Imagery XII. 1 – Painting – OPHELIA by Millais

OPHELIA by John Everett Millais, 1852Hughes' early Ophelia is among the most chilling, bleak images of her I've ever encountered. Strewn with wilted rushes rather than wildflowers, she seems barely in her teens and utterly bereft of hope...innocence destroyed.The lettering on the frame quotes Gertrude's description of Ophelia's fate in Act IV, Scene 7, and beginning "There is a willow grows aslant a brook..."