In The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, by William Shakespeare, women are portrayed as ineffectual and impressionable creatures dependent on men for emotional stability. The two women characters in the play, Ophelia and Gertrude, are similar in their weaknesses and frailties. Ophelia’s madness ensues from the loss of her father, who made her choices for her, and from Hamlet’s renouncement of their love. Shakespeare uses Ophelia’s reaction to tragedy to show how women are hysterical and lost without the voice of a man to guide their ....