Originally Posted by
ayesha.maya
What does Hamlet mean when he says to Yorick's skull: "Now get you to my lady's chamber and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come. Make her laugh at that."
Accepting the allusion to Ophelia, there also seems a strong allusion to Gertrude in these words of her son. For both Yorick and Hamlet, isn't "my lady" more naturally the queen? Just as Hamlet's words to Ophelia seem even more pertinent to Gertrude, or so Hamlet thinks:
I have heard of your paintings too, well enough.
God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another.
Similarly, Claudius's aside gently reminds us of a disloyal Gertrude, his late brother's wife, as seen through the eyes of Hamlet, her disenchanted son:
The harlot's cheek, beautied with plast'ring art,
Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it
Than is my deed to my most painted word.