My lord, as I was sewing in my closet,
Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced;
No hat upon his head; his stockings foul’d,
Ungarter’d, and down-gyved to his ancle;
Pale as his shirt; his knees knocking each other;
And with a look so piteous in purport
As if he had been loosed out of hell
To speak of horrors, – he comes before me.
– William Shakespeare
Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 1. Ophelia is frightened when Hamlet suddenly entered her room in a disheveled condition. She doesn’t know what to do and expresses concern about Hamlet’s strange behavior to her father Polonius. Her reliance on Polonius reinforces the idea that she is dependant on male figures and does not have the ability to think for herself. Polonius tells her Hamlet is mad with love.