By Madeline Renn
CONTRIBUTOR
“There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance. Pray you, 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 of grace o’ Sundays. 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.” (Hamlet, Shakespeare)
As Ophelia spirals into madness, she doles out symbolic rosemary to remember her dead father, rue for the sadness of his passing and a lost violet for her bygone innocence. Ophelia’s flower speech has gone down in history as one of the most interpreted passages in the literary canon. Scholars have read into the symbols through different lenses: from spiritual to secular, madness to sanity. Theories range from Ophelia not being crazy at all, and her cognizance proved by her correct floral assignment, to the flowers being imaginary, and she is handing out schizophrenic gifts.
In Hamlet, Shakespeare utilizes flowers as a narrative vehicle because of the ability to layer botany with symbolic complication. This is because there is a long, dense history of floral language that Shakespeare’s contemporary audience would understand.
The language of flowers, otherwise known as floriography, has evolved from human’s greatly varied usage of flowers: uses from medicine to ceremony to food to aesthetic. It is no wonder that in the process of discovering elixirs and healing recipes that we began to interpret the varieties with symbolic reference.
The Victorian era saw a revival in floriography, for reasons most likely attested to the intensified importance of appearance and class. Floriography took whole new forms: scents of certain plants and herbs worn on a handkerchief sent cryptic messages of class, while a bouquet could make or break a suitor’s advances. A flower offered with the right hand meant yes, while a left-handed offering meant no. Curated bouquets became a way of sending messages: a popular Victorian pastime was to untangle the meaning behind a lover’s arrangement.
Entire dictionaries were devoted to unlocking the secrets for a lover to offer the right combination of roses and lilies, symbolizing love and beauty. However, there were multiple dictionaries, surely leading some unlucky researchers to strike out.
Today, we similarly imbue meaning onto the bouquets and boutonnieres we wear and give, but might not wholly understand them like Victorians. Floriography has been lost in our society of empty gestures and societal constructs; but it can be so easily relearned (much easier than paging through contradicting dictionaries).
A quick internet search leads to pages of information: red roses on boutonnieres are associated with Englishmen on St. George’s Day, poppies are worn for Remembrance Day, orchids for Joseph Chamberlain. While we still practice these gestures at dances, proms and weddings, we don’t really know, or even ask, why. The language of flowers is so deeply etched into our society, that we have lost the script but continue the tradition.
We may never have another floriography renaissance like the Victorians saw, however, we might be able to further our understanding of the strange, human things we do by looking back at the history that informs today’s traditions. With The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens as part of the San Marino community, understanding those seemingly quirky and enigmatic traditions is as easy as signing up for a class, taking a walk through the gardens, or sitting down with a book from the library.
To learn more about floriography and the art of flower arranging, The Huntington will be hosting a children’s flower arranging workshop on Saturday, June 4 that will discuss the cryptic language of flowers. For a different kind of experience, The Huntington’s Shakespeare Garden displays pansies, fennel, a willow tree and rosemary all to commemorate Ophelia’s famous speech, as well as other varieties that reference his other plays. Head to the garden to try your hand at interpreting the hidden messages laden with meaning in Shakespeare’s texts.
