In the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, Gertrude is Hamlet's mother and the queen of Denmark. Hamlet and Queen Gertrude have a difficult relationship throughout the story, as he resents her for marrying her husband's brother, Claudius, after murdering the king (young Hamlet's father, King Hamlet) . Gertrude reveals no guilt in her marriage to Claudius. The immediacy of her second marriage suggests that it is questionable whether or not she was involved in the murder. Her actions are often suspect, especially since, according to Hamlet, she barely mourned her husband's death before marrying Claudius. Gertrude is, more than any other character in the play, the antithesis of her son, Hamlet. Hamlet is a scholar and philosopher searching for life's most elusive answers. He does not care about his “mortal envelope” nor the vices to which man has become a slave. Gertrude is superficial and only thinks about her body and external pleasures. Like a child, she longs to be delighted. We don't see much of her in her daily activities, but if we could, we would see a woman delighted by trinkets and beautiful clothes, soft pillows and hot baths. Gertrude is also a very sexual being, and it is her sexuality that turns Hamlet so violently against her. The Ghost gives Hamlet, already disgusted with his mother for marrying his uncle so soon after his father's death, even more disturbing information about the queen. There is no reason to believe that Gertrude is lying to appease Hamlet in the lines above. Nowhere else in the play is Gertrude depicted as cunning or Janus-faced as Claudius. Even though Hamlet attacks her with ...... middle of paper ...... Tise is lying on the ground after the fight, he admits to Hamlet the plot to poison him if he won the fight, and after seeing his mother leaning dead in her chair, Hamlet thrusts the sword into the king's middle and kills him dead. The king falls dead to the ground trying to reach his crown which has fallen from his head. It's over for Hamlet. Hamlet steps back and says, “Miserable queen, farewell.” Now that it's done, King Hamlet has been poisoned. The king's jester was murdered by the sword. Ophelia, the jester's beloved daughter, drowned. The jester's son was killed by the sword while seeking revenge. King Claudius was killed by oath and eventually Hamlet's mother was accidentally poisoned. Only Hamlet is left to live in the sick world created for him by his mother, Queen Gertrude..