O decesso de violetas em Orquídeas Púrpura: a linguagem e a loucura cultivadas pelas Flores de Ofélia desvendadas à luz da psicanálise.

Abstract

One of the biggest tragedies of the british dramatist William Shakespeare, The tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (1602), presents its paths of interpretation in consonance with psychoanalysis, having been the object of study of revolutionary people of this feud like the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, in particular regarding the homonym main character, Hamlet. For female characters, like Ophelia, the focus is given in order to seek more understanding about Hamlet, conditioning her existence exclusively to this figure (LACAN, 1977). However, would Ophelia in fact be exclusively conditioned to Hamlet, and not to her interactions and relationships with the play’s other characters, even if those interactions present a background about Hamlet? With the intention of undertaking counter-hegemonic efforts to hamletian studies and expanding the studies about Ophelia beyond the scope of symbology of sexuality and desire, this research proposes to analyze the different forms of expression about, for and of Ophelia inside the play, through the psychoanalytic way of analysis of the (un)conscious through an individual’s language, as well as the he effects of this speeches, hers and from the other characters of the play, on their relationships, as well as in her madness. The analysis stands by the postulations and studies regarding madness as whilst a result of diagnosis imposed by an overwhelming (patriarcal) masculine coercive order, stem from philosophy (FOUCAULT, 1975; 2002; MELO; ARAÚJO; COSTA, 2010) and from psychoanalytic feminist criticism (FELMAN, 1975; USSHER, 2011), as well as madness as a particular and individual language (FELMAN, 2003), resulting from the (o)pressions suffered by female gendered individuals (FELMAN, 1975; USSHER, 2011). For the comprehension of the particular and individual languages of madness, studies about the use figures of speech as the expression of elements from the human unconscious were used (GROSZ, 1990; LACAN, 2002; SALES, 2004; CASTRO, 2009; BARROSSO, 2015), and about the standardization of social gender roles (FELMAN, 1975, ZANELLO, 2022). The speeches of the hamletian characters highlight different uses of the figures of speech according to Ophelia’s position inside these speeches as Third, Second or First person of speech. While “Her, Ophelia” and “You, Ophelia”, they are utilized as ways through which the other characters employ their judgements and articulate the imposition of different gender roles attributed to Ophelia. Whilst First person, “I, Ophelia”, however, the figures appear as representatives of moments of truth expressing how the contents of the other characters’ speeches were internalized by Ophelia. This distinction also marks the existence of different types of madnessess expressed by the characters.