ld be is uncertain. The climax of Ophelia’s story is by far, her tragic and romantic suicide. She had “fell in the weeping brook...till that her garments, heavy with their drink, pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay to muddy death.”(4.7,176-184) She died among her flowers, among “crowflowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples”(4.7,170), a portrait of innocence lost, of romance and love forgotten, of torn soul and broken heart. Daisies are the symbols of innocence, for this once innocent girl grew up and in doing so she had lost all sanity. Gertrude woefully describes her death, yet this romantic suicide seems to fit her perfectly, for even in death, she was a beauteous creature.Yet, the drama did not end in suicide. A hasty burial in hallowed ground was her fate, Laertes worrying about the ceremony being too short, as if she had not received enough blessing and preparation for the afterlife. Gertrude mentions how she would’ve loved if she had married Hamlet, maybe an act of grief and politeness at death, but still, the irony remains. Hamlet ruins his cover and cries about how much he had loved her, yet if he had loved her so much in life why did he treat her so badly? All of the characters seem to twinge with guilt at this untimely death, as though they know that they had been responsible for this tragedy in part. “When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions.”(4.5, 79-80) For Ophelia, this statement rings true even after death. None of the events that made her go insane were because of her own faults; she had be the good, innocent, virginal young maid. She was abused, mentally and sometimes physically, by every single character in the play. Yet, by no fault of her own, she got caught up in the selfish acts of others. These selfish acts victimized this sweet maid, leading her to her untimely death. ...
