The supernatural is used widely throughout 'Wuthering Heights' and plays a big part in determining the outcome of the story. The Victorians were very superstitious about the supernatural. Education was already becoming commonplace in Victorian England, and education brought scepticism. The majority of people were very sceptical about the supernatural but not non-believers because of the number of ghost stories that came in this period. The age of the Victorians was an important period where people's perceptions and ghosts changed dramatically, from partially believing in ghosts, to not believing in them at all, yet still being terrified of them. This clearly explains Heathcliff's reaction to seeing the ghost of Cathy. At first, the book was seen as shocking and inappropriate by all its readers.
When the book was first published, readers of the time saw it as extremely scandalous. Despite the fact that the novel doesn't not demonstrate any sex or bloodshed its depiction of the passionate love story of Cathy and Heathcliff was considered highly inappropriate, and was ignored for some time.
Bronte uses the supernatural through the entirety of the novel, however she uses it unconventionally. Heathcliff is not 'supernatural' in the sense that he is paranormal, but in that he appears to be superhuman. He appears bigger, stronger and larger than everything and everyone else around him. A large part of the fearsome power of the novel is the fact that Heathcliff is ultimately still flesh and blood, therefore, the horror and brutality of his actions make him seem supernatural (due to the severity of them). Heathcliff's malevolence proves great and long-lasting, this is shown in the abuse of Isabella, which he describes himself as purely ...
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...e supernatural. Towards the end however, it is unclear to the reader whether Heathcliff is dead or not. "But the country folks, if you ask them, would swear on the Bible that he walks..." suggests his ghost is present, yet prior to this, Brontë doesn't suggest that the villagers are superstitious, so there is a chance that these sightings were not real.
In conclusion, Bronte uses the supernatural and ghosts in Wuthering Heights to emphasise the power of love between Cathy and Heathcliff and proving that love exists beyond the grave and that the quality of love is unending. Furthermore, ghosts are used to assist in the storytelling, to help in enhancing the setting and develop characterisation, particularly in the character of Heathcliff, Nelly and Lockwood. The use of the supernatural enables the reader to be intrigued by the confusing use of extraordinary beings.
From the beginning of the novel, the main character, Jane encounters the supernatural. Charlotte Bronte uses both supernatural and gothic themes to enhance situations for the reader and to develop the characters. In particular natural imageries have been used to convey a human connection with the natural world and human nature (Franklin, 1995). Eyre portrays the intrinsic struggle between supernatural and the effects of nature. Branflinger and Thesing (2002) argue that Bronte used Gothic and the supernatural to explore and portray the darkest alleys of her own psyche which Bronte was deeply disturbed by (p309).
In Emily Bronte's novel 'Wuthering Heights,' the principal characters Cathy and Heathcliff are presented as needing this division within themselves to recognise their need for each other. This endurance of physical, mental and spiritual division whilst alive, allows them only tragically to experience when in death, complete entity within themselves.
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.
In the novel Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, Heathcliff is an orphan boy brought to Wuthering Heights by Mr. Earnshaw, who has two children of his own already - Catherine and Hindley. Heathcliff changes over the course of his life by the following; Heathcliff begins by getting along well with Catherine Earnshaw, however, Catherine Earnshaw is introduced to Edgar Linton and Heathcliff becomes jealous of their forming relationship, and once Catherine has passed away after delivering Edgar’s child, Heathcliff becomes haunted by her ghost, and wishes to only be united with her in death.
Nelly Dean is quite knowledgeable about Wuthering Heights and the events that transpired there; however, she is blunt and opinionated. She does not fail to mention that he has taken a genuine interest in Heathcliff sinc...
. The reader sees an extraordinary inwardness in Emily Bronte’s book Wuthering Heights. Emily has a gloomy and isolated childhood. . Says Charlotte Bronte, “ my sister’s disposition was not naturally gregarious; circumstances favored and fostered her tendency to seclusion; except to go to church, or to take a walk on the hills, she rarely crossed the threshold of home.”(Everit,24) That inwardness, that remarkable sense of the privacy of human experience, is clearly the essential vision of Wuthering Heights. Emily Bronte saw the principal human conflict as one between the individual and the dark, questioning universe, a universe symbolized, in her novel, both by man’s threatening and hardly-to-be-controlled inner nature, and by nature in its more impersonal sense, the wild lonesome mystery of the moors. The love of Heathcliff and Catherine, in its purest form, expresses itself absolutely in its own terms. These terms may seem to a typical mind, violent, and even disgusting. But having been generated by that particular love, they are the proper expressions of it. The passionately private relationship of Heathcliff and Catherine makes no reference to any social convention or situation. Only when Cathy begins to be attracted to the well-mannered ways of Thrushcross Grange, she is led, through them, to abandon her true nature.
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.
To sum up, Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is a classic that portrays a love, even though confined by social classes, trespasses boundaries of life and death. The Gothic elements incorporated in this novel such as extreme landscape and weather, supernatural events and death brings about a mysterious and gloomy atmosphere suitable for a revenge plot with heightened emotions.
...ctive. Catherine is pushed to death and Heathcliff to brutal revenge, bordering on the psychotic. Yet before Cathy’s death, the knowledge that the other loves them is strong enough to make Wuthering Heights such a classic love story, and “that old man by the kitchen fire affirming he has seen two of 'em looking out of his chamber window, on every rainy night since his death,” shows that as they walk together on the moors, their self destruction may have led them to death, but also to what they most desired-being together.
“Wuthering Heights is a strange, inartistic story”(Atlas, WH p. 299). “Wuthering Heights is a strange sort of book” (Douglas, WH p.301). “This is a strange book” (Examiner, WH p.302). “His work [Wuthering Heights] is strangely original” (Britannia, WH p.305). These brief quotes show that early critics of Emily Bronte’s first edition of Wuthering Heights, found the novel baffling in its meaning - they each agreed separately, that no moral existed within the story therefore it was deemed to have no real literary value. The original critical reviews had very little in the way of praise for the unknown author or the novel. The critics begrudgingly acknowledged elements of Wuthering Heights that could be considered strengths – such as, “rugged power” and “unconscious strength” (Atlas, WH p.299), “purposeless power” (Douglas, WH p.301), “evidences of considerable power” (Examiner), “power and originality” (Britannia, WH p.305). Strange and Powerful are two recurring critical interpretations of the novel. The critics did not attempt to provide in depth analysis of the work, simply because they felt that the meaning or moral of the story was either entirely absent or seriously confused.
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.
Brontë promotes the fact that personality is indicated in early age, in that while a person’s upbringing affects their outlook, the heart of the disposition is given at birth. If one is evil, it has been decided beforehand, and anyone wicked cannot be forgiven. Brontë’s views on personality can be interpreted as an argument for the innate qualities of humankind and its ultimate regard for the mind. While she acknowledges Heathcliff’s past and lack of assistance, Brontë implies that childhood is not the only indicator of lifestyle, and that an adjustment of mindset must be made as an active choice. There is satisfaction in that he never receives a redemption arc, nor does any character forgive him during his lifetime. By emphasizing his true nature, a statement is made in that fate will occur if unimpeded, and a lack of effort lets destiny continue its path. These examples of unforgiveness establish the idea that Heathcliff is an evil human from the beginning who will never be
The ghost of Cathy is not a true spirit, for Lockwood in order to release himself, pulls Cathy's wrist down onto the broken glass causing blood to flow (negative imagery which creates a dark atmosphere),Lockwood's interaction with Catherine's spirit moves him from being an outside observer to an active participant in the plot. The ghost of Catherine acts as a symbol in chapter 3; other symbols in the novel are 'the moors' which of course resemble 'Heathcliff'. One of the most obvious things that some might notice when analysing 'Wuthering Heights' is that the dark descriptive language is used to create or darken the tone and atmosphere of the book, an example is during Lockwood's dream when the preacher shouts out, "Drag him down and crush him to atoms", that quote is no doubt negative and reflects the moods of the characters, such as Heathcliff. Furtherly a quote which shows negative and gothic imagery is when Lockwood describes cutting Catherine on the glass, he says, "I pulled its wrist on to the
Heathcliff is characterized “as dark almost as if it [Heathcliff] came from the devil.” (45) Throughout Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff is treated poorly and is mainly a product of a troubled childhood. This man then manifests into a person that is hardly capable of holding back his impetuous actions, and, therefore, exemplifies the capacity of the most powerful emotions. Although he may not be the ideal protagonist, it is ultimately not his fault and in the end is defined by the events in the story. Due to the extreme emotional and physical pain endured throughout his life, Heathcliff exhibits the strongest love and hate towards others through passion and revenge.