acts which show the audience first hand that she is not in the right frame of mind. The audience is not told by any of the characters that Ophelia is mad. Shakespeare leaves it up to the audience to discover that her behavior is irrational. Thus, the audience is unmistakably convinced who is really "missing a few screws."An example of Ophilia's irrational behaviors is the scene with the queen. Here, there's more to Ophilia's words and behavior than meets the eye. She thinks that she is delivering some kind of a message to the queen. Her speeches are long, making it seem like she is talking to the queen as one woman that has lost something special would to another. What she goes on to say, as the king enters, is of different subjects, hinting at different ideas, asking philosophical questions. She sings of flowers and of how cold her father's grave is, giving an unmistakable impression that her sanity has followed her father into his grave.Ophelia was a pawn, nothing more, which was used by those that supposedly loved her for their own purposes. She was used by her father to drive Hamlet to madness, as he thought. Hamlet used her to convince Polonius and others that he was mad. Ophelia eventually looses both of these men, which is what drives her to insanity, possibly because the two biggest "influences" of her life have disappeared.This is how Shakespeare used madness to show the differences between Ophelia and Hamlet. He showed brilliantly and skillfully true insanity and faking. Hamlet had a very brilliant plot of avenging his father, which certainly worked, though, surely, Hamlet wasn't planning on so many deaths. The careful, skillful setup of the plot of this play truly expresses Shakespeare's genius!...
