How Emily Brontë Fulfills the Expectations of the Gothic Genre

How Emily Brontë Fulfills the Expectations of the Gothic Genre

Within this essay I will examine the social and historical background

of Emily Brontë's upbringing, and the way her only novel, wuthering

height, is related to the gothic genre.

Emily Brontë was brought up in a time very different from our own; she

lived on secluded moors and without many of our modern day privileges,

and became very close to her family. Many of her close family members

died within her lifetime, affecting her deeply and leaving her

emotionally scarred. The tragedy and misfortune of Emily Brontë's life

is shown through her novel 'Wuthering Heights'. The many dark, sad and

misfortunate parts of this novel which represent Emily Brontë's life

are the same parts which can be categorised it in to the gothic genre.

Cathy represents Emily Brontë; they both suffered the loss of a parent

and lived on secluded moors. The semi-autobiographical nature is also

shown through Hindely, Cathy's brother, and his similarities to Emily

Brontë's brother, both go through a spiral downfall into alcoholism

and drink themselves into early graves.

Emily Brontë lived in a male dominated Georgian society. It was this

male dominance and the idea of female inadequacy that forced her to

publish her only novel Wuthering Heights under the male pseudonym

Ellis Bell.

Brontë's novel contains many of the elements that can be seen in the

gothic genre. The setting is true to the gothic style; it is in a

secluded place that often represents something that happened there.

'On that bleak hill top the earth was hard with a black frost.' In my

opinion it represents the dark and gloomy past of Wuthering Heights,

the death of Cathy and the tormented life of Heat...

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... of a higher class.

This shows the shallowness of society at the time and that society was

male dominated. Women were forced to be dependent on men and had to

marry men they didn't love to secure them a financial future and to

gain a better social status.

The novel raises issues that can been seen in societies of all times,

including the modern society in which we live. It shows how people are

judge on material things, most commonly in this novel it shows how

people are judged on social status.

The novel is told through two narrations, Nelly Dean and Lockwood. The

parts of the novel that Nelly Dean narrates are informal, This shows

Nelly is a servant, and is considered to be lower class in society.

However when Lockwood narrates, the language is more formal, and like

that of a highly educated person showing he is of higher class than

Nelly Dean is.