Title:Aggressive and Passive. Compare characters in the Handmaid's Tail between Hamlet. Offred is aggressive while Ophelia is passive

Aggressive and Passive

Aggressive and Passive are two inverse attitudes to things, events or life. They cause different results. Offred and Ophelia are two women who have contrary destinies because of their different attitudes.

Offred is a powerless woman in "the Handmaid's Tale". She's a handmaid of a commander in Gilead. She has no freedom. She belongs to him as a property. Her only duty is to have sex with the commander and give birth to a baby. Ophelia is also a weak woman in "Hamlet" play. She has no power over anybody. But their fates in the end are quite different. Offred succeeds in escaping from the dystopian socityGilead, while Ophelia dies of drown. Because Offred is affressive but Ophelia is passive.

Offred lives in a society where the women are completely powerless. They are all controlled by the commanders. Even though,Offred finds her power, which is sex. Later, when the time limit for her to get pregnant is approaching(unless she will be sent to the colony), she has sex with another guy--Nick, because the commander couldn't make her pregnant. Though this is forbidden, she does it. She cheats because this is the only way to survive. Offred has her own thinking. She's thingking all the time--Pri-Gilead, Gilead, her family, her friend, the commander...Though she feels sad, numb, she never gives up, she never loses her faith. We can say Offred is aggressive otherwise she won't have sex with Nick. Because of her aggressive attitude, Offred finally runs away from Gilead.

But Ophelia is totally different. She's powerless, too. But she never behaves like Offred. She doesn't use her mind. She doesn't do much thinking. She just obey whatever people tell her to do. She loves Hamlet and she knows Hamlet really loves her. But when her father tells her that Hamlet is not serious and asks her to stay away from Hamlet, she listens to her father though she's sad. She doesn't try to explain, to persuade or to prove. She just obeys her father. So does she to her brother. So when she's told that Hamlet has never loved her before and her father is killed by Hmalet by mistake, she went insane. Ophelia is passive already. Unfortunately all the bad things just happen to her, which makes tragedy of Ophelia sadder. If she's much more aggesive, things might be different.

In general, aggressive and passive, these two attitudes will surely make the things different. No matter how powerless you are, how frustrated you are, how unlucky you are, you should be like Offred, don't give up, be aggressive. Don't copy Ophelia, you will see the result is different.