Wuthering Heights: A Parallel Universe
Throughout the ages, literature and her artists have given anyone the chance to be something they are not: a princess, a pirate, lovers like Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy, anything imaginable, or “call me Ishmael.” Perhaps one of the greatest of these artists is so underrated and misunderstood, but belongs to a category that can only be described as brilliant. Emily Bronte employs powerful characterization and grotesque imagery to manifest the fierce symbolism in the tragic love story that is Catherine and Heathcliff, in her novel Wuthering Heights.
Formerly published as Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, the Bronte sisters are somewhat of a mystery (Hewish). One of six children, Emily lived a quiet life at her family’s estate in Hawthorn, England. She was bright and reclusive, to an extent, and taught herself German and piano. In 1842, Emily went with Charlotte to Héger Pensionnat, a school, in Brussels, Belgium. There she perfected her German and French. The two sisters intended to stay and teach at the school, but after the death of their aunt, they naturally returned to the estate. Emily then began to write poems and her famous novel in secret. All three sisters came together bearing novels to be published: Emily’s Wuthering Heights, Charlotte’s Jane Eyre, and Anne’s Agnes Grey. Emily Bronte never saw the success of her novel as she died at the age of thirty from tuberculosis one year after it was published (D’Amico).
Bronte’s artistic expression through her characters is both fascinating and frustrating. The portrayal of these extensive masterpieces validates Bronte’s boldness and wit and confirms “Wuthering Heights is not a silver fork novel where children are undressed by their maids” (Hewish)...
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...ways walking the moors, and surrounding herself with nature. It makes perfect sense when Catherine says “whatever our souls are made of, [Heathcliff’s] and mine are the same.”(Bronte). Alternately, Catherine’s marriage to Edgar Linton represents the temptation she felt to be a part of society, as he was wealth and well known. Ultimately, the conflicting of nature versus society is illustrated by the burial of Catherine “in a corner of the kirkyard, where the wall is so low that heath and bilberry plants have climbed over it from the moor,” between Edgar Linton and Heathcliff. Nature or Heathcliff won the heart of Emily in the end. The success of Catherine Heathcliff and Hareton’s love story restores balance to Wuthering Heights, altogether proving there must be balance between nature and culture.
Wuthering Heights whisks the traditional ideals of love under the rug.
The essence of any true magnificent piece of literature is not what one can see in words. It is what one can see behind the words. It is through the symbolism and imagery found in works of literature that a reader can truly connect with the writer. Charlotte Bronte epitomizes the spirit of the "unread but understood" in her Victorian work Jane Eyre. There have been numerous essays and theories presented examining the complex symbolism and imagery used by Bronte in Jane Eyre. Much of the imagery she uses concentrates on passion, fantasy, and the supernatural. In this essay I will examine Bronte’s use of fire and heat imagery pertaining to Mr. Rochester and Jane’s love relationship.
... images the story of Catherin and Heathcliff’s struggle to find one another and themselves at Wuthering Heights was able to be understood by the reader. The central theme of identity search was clear because of the words chosen by Emily, the passages from the text above and the central line “I am Heathcliff” (82). The social status and sew of the characters is what ultimately lead to the choices they made which in turn determined their final identities, the ones that they were destined to get but did not want. Catherine and Heathcliff both made their decision on who they wanted to be and how they wanted to be defined. Their identities are what they died with and although they were buried beside eachother that’s not how they lived their lives. Identity is a balance between outer and inner perception and once one realizes what they want it’s hard to balance the two.
Jane Eyre, written by Charlotte Brontë, was published in 1847 by Smith, Elder & Company, in London. This year is exactly ten years into Queen Victoria’s sixty-four year reign of the British Empire. The Victorian Era was renowned for its patriarchal Society and definition by class. These two things provide vital background to the novel, as Jane suffers from both. Jane Eyre relates in some ways to Brontë’s own life, as its original title suggest, “Jane Eyre: An Autobiography”. Charlotte Brontë would have suffered from too, as a relatively poor woman. She would have been treated lowly within the community. In fact, the book itself was published under a pseudonym of Currer Bell, the initials taken from Brontë’s own name, due to the fact that a book published by a woman was seen as inferior, as they were deemed intellectually substandard to men. Emily Brontë, Charlotte’s sister, was also forced to publish her most famous novel, Wuthering Heights, under the nom de plume of Ellis Bell, again taking the initials of her name to form her own alias. The novel is a political touchstone to illustrate the period in which it was written, and also acts as a critique of the Victorian patriarchal society.
In the gothic novel Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, the author hides motifs within the story.The novel contains two major love stories;The wild love of Catherine, and Heathcliff juxtaposing the serene love of Cathy,and Hareton. Catherine’s and Heathcliff's love is the center of Emily Bronte’s novel ,which readers still to this day seem to remember.The characters passion, and obsession for each other seems to not have been enough ,since their love didn't get to thrive. Hareton and Cathy’s love is what got to develop. Hareton’s and Cathy’s love got to workout ,because both characters contained a characteristic that both characters from the first generation lacked: The ability to change .Bronte employs literary devices such as antithesis of ideas, and the motif of repetition to reveal the destructiveness of wild love versus a domestic love.
Heathcliff cried vehemently, "I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!" Emily Brontë distorts many common elements in Wuthering Heights to enhance the quality of her book. One of the distortions is Heathcliff's undying love for Catherine Earnshaw. Also, Brontë perverts the vindictive hatred that fills and runs Heathcliff's life after he loses Catherine. Finally, she prolongs death, making it even more distressing and insufferable.
Catherine Earnshaw appears to be a woman who is free spirited. However, Catherine is also quite self-centered. She clearly states that her love for Edgar Linton does not match how much she loves Heathcliff. She is saying that she does love both, and she is unwilling to give one up for the other; she wants “Heathcliff for her friend”. Catherine admits that her love for Linton is “like the foliage in the woods”; however, her love for Heathcliff “resembles the eternal rocks beneath”. She loves Heathcliff and yet she gives him up and marries Linton instead, Catherine believes that if she marries Heathcliff it would degrade and humiliate her socially.
Definitive criteria for judging the success or failure of a work of fiction are not easily agreed upon; individuals almost necessarily introduce bias into any such attempt. Only those who affect an exorbitantly refined artistic taste, however, would deny the importance of poignancy in literary pieces. To be sure, writings of dubious and fleeting merit frequently enchant the public, but there is too the occasional author who garners widespread acclaim and whose works remain deeply affecting despite the passage of time. The continued eminence of the fiction of Emily Bronte attests to her placement into such a category of authors: it is a recognition of her propensity to create poignant and, indeed, successful literature.
It is in this respect that many Gothic analogies exist between Lord Byron’s “Manfred” and Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights. It is in this respect that Emily Bronte’s literary bent of mind is highly influenced by Byron’s writings.
The basic conflict of the novel that drives Heathcliff and Catherine apart is social. Written after the Industrial Revolution, Wuthering Heights is influenced by the rise of new fortunes and the middle class in England. Money becomes a new criterion to challenge the traditional criterias of class and family in judging a gentleman’s background. Just as Walpole who portrays the tyrannies of the father figure Manfred and the struggles of the Matilda who wants to marry the peasant Theodore, as depicted in the quote “(…) improbability that either father would consent to bestow his heiress on so poor a man, though nobly born”(p. 89), Brontë depicts a brutal bully Hindley who torments Heathcliff and separates Catherine from him. Heathcliff, a gypsy outcast picked u...
Wuthering Heights is a novel which deviates from the standard of Victorian literature. The novels of the Victorian Era were often works of social criticism. They generally had a moral purpose and promoted ideals of love and brotherhood. Wuthering Heights is more of a Victorian Gothic novel; it contains passion, violence, and supernatural elements (Mitchell 119). The world of Wuthering Heights seems to be a world without morals. In Wuthering Heights, Brontë does not idealize love; she presents it realistically, with all its faults and merits. She shows that love is a powerful force which can be destructive or redemptive. Heathcliff has an all-consuming passion for Catherine. When she chooses to marry Edgar, his spurned love turns into a destructive force, motivating him to enact revenge and wreak misery. The power of Heathcliff’s destructive love is conquered by the influence of another kind of love. Young Cathy’s love for Hareton is a redemptive force. It is her love that brings an end to the reign of Heathcliff.
(4) Wuthering Heights’s mood is melancholy and tumultuous. As a result, the book gives off a feeling of sorrow and chaos. For example, Catherine’s marriage with Edgar Linton made Heathcliff jealous and angry. In retaliation, Heathcliff married Edgar’s sister, Isabella, to provoke Catherine and Edgar. Heathcliff and Isabella’s marriage ignited a chaotic uproar with Edgar and Catherine because Linton disapproved of Heathcliff’s character, and Catherine loved Heathcliff in spite of being married to Edgar. Inside, Catherine wanted to selfishly keep Heathcliff to herself. Their relationships all had tragic endings because Catherine died giving birth to Edgar’s child. Isabella also died, leaving behind her young son. Heathcliff and Edgar resented each other because of misery they experienced together. The transition of the mood in the story is from chaotic to somber.
...ly declared their love there. As respite from the prison of Wuthering Heights the moors are a mysterious place that is liberating, and boundaryless. Catherine says, “I wish I were out of doors- I wish I were a girl again, half savage and hardy, and free” (105). Once Catherine compares Linton and Heathcliff saying, “My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods. Time will change it, I’m well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath a source of little visible delight, but necessary” (84).
Emily Brontë was the fifth of six children, all of which turned to literature as a comforting form of expression (The New Republic). Emily Brontë’s only friends were her siblings, yet she was extremely more unsocial and reserved (Emily Jane Brontë). Soon after beginning their education at Clergy Daughter’s School at Cowan Bridge, two of Emily’s sisters contracted tuberculosis. Maria and Elizabeth returned from school...
It is a question that has baffled readers and critics alike through generations, a question that can be endlessly pondered upon and debated over, as to why Emily Bronte chose to name her first and only novel, after the house in which a sizable part of the action chronicled takes place, despite being armed with characters of such extra-ordinary strength and passion as Heathcliff or Catherine. But on close scrutiny, a reader can perhaps discern the reason behind her choice, the fact that Wuthering Heights is at once a motif, a setting and according to a few critics, even a ‘premonitory indication’ of the tempestuous nature of things soon to occur.
Bronte's Use of Language and Setting in Wuthering Heights Between pages 15 and 18 there are identifiable ways in which 'Bronte' uses 'language and setting' to establish the characters and create a distinguishable atmosphere. In this essay, themes, genres and styles will be discussed to show how 'Bronte' establishes the characters; there will also be a discussion of the 'gothic' elements which Wuthering Heights contains. Many people would argue that the style of 'Wuthering Heights' is peculiar and complex, the power of Wuthering Heights owes much to its complex narrative structure and to the device of having two conventional people relate a very unconventional tale. Bronte importantly introduces the element of 'the supernatural' into chapter 3 which is an important technique as it grips the reader. Lockwood has come into contact with the ghost of Cathy, who died 18 years before, Some might argue that she is a product of Lockwood's imagination, and it is clear that Bronte has presented these facts in this way so that the reader can make up their own mind on the subject.