Ophelia, driven mad by her father's death and Hamlet's rejection, distributes flowers with symbolic meanings to the court. Her fragmented speech and songs reveal her shattered mind and foreshadow her drowning.
Act 4 Scene 5 at Elsinore. Polonius is dead, killed by Hamlet behind the arras; Hamlet has been sent to England; Laertes has returned from France in a fury and stormed the palace with a mob behind him. Ophelia, who has had no protector and no information, enters the court in a state of dispersed grief, singing fragments of folk songs about dead fathers and lost virginity. Claudius and Gertrude are present; Laertes arrives mid-scene and sees his sister broken. Ophelia carries flowers — or imaginary flowers, or weeds gathered from the corridor, depending on the production — and distributes them, one by one, to the people in the room, naming each plant and its meaning. She gives rosemary and pansies (most commonly) to Laertes; fennel and columbines to Claudius; rue to Gertrude and keeps a sprig for herself; a daisy to someone; and she would give violets, but they withered when her father died. Then she sings again and leaves. She will be dead within the act.
Ophelia is not raving. The herb-distribution scene is the most coherent passage in her mad scene and arguably the most coherent thing she has ever said in the play. What she wants is to deliver judgement: each flower is a coded accusation, and the court — who have failed her — are being named and indicted in a language they cannot prevent her from speaking because she is "mad." Rosemary is remembrance; pansies are thoughts; fennel is flattery; columbine is adultery; rue is repentance; the daisy is unhappy love; the withered violets are faithfulness. Underneath the songs is a young woman whose father has been murdered by the man she loved, whose brother was abroad, whose queen used her as bait, whose king conspired against her. Her psychological state is not chaos; it is a finally honest woman who has been freed by collapse to say what she sees. The flowers are the only weapon she has.
The disaster is generalised madness — drifting, vague, eyes-up, ribbon-in-hair. Ophelia in this scene knows exactly what she is doing. The herbs are specific gifts to specific people, and the actor must decide, in rehearsal, who gets what and why. Most editions assign the herbs to particular recipients; choose your assignments and play them. The room must reorganise around her as she moves; she is the centre. Mark the moment about the violets — "they withered all when my father died" — that is the speech's grief-line and should arrive without decoration. The songs are not decorative; they are content, and the bawdy verses (Saint Valentine's Day, the cock that crew) are deliberately disturbing in a public court and should be sung clearly enough to make the room uncomfortable. Tempo varies: the herbs are deliberate, the songs are quicker, the transitions are abrupt. Resist the impulse to add weeping; Ophelia in this scene is past weeping and the scene is harder if she is calm. The flowers can be real, imagined, or weeds; commit to a choice. Vocally, the trap is little-girl voice. Ophelia is a young woman, not a child, and the speech lands harder if she sounds adult.
A common Shakespeare audition piece for young women, and one of the more difficult to do well because the scene is fragmentary and easily generalised. Useful for classical companies, MFA programmes, and any audition assessing verse-handling and the ability to play subtext inside surface incoherence. Demonstrates specificity, listening, and emotional intelligence; over-played, it demonstrates none of those things. Heavily over-used in audition rooms, and panels have seen many drifting, vague Ophelias. The actor who plays the herbs as specific accusations, and the songs as deliberately public provocations, will stand out. Less useful for screen-naturalism rooms unless you can find a hyper-specific take. Strong as a counter-piece to a comic monologue in a two-piece showcase. If you are auditioning for Ophelia herself, the panel may prefer to see "O what a noble mind is here o'erthrown" which shows a different Ophelia and is less worn.
There's rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray,
love, remember: and there is pansies. that's for thoughts.
There's fennel for you, and columbines: there's rue
for you; and here's some for me: we may call it
herb-grace o' Sundays: O you must wear your rue with
a difference. There's a daisy: I would give you
some violets, but they withered all when my father
died: they say he made a good end.
For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy.
And will he not come again?
And will he not come again?
No, no, he is dead:
Go to thy death-bed:
He never will come again.