Antonio Tagliente’s Opera amorosa: Love and Letterwriting

Hamlet, it seems, woos Ophelia with letters. The details are somewhat unclear. She tells her father Polonius that Hamlet has given her “many tenders of his affection” (1.3.99–100), and has “importuned” her “with love in honorable fashion” (1.3.110–111) but neither phrase necessarily refers to letters. Later she attempts to return “remembrances” Hamlet gave her and, when he denies giving them, she protests, “you know right well you did/And with them words of so sweet breath composed/As made the things more rich” (3.1.96–98). Again, she may not be referring to letters. The remembrances could be tokens of some sort; the words, though “composed,” are made of “sweet breath,” spoken, not written.