Who is Ophelia? Shakespeare character explained as Taylor Swift opens The Life Of A Showgirl with The Fate of Ophelia
As Taylor Swift opens her new album The Life Of A Showgirl with the song ‘The Fate of Ophelia’, we take a look at the Shakespeare character that inspired the track in-depth.
Swifties across the world are waking up to listen to The Life Of A Showgirl, Taylor Swift’s 12th studio album. The singer-songwriter has been hard at work on a range of new songs, and one has caught the attention of listeners already.
The Fate Of Ophelia opens the new album, and has many drawing parallels to the story of Shakespeare's Ophelia. Taylor is no stranger to using some literary (and specifically Shakespearian) influences in her work.
Not only that, but Taylor will be dropping The Fate Of Ophelia as her first single from the album, with the music video set to premiere at special album listening parties at cinemas across the world.
Here’s everything you need to know about Ophelia and what happened to the tragic Shakespearian figure, and how it connects to Taylor’s new song The Fate Of Ophelia.
Who is Ophelia?
Ophelia is a character in William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet. A young noblewoman of Denmark, she is the daughter of Polonius, sister of Laertes, and the prospective wife of Prince Hamlet.
She is seen as a tragic figure who is caught in the crossfire of Hamlet’s actions throughout the story. Ophelia is subjected to ridicule, as well as being infantilised and sexualised by the men in her life. As a result, she is depicted as having very little agency or power.
What happened to Ophelia in Hamlet?
Ophelia’s story in Hamlet ends in tragedy. She is driven to insanity by the cruelty of the men in her life and her father’s death at the hands of Hamlet, after the Prince mistakenly kills him during his own descent into madness. He also acts cruelly towards her and jilts her at the altar.
Flowers are a massive symbol for the character of Ophelia. At one point in the play, a dishevelled Ophelia hands out flowers to the Danish court, with each of the different types of flowers symbolising a virtue she is giving away to others - for example, during this monologue, Ophelia lifts a daisy, a symbol for innocence and gentleness and doesn’t hand it to anyone, representative of the fact she feels there is no innocence left in her world. Ophelia’s character as a whole is often read as being an example of lost innocence.
Ophelia ultimately drowns in a river a surrounded by flowers, with her death (which happens off-stage) often interpreted by many as to be suicide in an act of reclaiming agency she had previously surrendered. This is despite Gertrude announcing her death in the play as being an accident, from slipping while picking flowers.
What is Taylor Swift’s song The Fate Of Ophelia about?
The full lyric of The Fate Of Ophelia are below:
I heard you calling on the megaphone
You wanna see me all alone
As legend has it you are quite the pyro
You light the match to watch it blow
[Pre-Chorus]
And if you'd never come for me
I might've drowned in the melancholy
I swore my loyalty to me, myself, and I
Right before you lit my sky up
[Chorus]
All that time, I sat alone in my tower
You were just honing your powers
Now I can see it all (See it all)
Late one night, you dug me out of my grave and
Saved my heart from the fate of Ophelia (Ophelia)
Keep it one hundrеd on the land, the sea, thе sky
Pledge allegiance to your hands,
your team, your vibes
Don't care where the hell you been, 'cause now you're mine
It's 'bout to be the sleepless night you've been dreaming of
The fate of Ophelia
[Verse 2]
The eldest daughter of a nobleman
Ophelia lived in fantasy
But love was a cold bed full of scorpions
The venom stole her sanity
[Pre-Chorus]
And if you'd never come for me (Come for me)
I might've lingered in purgatory
You wrap around me like a chain (Chain), a crown (A crown), a vine (A vine)
Pulling me into the fire
[Chorus]
All that time, I sat alone in my tower
You were just honing your powers
Now I can see it all (See it all)
Late one night, you dug me out of my grave and
Saved my heart from the fate of Ophelia (Ophelia)
Keep it one hundred on the land, the sea, the sky
Pledge allegiance to your hands, your team, your vibes
Don't care where the hell you been, 'cause now you're mine
It's 'bout to be the sleepless night you've been dreaming of
The fate of Ophelia
[Bridge]
'Tis locked inside my memory
And only you possess the key
No longer drowning and deceived
All because you came for me
Locked inside my memory
And only you possess the key
No longer drowning and deceived
All because you came for me
[Chorus]
All that time, I sat alone in my tower
You were just honing your powers
Now I can see it all (I can see it all)
Late one night, you dug me out of my grave and
Saved my heart from the fate of Ophelia (Ophelia)
Keep it one hundred on the land, the sea, the sky
Pledge allegiance to your hands, your team, your vibes
Don't care where the hell you been, 'cause now you're mine
It's 'bout to be the sleepless night you've been dreaming of
The fate of Ophelia
[Outro]
You saved my heart from the fate of Ophelia
The Fate Of Ophelia appears to be a love song to Taylor’s fiance Travis Kelce. There are plenty of references to sports to indicate that she is talking about her NFL husband-to-be, including mentions of ‘team’ and ‘megaphone’.
Taylor compares herself to the tragic figure Ophelia, drawing parallels between the despair she was engulfing herself in following the end of her relationship to her ex-boyfriend Joe Alwyn. In comparing herself to the tragic figure Ophelia, she describes how he “saved” her from “the fate of Ophelia” - i.e being driven mad by the previous man in her life.
In an added piece of Taylor-lore, her ex-boyfriend Joe, whom she was with before Travis, was actually in a recent film adaptation of Hamlet, where he played Ophelia’s brother Laertes. Taylor and Joe broke off their six-year relationship in April 2023, with Joe going on to film Hamlet in late 2023.
Swifties already picked up on the Ophelia imagery during the launch of The Life Of A Showgirl era, with the singer-songwriter using water and flowers to evoke the character. The main inspiration appeared to have been the painting ‘Ophelia’ by Sir John Everett Millais, which currently hangs in the Tate Britain, for any Swifties wanting to make the pilgrimage.