Aayushi International Interdisciplinary Research Journal (AIIRJ)
UGC Approved [Link].64259
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Role of women in Shakespeare’s Tragedies : Character study of Gertrude from
Hamlet and Lady Macbeth from Macbeth.
Mr. B. N. Hiramani
Assit. Prof.
Department of English
S.P.K. Mahavidyalaya,
Sawantwadi.
Abstract –
William Shakespeare, the dramatist of all the ages and world occupied dramatist and poet
belonged to the later part of 16th century and the early part of 17th century has a big influence on the
world drama. He in terms of his life and his literary work, is the most written about author in the
history of western civilization. His literary production includes 38 plays, 154 sonnets and 2 long
narrative poems. The first critical writing on Shakespeare was published after his death in 1623 by
his two acting companions. Ever since then the works of Shakespeare have been studies, analyzed,
interpreted and enjoyed as some of the finest masterpieces of the English language. Shakespeare’s
plays are but the presentation of philosophy of human life. His plays are about the relationships
between men and women. Such a world dramatist has written near about nine tragedies in where
women, he presented in a different angle, particularly, from negative side. The above mentioned two
women are very important women from two tragedies viz, Hamlet and Macbeth, who are responsible
for the tragedy of the two heroes Prince Hamlet and Macbeth. Gertrude and Lady Macbeth play the
role of villain in their own life and the life of the tragic heroes.
Key Words :- Tragedy, Woman psychology,adultery, ambition .
The present paper will attempt to know the two important women who are the root causes of
the tragedy of the two tragic heroes, Hamlet and Macbeth, the two towering persons as Hamlet was
the Prince of Denmark and Macbeth was the velour‟s velour, the Chief of the Scottish Army. The
attempt is made to explore the psychology of these two women and their particular role in the tragedy
of the two heroes and consequently the tragedy of their own. William Shakespeare, the psychologist,
the master of human psychology the most learned man in the field of human mind has tried to present
human psychology in his four world famous tragedies. He has written total 38 plays, but Shakespeare
as a dramatist is known to the world for his four tragedies, though the other remaining plays are
equally famous or important. They are Hamlet Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth. All are the
exceptional personalities of their time. As Hamlet, was student of philosophy, a gentleman, calm and
very simple who did not believe that the world is occupied by such immoral and cruel people. Even he
does not think that there are people in this world who behave in such a inhuman and unnatural way.
He is the young man who believes in the people and the things as they appear, very innocent and
simple in thinking. He is the Prince of Denmark, the responsibility which comes on his shoulders in a
very early age. The next is Othello, the Military General, a black moor acquires the high position in
Army only with the help of his merit, his talent and his abilities. Othello deserves to his position and
status which he gets. King Lear, the next tragic hero produced by Shakespeare, is the King of Britain,
„every inch a king‟, at the age of 80 he was ably ruling his kingdom with a competence. Macbeth, the
Chief of Scottish Army is also such a brave soldier, the King‟s most trusted Army officer, who does
not know defeat in war, is always victorious. But very surprisingly these all exceptional persons meet
such a horrible tragedies in their personal life. The question arises that how and why such powerful
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and towering personalities got ruined and met such a horrible tragedy, that no common man can also
meet such a tragedy. Some students and scholars on Shakespeare has tried to answer saying that,
„character is destiny‟. According to them Shakespeare‟s heroes are responsible for their tragedies,
they are the sculptors of their own sculpture of tragedy, though the answer is right there is something
hidden behind the truth, the truth of character is destiny. The another truth is that of women who are
responsible for the tragedies of those all tragic heroes from the four famous tragedies by Shakespeare.
The women are the causes of the ruin of these heroes, when especially we look into the two women
characters, Gertrude and Lady Macbeth, though they are different from each other, are the main
causes of the tragedies of the tragic heroes. It is said that behind every successful man there is a
woman may be a wife, mother or any and it is absolutely true but here in these two plays, in the life of
the two heroes, there are women behind their complete ruin.
Tragedy in a very simple term is a serious play, in where there is suffering, torture both
physical and mental and at last the death of a hero of the play or the death both hero and heroine.
When we apply this meaning to Shakespeare‟s tragedies then, his tragedies are of higher, exceptional
suffering and there is a death of a sufferer. Shakespeare‟s idea of the tragic fact is larger. Tragedy
with Shakespeare is concerned always with persons of high degrees often with Kings or Princes, if not
with leaders in the state like Coriolanus, Brutus, Antony at the least as Romeo and Juliet with
members of great houses, whose quarrels are of public moment. Othello himself is no were private
person; he is the General of the Republic. At the beginning, we see him in the Council – Chamber of
the Senate. Hamlet is the Prince of Denmark, King Lear is the King of Britain, Macbeth is the chief of
Scottish Army. A Shakespearean tragedy as so far considered may be called a story of exceptional
calamity leading to the death of a man of high status or position. The calamities of tragedy do not
simply happen, nor are they sent; they proceed mainly from actions, and these the action of men. In
this tragic world, where individuals however grant they may be and however decisive their actions
may appear, are so evidently not the ultimate power. The tragic world is a world of action, and action
is the translation of thought into reality. We see men and women confidently attempting it. They
strike into the existing order of things in pursuance of their ideas. But what they achieve is not what
they intended. So is found in the Shakespeare tragedies. Here one thing to be noted is that though
Shakespeare heroes are exceptional, they have some drawbacks also and the women exploited the
shortcomings of the heroes. The women play very crucial part in the tragedies of Shakespeare,
particularly Hamlet and Macbeth.
Character Study of Gertrude:
Women as intelligent, Machiavellian, and independent as Gertrude will also be portrayed,
According to Pragati Das, “Gertrude is, more than any other character in the play, the antithesis of her
son, Hamlet. Hamlet is a scholar and a philosopher, searching for life‟s most elusive answers. He
cares nothing for this “mortal coil” and the vices to which man has become slave. Gertrude is shallow,
and thinks only about her body and external pleasures. Like a child she longs to be delighted.
Gertrude is also a very sexual being, and it is her sexuality that turns Hamlet so violently against her”.
Gertrude, is the antithesis of Ophelia. In contrast with Ophelia‟s personality, Gertrude is a very
Machiavellian and powerful woman. The fact that she married to her husband‟s brother only two
months after her former husband‟s death, shows her adultery and the importance that power has for
Gertrude. In spite of being somehow in the shadows, she rules the kingdom at the same level as King
Claudius. She wants to preserve the crown. Hamlet seems to be the only character who notices that
and accuses her of being insensible, of being a stone. Hamlet makes a good analysis of Gertrude‟s
personality and he refers to her as a corrupted and sinful character. He says, „Frailty is thy name of
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woman.‟ He further unable to trust in woman. Her sexuality is also very present in the play. Hamlet
makes references to her lascivious personality, comparing her to a person with an animal instinct, not
human. The fact that Gertrude as a maternal figure behaves in that sinful manner, affect the vision
Hamlet has about women. There is a rejection because of the loss of confidence due to the events
Gertrude is involve in: the passivity in the death of Hamlet‟s father, as Gertrude poisons her own
husband, the coronation of his uncle Claudius as King and the marriage with Gertrude. These all
aspects of her personality and mind are the causes of the tragedy of Hamlet.
Character study of Lady Macbeth:
Introducing the three witches in the play is an approach of how they aligned with Lady
Macbeth in Macbeth‟s fate. According to Robert Mighall‟s statement in his introduction to Macbeth,
“If the sisters hook Macbeth with their riddling, Lady Macbeth reels him in with her reasoning and
ridicule.” And as maintained by Mighall “The way Lady Macbeth completes the weird sisters‟ work
has encouraged her to be considered almost the fourth of their member”. Further, according to some
scholars, such as Daniel Albright, “Lady Macbeth is associated with the witches; and like the witches,
who sound sometimes tame and frivolous, sometimes like incarnations of supernatural evil; Lady
Macbeth hovers insecurely between roles: she is a hybrid of ambitious wife and agent of hell”. Unlike
Lady Macbeth, whose power and dominance dismiss, the witches‟ influence permeates in the entire
play and they continue to create chaos and disorder through out to the very end.
From the moment in which the witches announce to Macbeth the three prophecies, Macbeth
becomes entirely reliant on the words of the Weird Sisters. They predict he will be Thane of Glamis,
then Thane of Cawdor but the last shocks him the most “all hail Macbeth, that shalt be King
hereafter” Thereby, to accomplish his desire he sent a letter to Lady Macbeth, addressing the three
witches‟ prophecies. If Macbeth would have not sent the letter to his wife, the plan had not been
accomplished. The witches‟ role in Macbeth is like the ghost in Hamlet, they incite Lady Macbeth
into scruple mind, no matter whether the path is good or evil. Throughout the play, Shakespeare offers
to the reader an insight into Lady Macbeth‟s character, at first glimpse, when receiving Macbeth‟s
letter, she demonstrates an ability to control Macbeth, and holds an acknowledged degree of power
over her husband. The letter that Macbeth sent to his wife, explores the greatest level of choice that
she has.
“Hail, king that shalt be!
This have I thought good to deliver thee,
My dearest partner of greatness,
Though mightiest not lose the dues of rejoicing,
by being ignorant of what greatness is promised thee,
Lay it to thy heart, and farewell.” (Macbeth. Act I, scene V)
Shortly, after reading the letter, and before Macbeth‟s arrival, she invokes supernatural spirit,
demanding the forces of evil to free her of gender, doing this; she admits to evoke a strong sense of
evil, witch-like. Thereby, she accepts a more masculine identity into her life, in order to convince her
husband, and to fulfil her desire of being queen. She renounces to womanly love for the spirit murder.
And ultimately, that is going to be lady Macbeth‟s tragedy later:
Adelman points out that, The figure of Lady Macbeth is a representation of primitive fear
about man identity and autonomy itself, about those looming female presence who threaten to control
one‟s actions and one‟s mind” She says,
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“Infirm of purpose!
Give me the daggers. The sleeping and the dead.
Are but pictures; it‟s the eye of childhood
That fears of painted devil”. (Macbeth Act II, Scene ii)
In other words, Macbeth is essentially a struggle between a world of influential maternal and
female power. Macbeth comes under the control of Lady Macbeth and that leads him to his ultimate
tragedy. Her obsession and ambition to be queen are the motives of her deterioration. She falls into
periods of lunacy and sleepwalking, asserting this argument, Coriat Isador‟s Lady Macbeth Hysteria,
introduces Coleridge‟s Statement: “She mistakes the courage of fantasy for the power of bearing the
consequences of the reality of guilt. Hers is the mock fortitude of a mind deluded by ambition, she
shames her husband with a superhuman audacity fancy which she cannot support, but sinks in the
season of remorse and died in suicidal agony.”
Nonetheless, the psychological aspect of Lady Macbeth as Coriat emphasizes starts in the first
soliloquy “ The first soliloquy is remarkable, it is her first dream of ambition, so strong and
dominating, that she believes she possess what really she does not possessnamely, brave, it is this
imaginary wish fulfillment to be the queen which later causes the hysterical dissociation.” She
becomes dominated by fixed ideas that later will cause her sleepwalking, or according to some
scholars somnambulism. The idea of gaining sovereignty and power were set in her mind in an
uncontrollable impulse.
After the deed is done and Duncan is murdered, there arises the first mental dissociation and
suicide. Her fear horror has become so terrible, and according, to Coriat “She shrinks from the guilty
secret, and here enters the first element of mechanism which leads to her hysterical dissociation”.
Despite the fact that she apparently comforts Macbeth‟s fear, she prefers to repress her
emotions. The overall occurrences of keeping the murderer and the wish to become the mother of the
nation, Coriat claims that “here coincides with terror and excitement”. The most striking scene,
where Shakespeare excelled at depicting the mental state of Lady Macbeth, is the sleepwalking,
namely, a case of hysterical somnambulism. Once again Coriat attributed this to the predetermined by
the existing, suppressed complexes. The first complex is linked to the murder of Duncan,
demonstrating in the washing of the hands “a little water clears us of the deed.” (Macbeth. Act II,
scene II). As she sleepwalks, she says, “ All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand”
(Macbeth Act V, Scene I); here Lady Macbeth is confused, she is mixing feminine image with the
crime she committed, and the two things together appear as a symptom of her madness and decline.
The second complex is associated to the murder of Banquo “I tell you yet again, Banquo‟s buried; he
cannot come out of his grave”. (Macbeth Act v, scene I) in short, this scene shows the mental
collapse of Lady Macbeth and everything that drives her is about her obsession of becoming queen,
and gaining the highest womanly post. She is forced into acquiring more power, in order to raise her
status, because she is living in a time, where women cannot have authority, and she has to do it
through her husband, Macbeth.
Conclusion :
William Shakespeare who gives a new meaning to the term tragedy as he did not copy of his
predecessor, made a new concept of tragedy in where he made his heroes of tragedy responsible for
their own downfall or ruin. But at the same time he presented women in tragedies from a very
negative side. As the women play the role of villains in the life of their own men and are the causes
of the tragedies of the such an exceptional persons like Hamlet and Macbeth. It is the adultery of
Gertrude witch ruined the life of her son, Prince Hamlet If she could not have such illicit relationship
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with her own brother- in- law Claudius, the next tragedy would not happed. In the same way, Lady
Macbeth‟s over ambition to become a queen of Scotland, she forced her husband Macbeth, the
velour‟s valor to do such an unhuman and unnatural deed. This the above mentioned two women are
the causes of the tragedy of the two towering personalities. Their role in the tragedy of the two heroes
could not be ignored.
References:
1. Adelman, Janet. Suffocating Mothers: Fantasies of Maternal Origin in Shakespeare’s plays. Routledge,
1992.
2. Bradley, A. C. Shakespearean Tragedy. (1966). New York: St. Martin‟s Press.
3. Coriat, Isador. H. Lady Macbeth Hysteria. New York, Mufat, Yard and Company, 1919.
4. Bloom, H. Shakespeare: The invention of human. New York: Riverhead Books.
5. Naranjo, F. H, Cejas, E. L, Rodriguez, M. R. The role of women in Shakespeare‟s Tragedies.
6. Wilson, J. D. Hamlet Cambridge University Press Edited.
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