlet appears in the play dressed in all black. Gertrude disturbed by this look and requests him to do the following “Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off, and let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. Do not for ever with thy vailed lids seek for thy noble father in the dust: thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity.” Gertrude obviously considers her son’s dejection to result from his father’s demise. She joins in with Claudius in requesting Hamlet’s stay in Elsinore rather than returning to Wittenberg to study. Respectfully the son replies, “I shall in all my best obey you, madam.” Right then the audience notes a good relationship between Gertrude and those about her in the play, even though Hamlet’s “suit of mourning has been a visible and public protest against the royal marriage, a protest in which he is completely alone, and in which he has hurt his mother”.
Hamlet’s first soliloquy expresses his anger at the quickness of his mother’s marriage to Claudius, and the act of incest committed since it is between family: “Frailty, thy name is woman!” When the ghost talks privately to Hamlet, he learns not only about the murder of his father, but also about the unfaithfulness and adultery of his mother. Gertrude was seduced by “that incestuous, that adulterate beast, with witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts” – Claudius himself – prior to his brother’s passing. “So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd, will sate itself in a celestial bed, and prey on garbage.” This revelation shows Gertrude’s complex temperament and motivation and renders her much more rounded in the dramatist’s development of her. The ghost recommends to Hamlet to disregard revenge on Gertrude: “Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive against thy mother aught,” and to leave her “To those thorns that in her bosom lodge, to prick and sting her.” Hamlet, in order to more safely carry out his new duty of killing the king, assumes an “antic disposition” as a disguise for his actions.
Gertrude has a contrasting character in the person of Ophelia, who is the picture of purity and innocence. Ophelia obeys her very morally and socially conservative father, Polonius, in every detail, even to the extent of giving him her love-letters from Hamlet; unlike Gertrude, who brazenly violates her marriage vow. Then she breaks social conventions in marrying within a month of her first husband’s funeral, and in incestuously marrying her husband’s brother. Though Gertrude and Ophelia contrast morally, they are close socially; the queen confides in Ophelia: “And for your part, Ophelia, I do wish that your good beauties be the happy cause of Hamlet’s wildness.” Gertrude shares the duties of state with her husband, presiding alongside Claudius before visiting dignitaries and regarding the humdrum daily activities like Hamlet’s courtship of Ophelia. When Polonius and Claudius intend to spy on Hamlet and Ophelia, the king asks Gertrude to leave, and she responds, “I will obey you,” as if she did not have to comply if she didn’t feel like it. So it would seem that the queen actually shares the royal power with the king.
Gertrude reports to Claudius on Hamlet’s killing of Polonius – reportedly due to his madness – thus keeping her word to her son. Immediately Claudius plots the death of Hamlet in England, about which Gertrude has no knowledge. When Claudius and Laertes plotted to kill him with poisoned sword and poisoned drink it was a direct contradiction of Gertrude’s love for him. When in the graveyard during Ophelia’s burial, Hamlet argues with Laertes in her grave, meanwhile convincing his mother that he is mad, in a fit. She maintains that: “This is mere madness, and thus awhile the fit will work on him. Anon, as patient as the female dove, when that her golden couplets are disclosed, his silence will sit drooping.” As the climax approaches, Osric invites Hamlet to a rapier contest with Laertes. During the match Gertrude drinks from the cup poisoned by the king to kill Hamlet. As she dies, she speaks, “The drink, the drink! I am poisoned,” which words motivate Laertes to confess that the king is behind the massacre. Thus he dies by Hamlet’s hand. Then Hamlet and Laertes die, wounded by the poisoned sword meant for Hamlet. Thus, once again, Gertrude is pivotal and crucial character for plot de