Queen Gertrude’s Forbidden Sexual Desires
In Shakespeare's Hamlet, female sexuality may be regarded negatively. Adelman, for example,
links female sexuality to Hamlet’s view of his mother’s sexuality. Gertrude’s is the only fully
sexualized female body in the play, and we experience her sexuality largely through the
imagination of her son. I disagree with this assumption and think that the idea of female
sexuality should not be seen as a threat to society, but rather a normal part of life. In other words,
the idea of female sexuality should be seen as a common part of life because not only do men
acquire sexual desire, but women do too. And women should not be penalized for this, because
we should be treated as men’s equals in expressing sexuality. Why shouldn't women have the
same right as men to reveal their sexual preferences? In fact, I feel like female sexuality should
be regarded positively in Hamlet’s society and celebrated relatively more freely in the play,
equivalent to how males regard their sexuality. I feel like female sexuality should be more
accepted in not only literary works, but also in plays like Hamlet, as well as in society today. In
addition, the Freudian psychological theories aid us in understanding further the female sexuality
of certain characters in play. Expressing female sexuality correlates with self-esteem,
personality, values, and attitudes of the subconscious of the individual. Gertrude’s sexuality is
said by Adelman to be a basic foundation of Hamlet’s identity formation, but I will argue
against that belief. I’m critiquing how Adelman reduces Gertrude to a function of Hamlet’s
psychology. I will argue instead that Gertrude’s sexuality is not directly related to Hamlet’s
identity formation. I want to treat Gertrude as a character in her own right and to do this; I will
take stock of Gertrude’s role in the play, looking at scenes where she appears.
Hamlet's character dives into his psychology and reveals more Freudian ideas, like the repression
of memories. These repressed memories are regarding his parent's sexual tendencies, mainly
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focusing on his mother's. According to Freud, Hamlet delays his revenge for his father’s death
because his uncle has only carried out a murder that he himself wanted to accomplish (Freud,
916). And since he therefore desires his mother, he really is not romantically involved with
Ophelia. Gertrude’s sexuality is a separate entity from his unconscious desires. Along with
certain psychological beliefs and theories, there come certain accepted assumptions. Placing the
blame for Hamlet’s madness on his mother is ridiculous--how can Adelman blame Gertrude's
sexuality for Hamlet's madness? Gertrude’s sexuality cannot directly cause Hamlet’s madness or
Hamlet’s father’s death. There has to be some kind of third variable or extraneous variables
involved.
Adelman notices that the character of Gertrude in Hamlet is portrayed as a garden full of weeds
by Hamlet. Her metaphor for Gertrude’s sexuality portrayed negatively. But the character of
Gertrude is really not Eve nor is she really in the Garden of Eden. Gertrude does not share
enough characteristics with Eve to be compared to her so much as to make a metaphor. Gertrude
should have the opportunity to express her free will, pertaining to her potential to express her
female sexuality. Why should her sexuality be a crime committed—when it’s only a natural
reaction of the female body? As Lucianus carries the poison onstage in the Player’s play, “The
Murder of Gonzalo,” he addressed it in terms that associate it unmistakingly with the weed of
that first unweeded garden and paints the picture of female sexuality as a sin:
Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,
With Hecates ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,
Thy natural magic and dire property
On wholesome life usurps immediately. (3.2.251-54)
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The garden is full of weeds, similar to the first unweeded Garden of Eden in that everything is
growing wildly and sporadically. The seeds spread in the wind, bearing future offspring, like
poison spreading through the veins. Hamlet is attempting to warn Gertrude to stop sleeping with
Claudius because if she doesn’t, it will make her sins (incest) even "ranker" than they already
are. Hamlet's talk of "infection” seems to allude to venereal disease. It's as though Hamlet thinks
women are contagious—though in reality, women are not in any way really “contagious.” Even
as we see him poison the Player King, the language the actor uses insists that the poison is not
his but is Gertrude’s, its usurpation on wholesome life derivative not from Claudius's political
ambitions but from the “rank weeds” (3.4.153-54) of Gertrude’s body. Therefore, by claiming
that these “rank weeds” are like poison to Gertrude’s body, her sexuality is like poison, harming
her body and the ones around her. Its “mixture rank” is sexuality itself and the weeds in the
garden are seen as negative aspects of life; just as female sexuality is shed in a negative light.
Gertrude’s body should not be compared to weeds, but rather blooming flowers of her female
sexuality. Therefore, sexuality should not be regarded as negatively, but rather as a positive way
to feel delight, pleasure, and happiness. Gertrude’s sexuality is not directly linked to Hamlet’s
identity formation. Since the players [actors] are acting under Hamlet’s direction and artistic
representation of the character of Gertrude—his perception of her, which may not be entirely
accurate, his opinions of her don’t treat Gertrude as a person in her own right. Adelman’s
passage above doesn’t treat the character of Gertrude as a person in her own right, which I will
do with the rest of this essay.
Gertrude has some subconscious mechanisms that are dictating her actions. To examine
Gertrude’s subconscious; we will examine the scene where Hamlet confronts her in her bedroom,
where her shell of composure really cracks. This seems like a moment where Gertrude lays bare
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who she really is, where earlier in the play; she seems a bit too composed. It can be shown in the
bedroom chamber scene, that Hamlet disrupts Gertrude enough to set her in a phrase of
melancholia or that it causes a shift in her libido. In the bedroom scene, Hamlet blatantly attacks
his mother, “A bloody deed! almost as bad, good mother, / As kill a king and marry with his
brother,” (3.4.27-9). By ending the sentence with "'brother,” rather than “wife” or “queen,” Hamlet
is shifting the blame from Claudius to his mother, who then becomes the "active murderer.”
Hamlet confronts her mercilessly throughout the scene, and leaves her asking, “What do you
want me to do, Hamlet?” which shows how she has succumbed to his attacks, displays her fear,
as well as vulnerability (3.4.180). The Queen's sexuality, according to Hamlet, and her
remarriage to Claudius, was just as horrible as if she would have committed the murder herself.
But she didn’t commit the murder herself—Hamlet is just accusing her of the crime.
Gertrude has no criminal background history that we are aware of. For this very reason, the
likelihood of Gertrude attempting to commit the murder or aiding Claudius in the process,
decreases since her past record is clean. Therefore, we h ave no reason to blame her for the
murder of her husband or the cause of Hamlet’s madness, much less blame her sexuality for it.
Hamlet is blaming her though, and that’s an important aspect of the text. Just because Gertrude
has sexual desires, does not mean that she used them as an evil weapon to “kill” her husband,
poison the world, herself, or her son. Her sexual desires are not used as a weapon, but rather
more likely used to celebrate life and love with Claudius. I don’t think she directly set out to use
her female sexuality to “ruin the world.” Gertrude’s clean criminal history background provides
some evidence that she would not misuse her female sexuality to hurt her son in any way or his
identity formation.
Gertrude might just be sexually attracted to Claudius just as she had been with Hamlet’s father.
It’s quite possible that she loves Claudius as well as young Hamlet, and is still grieving over her
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dead husband internally. It never states in Hamlet that she does not show internal or external
signs of mourning over her dead husband, therefore we don’t really know whether or not she is
or is not mourning for sure. She could just be mourning internally or psychologically, and not
showing any physical symptoms that Hamlet can notice. There is also no tangible proof that
Gertrude committed adultery before Hamlet’s father died. In addition, Gertrude’s self-esteem
may be raised in marrying Claudius and having him as her companion. This reaction to remarry
may be the result in wanting contact comfort that she lost when Hamlet’s father died and that
New Hamlet was obviously not giving her. She just needed someone to communicate with, relate
to, someone who would listen to her, and understand her thought processes. She may have just
needed someone to confide in, and New Hamlet’s madness was evident evidence to her that he
was not worthy of aiding her in this grieving process. Gertrude, regardless of what people would
say and think of her, married Claudius to preserve her status and power after the fact that she
discovered her husband died. These liberal attitude and values show that she takes on the
responsibility of the Queen’s role: to aide in helping rule the kingdom rightfully. She is therefore
thinking about the others benefit, not just her own, and how they are relying on her to rule the
kingdom with another king companion. She is productive, just takes her job seriously, and wants
to serve their community justly. Gertrude doesn’t want to leave them with an absent ruler,
increasing the chance of societal chaos. Maybe she feels as though she needs a king-like
companion to share the role of responsibility with or support in overcoming her first husband’s
death. Since her husband had died, she now has the right to remarry if she wishes to. Therefore,
since her husband died, maybe Gertrude has lost a sense of herself, and is searching for that lost
part of herself in a sexual relationship with Claudius. Gertrude’s sexuality should not be directly
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linked to Hamlet’s identity formation, but rather concerning a part of Gertrude’s own identity
formation and Claudius’s.
Identities are formed by dealing with sexual relationships psychologically. The common belief in
this time period was that the identity of yourself is correlated to the parents self, and is therefore
rather inescapable. I believe that identities are not only formed by dealing with sexual
relationships psychologically, but also dealing with other kinds of relationships as well. But I
believe that we have the free will to use our creativity to create our own self, our own identity
formation with the help of family and friends. Therefore, Hamlet has the capability to build his
own identity without concerning his mother’s sexuality. Our own self is not predetermined by
just our parents. Our identity formation is not predetermined, but rather subject to change based
on the decisions we make: our past experiences we have experienced, and the people we meet.
Our identity is not solely based on sexual relationships: our sexual relationships don’t entirely
define who we are. Though we may take into account one’s forbidden sexual desires, other
factors of our lives, besides our sex lives may interact with one another to form a substance that
we call our own identity.
Web Cited
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Shakespeare, William, and Susanne Lindgren Wofford. Hamlet: Complete, Authoritative Text
with Biographical and Historical Contexts, Critical History, and Essays from Five Contemporary
Critical Perspectives. Boston: Bedford of St. Martin's, 1994. Print.
Freud, Sigmund. “The Interpretation of Dreams.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism.
Ed. Vincent Leitch. New York: W. W. Norton Company, Inc, 2001. 913-923. Print.
Adelman, Janet. “Man and Wife Is One Flesh”: Hamlet and the Confrontation with the Maternal
Body. A Psychoanalytic Perspective. Psychoanalytic Criticism. Shakespeare, William, and
Susanne Lindgren Wofford. Hamlet: Complete, Authoritative Text with Biographical and
Historical Contexts, Critical History, and Essays from Five Contemporary Critical Perspectives.
Boston: Bedford of St. Martin's, 1994. 256-279. Print.
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