Gertrude

Also known as: Queen · Family: Danish court · Role: Queen of Denmark · First appears: Hamlet · Act I, Scene II

Gertrude is Queen of Denmark in the Danish court. In Act I, Scene II, Claudius takes her as his wife and queen, “Taken to wife”; she then urges Hamlet to remain in Denmark rather than return to Wittenberg, and he agrees. In Act II, Scene II, she and Claudius summon Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to investigate Hamlet’s transformation, while Polonius proposes secretly testing whether Ophelia’s love caused it; Hamlet discovers that the two courtiers were sent to him.

After the play, Claudius approves Gertrude’s private questioning of Hamlet while Polonius listens secretly. In their encounter, Hamlet shows her Ghost and identifies him as her husband; Gertrude accepts Hamlet’s demand to keep his disclosures secret, promising, “Be thou assur’d, if words be made of breath, / And breath of life, I have no life to breathe / What thou hast said to me.” She acknowledges that Hamlet’s departure for England has been arranged, later hears of his sudden return, and reveals at Ophelia’s grave that she once hoped Ophelia would become Hamlet’s wife.

In Act V, Scene II, Gertrude drinks from the poisoned cup and dies, crying, “I am poison’d.”