Probably the most complex female character in the novel, Ophelia deserves special attention from the reader because she is treated as a surrogate for Stowe’s intended audience. Its as if Stowe conceived an imaginary picture of her intended reader, then brought that reader into the book as a character. Ophelia embodies what Stowe considered a widespread Northern problem; the white person who opposes slavery on a theoretical level but feels racial prejudice and hatred in the presence of an actual black slave.
Ophelia detests slavery, but she considers it almost necessary for blacks, against which she harbors a deep-seated prejudice, she does not want them to touch her. Stowe emphasizes that much of Ophelia’s racial prejudice stems from unfamiliarity and ignorance rather than from actual experience-based hatred. Because Ophelia has seldom spent time in the presence of slaves, she finds them uncomfortably alien to her. Ophelia seems to be one of the only characters in Uncle Tom’s Cabin whose character develops as the story progresses.
Once St. Clare puts Topsy in her care, Ophelia if forced to be in contact with a slave. At first she begins to teach Topsy out of mere duty. But Stowe suggests that duty alone will not eradicate slavery and that abolitionists must act out of love. Evas death proves to be the crucial catalyst in Ophelia’s transformation, and she comes to love Topsy as an actual human being and not just a slave. She overcomes her racial prejudice and offers herself as a model to Stowe’s Northern readers.
