Love Gone Wrong in Bronte's Wuthering Heights

1205 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Critical opinion on boundaries of love within wuthering heights

In the novel Wuthering Heights Emily Bronte talks about two cities combining by a forced marriage. She talks about how these characters are in one big love triangle. These characters are Catherine, Edger, Cathy, Heathcliff, Isabella, Linton, Hareton, and many more. The novel starts off with these characters that are in love with each other. They end up getting separated by an event that will change relations not only between them but the entire city. So the novel starts off with Catherine who is madly in love with Heathcliff who owns Thrushcross Grange.

Heathcliff and Catherine where the best of friends when they where children. When they got older that friendship turned into love. Heathcliff and Catherine where caught spying on Edger’s party. When they ran off Heathcliff got away but Catherine didn’t. She twisted her ankle trying to escape. “He sends his love, ma’ma [Catherine], and his wishes for your happiness” (107). Heathcliff hopes that Catherine forgives him for all the grief she went through. He feels bad and hopes that everything goes back to the way it was when she gets back. Edger got his people on her to help her and he had her stay with him as he nursed her back to help. This is when Catherine starts to think she is falling in love with Edger. She sees how life is being in the upper class and having money. She realizes that is what she wants. “I could fancy a love for life here almost possible; and I was a fixed unbeliever in any love of a year standing” (62). She is willing to fake love for her want to be in the upper class and to have money. She is even willing to sacrifice her love for Heathcliff for it. When Catherine comes back from the grange, Edger and Isabella are coming over to visit. Cat...

... middle of paper ...

...s and popularity.

So Catherine and Heathcliff had a long and very bumpy relationship. They are soul mates but don’t realize it till they are dead and end up happily in love in Heaven because it was to late to realize there love for each other. Catherine was too stubborn and to in love of her life of money and social standing to realize who her true love was. She realizes that she is not in love with Edger but with the money and social standing they have together. So the cities are finally combined when Cathy marries Linton (forcefully) and Linton dies leaving Wuthering Heights to his father in his will. So then Cathy is finally able to marry somebody that she wants to marry instead of being forced to. She marries Hareton at the end of the novel so we don’t really know how the marriage went but to assume that they have a family and live happily ever after.

Show More
Related

  • Macbeth Manipulation Quotes

    800 Words  | 2 Pages

    Catherine manipulates,her own self even. Who does she really love,and want to be with? “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. Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He’s always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being.” Cathy is also referring to herself as Heathcliff,basically stating that she knows him and loves him as well as she does herself. Catherine may have been in love with Linton but she feels like that's going to change. Her love for Heathcliff maybe too strong and she does want to be with Linton. He has only manipulated herself. Yes, as such wondrous creatures, women even manipulate themselves

    Read More

  • Wuthering Heights Deception

    787 Words  | 2 Pages

    Which drew Catherine towards him; she describes him as “handsome”, “pleasant to be with,” and “cheerful,” and “rich”. Linton turns Catherine from a wild child to a well-mannered lady. They meet when Catherine got bit by a dog, and then the Lintons take her in while she is healing, this lasts for five weeks. Edgar tames her in a way, his overall persona clashes with hers in a perfect way. His love gives Catherine safety a security in the society. Heathcliff on the other hand is almost obsessed and can't give her the attributes she needs and wants; such as, commitment and how he won't sacrifice anything. However, those exact qualities attract Catherine to him. “She was much too fond of Heathcliff. The greatest punishment we could invent for her was to keep her separate from him: yet she got chided more than any of us on his account.”(Brontë 41) According to Levy, “As a result of the Unlove that they were made to suffer, both Heathcliff and Catherine, by opposite means and in distinct circumstances, turn loneliness into a community of rejection over which they wield absolute control. Heathcliff does this by persecuting those he hates; Catherine, by persecuting those she loves.” Edgar and Heathcliff have a good angel bad angel complex, of course Heathcliff is the bad angel and Edgar is the good angel. The reasons behind this is simply the characteristics portrayed;Edgar

    Read More

  • Theme Of Heathcliff In Wuthering Heights

    1094 Words  | 3 Pages

    Heathcliff and Cathy have a sadistic relationship. They are only truly in love when they are hurting each other. As Catherine lay dying, she wants Heathcliff, her love, to join her in death. She pleads to him:

    Read More

  • Distortions and Exaggerations in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

    1017 Words  | 3 Pages

    Heathcliff's love for Catherine transcends the normal physical "true love" into spiritual love. He can withstand anything against him to be with her. After Hindley became the master of Wuthering Heights, he flogged Heathcliff like a slave. Although Heathcliff could have simply run away, his decision to endure the physical pains shows his unrelenting devotion to Catherine. Fortunately, Catherine feels as deeply for Heathcliff as he does for her, explaining to Nelly that "Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same…" Their love for each other is so passionate that they can not possibly live apart. At Catherine's death, Heathcliff hopes that she will not rest, but will haunt him until he dies. This absurdity contradicts the traditional norm that one should pray that the dead rest in peace. Near the end of the novel, we learn that Catherine has haunted Heathcliff, allowing him only fleeting glances of her. This shows that despite their physical separation, nothing can part them spiritually. When Heathcliff dies and unites with Catherine once again, the neighbors see them haunt the moors. We finally see the power of their love; Not only does this love transcend physical barriers, it transcends time as well...

    Read More

  • Character Analysis Of Wuthering Heights

    995 Words  | 2 Pages

    The complicated nature surrounding Heathcliff’s motives again adds an additional degree of ambiguity to his character. This motivation is primarily driven by Catherine’s marriage to Edgar and past rejection of Heathcliff, since he was a servant whom Hindley disapproved of. Prior to storming out of Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff overhears Catherine say, “It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now…” (Brontë 87). The obstacles that ultimately prevent Heathcliff from marrying Catherine provide insight into Heathcliff’s desire to bring harm to Edgar and Hindley. The two men play prominent roles in the debacle, Edgar as the new husband and Hindley as the head figure who refused Heathcliff access to Catherine. Following this incident, Catherine says, “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same…” (Brontë 87). Catherine’s sentiment indicates she truly would rather be with Heathcliff, but the actions of others have influenced her monumental decision to marry Edgar. Furthermore, Heathcliff is motivated to not only ruin Edgar’s livelihood, but also gain ownership of his estate, Thrushcross Grange. This becomes clear when Heathcliff attempts to use Isabella

    Read More

  • Selfishness in "Wuthering Heights"

    797 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Catherine Earnshaw

    804 Words  | 2 Pages

    Catherine is free-spirited, wild, impetuous, and arrogant as a child, she grows up getting everything she wants as Nelly describes in chapter 5, ‘A wild, wicked slip she was’. She is given to fits of temper, and she is torn between her wild passion for Heathcliff and her social ambition. She brings misery to both of the men who love her, ultimately; Catherine’s selfishness ends up hurting everyone she loves, including herself.

    Read More

  • Literary Criticism of Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

    995 Words  | 2 Pages

    McKibben and Hagan take different approaches to Wuthering Heights, but both approaches work together to form one unified concept. McKibben speaks of Wuthering Heights as a whole, while Hagan concentrates on only sympathies role in the novel. McKibben and Hagan both touch on the topic of Catherine and Heathcliff’s passionate nature. To this, McKibben recalls the scene in the book when Catherine is "in the throes of her self-induced illness" (p38). When asking for her husband, she is told by Nelly Dean that Edgar is "among his books," and she cries, "What in the name of all that feels has he to do with books when I am dying." McKibben shows that while Catherine is making a scene and crying, Edgar is in the library handling Catherine’s death in the only way he knows how, in a mild mannered approach. He lacks the passionate ways in which Catherine and Heathcliff handle ordeals. During this scene Catherine’s mind strays back to childhood and she comes to realize that "the Linton’s are alien to her and exemplify a completely foreign mode of perception" (p38). Catherine discovers that she would never belong in Edgar’s society. On her journey of self-discovery, she realized that she attempted the impossible, which was to live in a world in which she did not belong. This, in the end, lead to her death. Unlike her mother, when Cathy enters The Heights, "those images of unreal security found in her books and Thrushhold Grange are confiscated, thus leading her to scream, "I feel like death!" With the help of Hareton, Cathy learns not to place her love within a self created environment, but in a real life where she will be truly happy. The character’s then reappear as reconciled, and stability and peace once more return to The Heights.

    Read More

  • Interweaving Characters and Surroundings in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

    1715 Words  | 4 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • The Castle of Otranto and Wuthering Heights: Love Beyond Classes, Life, and Death

    1195 Words  | 3 Pages

    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...

    Read More

  • The Self-destructive Relationship in Wuthering Heights

    1235 Words  | 3 Pages

    Catherine is trapped between her love of Heathcliff and her love for Edgar, setting the two men down a path of destruction, a whirlwind of anger and resentment that Catherine gets caught in the middle of. Catherine is drawn to Heathcliff because of his fiery personality, their raw attraction and one certainly gets the sense that they are drawn together on a deeper level, that perhaps they are soulmates. C. Day Lewis thought so, when he declared that Heathcliff and Catherine "represent the essential isolation of the soul...two halves of a single soul–forever sundered and struggling to unite." This certainly seems to be backed up in the novel when Catherine exclaims “Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He's always, always in my mind--not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being...” This shows clearly the struggle Catherine feels as she is drawn spiritually to Heathcliff, but also to Edgar for very different reasons. Edgar attracts Catherine predominantly because he is of the right social class. Catherine finds him "handsome, and pleasant to be with," but her feelings for him seem petty when compared to the ones she harbours...

    Read More

  • The Power of Love in Wuthering Heights

    1397 Words  | 3 Pages

    Heathcliff and Catherine have loved each other since their childhood. Initially, Catherine scorned the little gypsy boy; she showed her distaste by “spitting” at him (Brontë 27). However, it was not long before Heathcliff and Catherine became “very think” (Brontë 27). They became very close friends; they were practically brother and sister (Mitchell 122). Heathcliff is intent upon pleasing Catherine. He would “do her bidding in anything” (Brontë 30). He is afraid of “grieving” her (Brontë 40). Heathcliff finds solace and comfort in Catherine’s company. When Catherine is compelled to stay at Thrushcross Grange to recover from her injury, she returns as “a very dignified person” (Brontë 37). Her association with the gente...

    Read More

  • Storm & Calm in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

    761 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Lintons, and the social and material advantages they stand for become Heathcliff’s rivals for Catherine’s love, which leads directly  to the central conflict of the novel.  Heathcliff despises them at first sight for their weakness, but Catherine, being an extremely proud girl, is tempted.  A lovers’ triangle begins  to take definite shape  when the aristocratic Edgar Linton falls in love with Catherine, upsetting the balance between the relationship of Catherine and Heathcliff.  Edgar’s love for Catherine is sincere, but the element of great passion which is strongly characterized does not compare to Heathcliff’s love.  The difference between Catherine’s feeling for Heathcliff and the one she feels for Linton is that Heathcliff is a part of her nature, while Edgar is only a part of  her superficial love.  “For he (Heathcliff),  like her, is a child of storm; and this makes a bond between them, which interweaves itself with the very nature of their existence.”  (Cecil 26)  Emily Bronte makes a point in the novel to mention the fact that Catherine’s affection for Heathcliff remains unchanged in spite of the Lintons’ influence over her. As Catherine confesses to Nelly that Heathcliff and her share the same soul, and also declares “I am  Heathcliff.” (Bronte 84)  Her pride, yearning for the world of the Lintons, has gotten the better of her natural inclination, and she knows she  has made the wrong decision by

    Read More

  • The Real Meaning Of Love In Wuthering Heights By Emily Bronte

    1613 Words  | 4 Pages

    In text The Story of Layla and Majnun, Majnun goes for his desire to marry Layla but goes through many obstacles that prevent him from doing so which include the rules of society during that time including requesting the father for approval of marriage. In the text Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, Heathcliff has a desire to be with Catherine but the marriage between her and Edgar is the obstacle between Heathcliff fulfilling the desire of the relationship with Catherine. In these two texts, we can see that the motif of nature play a major role to how the main characters express similar theories and perspectives of love towards one another.

    Read More

  • Love In Wuthering Heights

    1255 Words  | 3 Pages

    During the first half of the book, Catherine showed different types of love for two different people. Her love for Heathcliff was her everything, it was her identity to love and live for Heathcliff but as soon as she found out how society views Heathcliff, she sacrificed their love and married Edgar Linton in the hopes of saving Heathcliff from Hindley and protecting him from the eyes of society. In her conversation with Nelly, Cathy who professed her love for Heathcliff quoted “My great miseries in this world have been Heathcliff's miseries, and I watched and felt each from the beginning: my great thought in living is himself.” Catherine proved Nelly Dean that the only person who can make her feel pain and sorrow is Heathcliff. The extent of her love was uncovered when she sang her praise of “I am Heathcliff” because this was the turning point in the book that allowed the readers to truly understand and see the depth of Cathy's love for Heathcliff. On the other hand, Catherine's love for Edgar wasn't natural because it was a love that she taught herself to feel. It might have come unknowingly to Cathy but she did love Edgar as she said “My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I'm well aware, as winter changes the trees.” Cathy knew that it was not impossible to love Edgar for he was a sweet and kind gentleman who showed her the world but unlike ...

    Read More

More about Love Gone Wrong in Bronte's Wuthering Heights

Open Document