“The difficulty of literature is not to write, but to write what you mean; not to affect your reader, but to affect him precisely as you wish,” said Robert Louis Stevenson, author of Treasure Island. Any person can write a book, but to be able to write what you mean and affect your readers is very difficult. A writer simply can’t just drop dialogue into a character’s mouth without having any context of the dialogue. If an author has his or her character saying “I’m broke,” what does this really mean without any context? To Oprah Winfrey, being broke may mean she can’t buy a Silk Jet, a winery, or a country. To a middle- class American, being broke may mean they can’t buy a new pair of shoes that week, buy a new car, or get their hair done. This simply means that they would have to manage their money until their next pay check. To an Ethiopian, being broke may mean they don’t have the money for food, clothes, or shelter. However, Emily Bronte does affect her readers ‘precisely as she wishes’ in her novel, Wuthering Heights, and she affects her readers through the literary devices she employees: setting, theme, and mood. But first, before looking at her devices, one should have a brief overview of her novel (Bronte).
Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights was published in December 1847. It is a story of unchecked desires, voracious love, and vengeance. Heathcliff is adopted by the Earnshaw family at a young age, but at Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff endures cruel torment from Hindley, the eldest of the Earnshaw children. Heathcliff finds solace in the surrounding moors and in his relationship with Catherine. She was the upper class girl Heathcliff was fondly in love with. Their adventures on the moors lead to a dog bit...
... middle of paper ...
...because of the different elements and vocabulary any person can apply.
Works Cited
Bronte, Emily. "Theme." Free Web Page. John Wiley & Sons, 07/5/2007. Web. 25 Mar 2011. <1. http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmWuthering73.asp>.
BRONTË, Emily. "OVERVIEW OF EMILY BRONTË." Emily Bronte. cuny, 09/03/2011. Web. 28 Mar 2011. http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/novel_19c/wuthering/index.html
Bronte, Emily. "Setting." WebNet. Princeton University, 03/02/2011. Web. 28 Mar 2011. http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=setting
Bronte, Emily. "Robert Louis Stevenson quotes." Thinkexist.com. ThinkExist, 1999-2010. Web. 28 Mar 2011. http://thinkexist.com/quotation/the_difficulty_of_literature_is_not_to_write-but/14621.html
Bronte, Emily. "Mood." Dictionary.com. LLC, 2011. Web. 28 Mar 2011. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/mood
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.
Bronte, Charlotte. The Letters of Charlotte Bronte: 1829-1847. Ed. Margaret Smith. 2 vols. New York: Oxford UP, 1995-2000.
The never-ending question pertaining to Emily Brontë is “how can such a sheltered child write such scandalous stories?” (The New Republic). Emily Brontë grew up in Yorkshire, England. Her mother, Maria Branwell, succumbed to cancer at the age of thirty eight, leaving Emily motherless at the age of three. Her father, Patrick Brontë, was a clergyman who secluded himself from even his family. He was even known to eat dinner in his own room. Mr. Brontë never remarried, leaving himself to raise six children on his own. This upbringing led to Emily’s lack of familiarity with the outside world (Emily Jane Brontë).
Brennan, Zoe. "Reader's Guide: Bronte's Jane Eyre." Ebrary. Continuum International Publishing 2 2010. Print. April 28, 2014
Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights is a novel about lives that cross paths and are intertwined with one another. Healthcliff, an orphan, is taken in by Mr. Earnshaw, the owner of Wuthering Heights. Mr. Earnshaw has two children named Catherine and Hindley. Jealousy between Hindley and Healthcliff was always a problem. Catherine loves Healthcliff, but Hindley hates the stranger for stealing his fathers affection away. Catherine meets Edgar Linton, a young gentleman who lives at Thrushcross Grange. Despite being in love with Healthcliff she marries Edgar elevating her social standing. The characters in this novel are commingled in their relationships with Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange.
The famous saying that from a true love to a great hatred is only a
Laban, Lawrence F. "Emily Brontë." Critical Survey Of Long Fiction, Fourth Edition (2010): 1-4. Literary Reference Center. Web. 20 May 2014.
Wuthering Heights, written by Emily Bronte, has 323 pages. The genre of Wuthering Heights is realistic fiction, and it is a romantic novel. The book is available in the school library, but it was bought at Barnes and Nobles. The author’s purpose of writing Wuthering Heights is to describe a twisted and dark romance story. Thus, the author conveys the theme of one of life’s absolute truths: love is pain. In addition, the mood of the book is melancholy and tumultuous. Lastly, the single most important incident of the book is when Heathcliff arrives to Edgar Linton’s residence in the Granges unannounced to see Catherine’s state of health. Heathcliff’s single visit overwhelmed Catherine to the point of death.
The setting is the backbone for a novel it sets the tone and gives the reader a mental image of the time and places the story takes place. The Wuthering Heights Estate in Emily Bronte’s novel “Wuthering Heights” is one of the most important settings in the story. Wuthering Heights sets mood for the scenes taken place in the house, and reflects the life of Heathcliff through its description, furniture, windows, gates, and the vegetation.
Wuthering Heights is not just a love story, it is a window into the human soul, where one sees the loss, suffering, self discovery, and triumph of the characters in this novel. Both the Image of the Book by Robert McKibben, and Control of Sympathy in Wuthering Heights by John Hagan, strive to prove that neither Catherine nor Heathcliff are to blame for their wrong doings. Catherine and Heathcliff’s passionate nature, intolerable frustration, and overwhelming loss have ruined them, and thus stripped them of their humanities.
Brontë, Emily. Wuthering Heights. N.p.: Project Gutenberg, 2007. Print. Transcribed from the 1910 John Murray edition by David Price
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...
Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights can be considered a Gothic romance or an essay on the human relationship. The reader may regard the novel as a serious study of human problems such as love and hate, or revenge and jealousy. One may even consider the novel Bronte's personal interpretation of the universe. However, when all is said and done, Heathcliff and Catherine are the story. Their powerful presence permeates throughout the novel, as well as their complex personalities. Their climatic feelings towards each other and often selfish behavior often exaggerates or possibly encapsulates certain universal psychological truths humans are too afraid to express. Heathcliff and Catherine's stark backgrounds evolve respectively into dark personalities and mistaken life paths, but in the end their actions determine the course of their own relationships and lives. Their misfortunes, recklessness, willpower, and destructive passion are unable to penetrate the eternal love they share.
Charlotte Bronte assumed the role of intermediary between her late sister and the perplexed and hostile readers of Wuthering Heights (Sale and Dunn, WH p. 267). Charlotte attempted to provide Emily’s readers with a more complete perspective of her sister and her works. She selectively included biographical information and critical commentary into the revised 1850 edition of Wuthering Heights, which gave the reader a fuller appreciation of the works of Emily Bronte. Charlotte championed the efforts of her younger sister and believed that Emily’s inexperience and unpracticed hand were her only shortcomings. Charlotte explains much of Emily’s character to the readers through the disclosure of biographical information.
In the novel Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte strongly emphasizes the dynamic and increasingly complex relationship of Mr. Heathcliff and Catherine. Heathcliff, the abandoned gypsy boy is brought to Wuthering Height by Mr. Earnshaw to be raised with his family. After Mr. Earnshaw's death, he suffers harsh abuses from his "brother" Hindley and from Catherine, whom he dearly loves. This abuse will pave the way for revenge. The evolving and elaborate plans for revenge Mr. Heathcliff masterminds for those who he feels had hurt him and betray him is what makes Wuthering Heights a classic in English literature. The sudden change in feelings and emotions in Mr. Heathcliff are powerful scenes. Revenge becomes the only reason to live for him. Revenge is the main theme in Wuthering Heights because it highlights important events, personality flaws, and the path of destruction.