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Literary criticism of Wuthering Heights
Discuss the theme of revenge in Wuthering Heights
Discuss the theme of revenge in Wuthering Heights
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Heathcliff in Bronte's Wuthering Heights Heathcliff is the man with a desire for revenge, which means we should hate him; or should we? In the novel Heathcliff does search for revenge in anyone who has done him harm, or in some cases punishes somebody else in order to seek revenge on others. This is just one of many reasons why you could indeed hate Heathcliff, but there is another side to him. At certain places in the novel you do sympathise with him, as at times what he is put through is very tough. Through out the novel there are many ways in which we could hate Heathcliff but also times where we could sympathise with him for his words and actions he takes. At the start of the novel Mr Earnshaw brings Heathcliff into the story. He is picked up by Mr Earnshaw on his trip to Liverpool and brings Heathcliff back with him. This is one of the first times we feel sympathy for Heathcliff. The description of him was, " A dirty, ragged, black-haired child." He's a lonely orphan who needs to be loved and this makes him seem like a poor little innocent child in some ways deceiving the reader. Mr Earnshaw's two children take to Heathcliff very differently. Catherine likes him and their relationship becomes very intense; Whereas Hindley does not take to Heathcliff very well at all. He hates him and despises him. The reason he does this is because his father (Mr Earnshaw) treats Heathcliff very well, if so better than he does Hindley. He victimises and degrades him with his actions and language. "He would stand Hindley's blows without winking or shredding a tear." This makes the reader believe that Hindley is the violent, jeal... ... middle of paper ... ... Heathcliff's character. After Catherine's death, his desire for revenge destroys all those around him as well himself in the end. Heathcliff is like a catalyst, in that he seems to change everyone around him. The reader looks upon his strong role throughout the novel in different ways. In the conclusion of the novel your hatred for him dies down. This is because you realise that all along all he really wanted was to be with Catherine, but as she hurts him along the way, his lust for revenge becomes too powerful. I believe that some of his actions he takes make us repel and hate him, but his past and poor childhood makes us as the readers sympathise with him. Once him and Catherine are both dead, they are reunited in the afterlife and although it's a very morbid event the sense of happiness is there and always will be.
The initial downward spiral of Heathcliff’s life was predominantly caused by harsh influences in the environment in which he was raised. Heathcliff, an adopted child, grew up in Wuthering Heights, a desolate and dystopian estate when compared to the beauty of the neighboring Thrushcross Grange. In childhood, Heathcliff displayed evidence of a sympathetic personality through his emotional attachment to Catherine and kind attitude towards Nelly. At the time of Mr. Earnshaw’s death, Nelly describes a scene where, “Miss Cathy had been sick, and that made her still; she
Heathcliff is a character who was abused in his childhood by Catherine’s brother, Hindley, because of his heritage as a “gypsy”, and Hindley was jealous of the love that Heathcliff got from Mr. Earnshaw, Hindley’s father. This is also selfishness upon Hindley’s part since he only wanted his father’s love for his sister and himself. So to reprimand Heathcl...
Discuss the portrayal of Heathcliff and Hareton Earnshaw in WutheringHeights. Are they products of nature or nurture? I am going to look at the nature and nurture of both Hareton Earnshaw and Heathcliff, of Emily Brontë's 'Wuthering Heights', and try to decide whether these two characters are products of their nature or their nurture. A person's nature is the way they are born, their 'raw state of mind', the parts of their character unaffected by outside influence. A person's nurture is the way they are brought up, and they way they are influenced and shaped by society.
Primarily, Heathcliff's hunger for revenge blindsides the character’s, Hindley, Catherine, Hareton, and young Catherine. Revenge is what Heathcliff wishes to
Hindley, being the only biological son of Mr Earnshaw was envious of the relationship shared between Mr Earnshaw and Heathcliff and burned with fury. He made no effort to hide his resentment toward Heathcliff. Hindley despised Heathcliff to such an extent that when Mr Earnshaw died, he treated Heathcliff more like a servant and for bided him to talk to Catherine. Life then became miserable for Heathcliff and then became revenge driven. Hindley’s abusive and arrogant attitude toward Heathcliff, resulted in the chain of revengeful events that occurred in the novel. Hindley was instrumental in moulding Heathcliff into the destructive character he became.
Isolation is a powerful force. Human beings live, work, and play in groups, and to be separate from the whole of humanity can disorient us, debilitate us, and even make us question our place in the world. Isolation is easily confused with other forms of aloneness such as loneliness and alienation, but the condition of being isolated requires that one be detached from others through reasons not in one’s control. This can be taken into context as to why Heathcliff’s feelings of revenge for basically everyone at Wuthering Heights. His feelings overshadowed and clouded his judgement and made him a bitter man, isolating him from those who he once held dear. Heathcliff’s great natural abilities, strength of character, and love for Catherine Earnshaw all enable him to raise himself from humble beginnings to the status of a wealthy gentleman, but his need to revenge himself for Hindley’s abuse and Catherine’s betrayal leads him into a twisted life of cruelty and hatred.
From the beginning of the novel and most likely from the beginning of Heathcliff's life, he has suffered pain and rejection. When Mr. Earnshaw brings him to Wuthering Heights, he is viewed as a thing rather than a child. Mrs. Earnshaw was ready to fling it out the doors, while Nelly put it on the landing of the stairs hoping that it would be gone the next day. Without having done anything to deserve rejection, Heathcliff is made to feel like an outsider. Following the death of Mr. Earnshaw, Heathcliff suffers cruel mistreatment at the hands of Hindley. In these tender years, he is deprived of love, friendship, and education, while the treatment from jealous Hindley is barbaric and disrupts his mental balance. He is separated from the family, reduced to the status of a servant, undergoes regular beatings and forcibly separated from his soul mate, Catherine. The personality that Heathcliff develops in his adulthood has been formed in response to these hardships of his childhood.
Catherine Earnshaw is the daughter of Mr. Earnshaw and his wife; Catherine falls powerfully in love with Heathcliff, the orphan Mr. Earnshaw brings home from Liverpool. She was born at Wuthering Heights and was raised with her brother Hindley. Catherine loves Heathcliff so intensely that she claims they are the same person but does not marry him because Hindley has degraded him after their father's death so her desire for social advancement motivates her to marry Edgar Linton instead, a neighbour from Thrushcross Grange and he is handsome and rich, another reason for Catherine marrying him. She is quite passionate about Heathcliff though, and does not want to give him up. She becomes ill when Heathcliff and Edgar fight, and dies in childbirth.
Heathcliff never finds peace through his revenge. In fact, the only time he truly finds happiness is when he gives up his plan for retaliation. Austin O’Malley states “Revenge is like biting a dog that bit you” (O’malley 1). O’Malley’s quote reflects Heathcliff’s immature need to propagate agony in those who have offended him. Heathcliff’s plan for revenge on Edgar and Catherine is to marry Isabella, who is ignorant of love and of men because she has never experienced either. He wants to hurt Edgar because of his marriage to Catherine, and he wants to get revenge on Catherine by making her jealous. Catherine’s death proves that this flawed plan of repayment helps nothing. Heathcliff, haunted by the ghost of Catherine because he is her “murderer,” still is motivated by the need for revenge and tries to get young Cathy away from Edgar by having her marry his son, Linton. Heathcliff never finds peace until he gives up his plan for revenge just before he dies. When Heathcliff gives up his plan for revenge, he meets Catherine in death and truly becomes happy once more.
Pamela Gonzalez April 10, 2014 Dr. Yoder English 210A: The Novel. Wuthering Heights Symbols are in which someone chooses to be visualized and the setting within which someone’s portrait is placed can communicate to us about that person’s personality and objectives, how they like to be seen and/or the period in which they lived. Wuthering Heights is a quarantined building on the hills in the West Riding of Yorkshire. “Wuthering Heights is the name of Mr. Heathcliff’s dwelling ‘Wuthering’ being a significant provincial adjective, descriptive of the atmospheric tumult to which its station is exposed in stormy weather" (Emily Bronte pg.2).
Although, Mr. Earnshaw tried to make Heathcliff an equal part of the family, Heathcliff never truly fits in. Heathcliff is from a completely different social class than the rest of his “family”. This led to the hatred that Hindley felt towards Heathcliff. Hindley robs Heathcliff of his education, forces him to work as a servant at Wuthering Heights and frequently beats him. Throughout this all, Heathcliff never complains.
His strong, merciless hate towards others is a result of the events that occurred in his childhood. “I’m trying to settle how I shall pay Hindley back.I don’t care how long I wait, if I could only do it at last. I hope he will not die before I do!” (69) Because of all the torturous things Hindley did to Heathcliff back when they were children, “Hindley had blamed our father for treating Heathcliff too liberally; and swears he will reduce him to the right place,” (30) he hopes Hindley will not die before him just so he can carry out his revenge-driven plan. He is shaped by what has happened in his life previously which then causes meticulous actions that signify his intense hate towards everyone at Wuthering Heights. Although it is essentially not his own fault, some argue that there is no excuse for Heathcliff to act vindictively. In contrast, though, the psychological problems that he experienced have hand-crafted Heathcliff into the person he is. “It expressed, plainer than words could do, the intensest anguish at having made himself the instrument of thwarting his own revenge.” (58) This only adds to the complete and serious hatred he has for everyone that even saving his nephew from falling from the balcony was a thwart to his own revenge. The audience can conclude based on the characterization of Heathcliff as malicious that he is only focused on
Heathcliff’s arrival at Wuthering Heights impacted him both positively and negatively. Catherine Earnshaw was highly welcoming of him, but her brother Hindley
Not only does revenge highlights important events, but also highlights personality flaws. Heathcliff is convinced that Hindley and Catherine are the reason for his loneliness and how he...
At first, the children of Wuthering Heights (Hindley, Cathy, Nelly) all rejected him for his appearance as a gypsy- they thought of him as knavish, grimy, and uneducated. Despite this, Mr. Earnshaw treated with a certain respect by letting him live as with the Earnshaws while still being an outsider to the family. Yet the spectrum of hostility didn’t end with the children. Mrs. Earnshaw questions her husband’s insight, “asking how [Mr. Earnshaw] could fashion to bring that gipsy brat into the house” when he added another mouth for her to feed at the dinner table. (Chapter 4). Mr. Earnshaw’s attempt to integrate Heathcliff fails once Hindley takes over Wuthering Heights. Despite basically being middle class under Mr. Earnshaw, Hindley takes it on his own to oppress and torture him. Before this, Heathcliff was on a level playing field class wise compared to the Earnshaws. Heathcliff now finds himself as a servant, a laborer working the fields. By subjugating Heathcliff, Hindley drew the line in the sand. Hindley has effectively forced Heathcliff into a lower class, Hindley has colonized