Wuthering Heights Character Analysis

1592 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Analysis of wuthering heights

In the winter of 1801, a man named Lockwood pays a visit to his landlord Mr. Heathcliff, who lives at Wuthering Heights. Lockwood finds Mr. Heathcliff strange and wants to learn more about him. When he gets back to his home at Thrushcross Grange, he asks his house keeper, Nelly, to tell the story of Heathcliff, which he writes in his diary.

She narrates his history and that of the estates through the present, and then Lockwood leaves and returns to the complete the novel.

Nelly starts her story with her childhood working as a servant in Wuthering Heights. Mr. Earns haw, the owner of the Heights, goes to Liverpool, and returns with an orphan boy, Heathcliff. The Earns haw children, Hindley and Catherine, do not like Heathcliff, but Catherine quickly comes to love him. Three years later, Mr. Earns haw dies and Hindly inherits the Heights. Hindly still dislikes Heathcliff, and puts him to work as a laborer. Catherine and Heathcliff sneak off one night to the Grange to make fun of Edgar and Isabella Linton, the snobbish children who live there. Catherine gets bitten by a dog, and is forced to stay at the Grange until she gets better. By the time Catherine comes back, she is a proper young lady and Edgar proposes to her. She loves Heathcliff, but she wants to be with Edgar because he is rich. Heathcliff, hearing this, runs away and does not come back for three years.

When he returns, he immediately sets about seeking revenge on all who have wronged him. Handily has a drinking problem and has no money. Heathcliff pays for the Heights and soon after Handily dies, and Heathcliff inherits the manor. He finds out Isabella Linton likes him so he marries her and treats her very cruelly, so he can inherit the Grange. Catherine becomes ...

... middle of paper ...

...t the beginning of the novel. It was the quote that started it all. Mr. Lockwood was curious about Catherine and goes to find out abut her. Most of the story is about Catherine. “The ledge, where I placed my candle, had a few mildewed books piled in the corner, and it was covered with writing scratched on the paint. This writing, however, was nothing but a name repeated in all kinds of characters large of small-Catherine Earnshaw here and there varied to Catherine Heathcliff, and then again to Catherine Linton [. . .] I lent my head against the window, and continued over spelling over Catherine Earnshaw Heathcliff-Linton, till my eyes closed; but they had not rested five minutes, when a glare of white letters started from the dark” (19).

Works Cited

“Emily Brontë.” Answers.com. Who2 Biography.1998-2009. 27 August 2009

Show More
Related

  • Character Analysis Of Wuthering Heights

    995 Words  | 2 Pages

    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

    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

  • Selfishness in "Wuthering Heights"

    797 Words  | 2 Pages

    Linton Heathcliff is only interested in himself. He is a sickly and scared young man. Like his mother Isabella Linton who accused Catherine Earnshaw of selfishly wanting Heathcliff for herself – in which she didn't- Linton enjoys inflicting and watching people suffer. As Heathcliff threatened to kill Linton, Linton only thought about his own life and, decided to betray Cathy, tricking her into staying at Wuthering Heights and getting married to him, instead of returning to Thurshcross Grange to where her father lies on his deathbed.

    Read More

  • The Unwanted Villain in Wuthering Heights

    1113 Words  | 3 Pages

    Emily Bronte, the author of Wuthering Heights, had a very unfortunate life as a young lady being raised in a very meager life style, she was a very reserved girl, and during her life only wrote one novel, its characteristic of a passionate romantic love story, this novel construct both the anger and madness of love. Ms. Bronte does not take any guide from what she lived to this story but solely imagines a love affair which turns Heathcliff, the main character mad. Heathcliff renounces his footing of love due to her damsel wanting something better in life. However, the wait which Catherine the child, the girl, the woman for whom Heathcliff loves and cares deeply about, renounces her love for him while speaking to Allen Dean, Nelly. Nelly, one of the servants, is always in every ones business, although she makes a lot of favoritism her opinion le...

    Read More

  • Events that Affect Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights

    398 Words  | 1 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Heathcliff's Personality in Wuthering Heights

    1023 Words  | 3 Pages

    Now with victory over Hindley achieved and Edgar retreated in sorrow, the violent aspect of the. revenge gives way to patience and legal guile. To complete his revenge over the Lintons, Heathcliff employs these latter tactics. the marriage between Linton and Catherine is patiently contrived. The question of succession, shrewdly investigated, his guardianship over.

    Read More

  • The presentation of Mr. Lockwood in Wuthering Heights The novel,

    820 Words  | 2 Pages

    Mr. Lockwood, a somewhat vain and presumptuous gentleman deals very clumsily with the inhabitants of Wuthering Heights. He finds himself at a loss when he witnesses the strange household’s disregard for the social conventions that have always structured their world. As a narrator, his vanity and unfamiliarity with the story occasionally. lead him to misunderstand events. His initial visit to Wuthering. Heights, in which the mysterious relationships and lurking resentments.

    Read More

  • Physical and Emotional Destruction in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

    1246 Words  | 3 Pages

    Often the lifestyles of a person and those around them are affected by one's concern for his/her own welfare and neglect of others. This attitude is a reflection of self-love and a feeling of self-righteousness. In the novel, Wuthering Heights , Emily Brontë describes the lifestyles of late 18th century and early 19th century rural England emphasizing selfishness. From the very beginning, there is an obvious tension between the households at Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange. The Heights is the house of the Earnshaws: Mr. and Mrs. Earnshaw, Catherine, Hindley and later Linton and Hareton. The Grange is inhabited by the Lintons: Mr. and Mrs. Linton, Edgar and Isabella. This tension begins with the arrival of Heathcliff, a gypsy orphan. The Earnshaw family, minus Mr. Earnshaw, resents the presence of Heathcliff for he has captured the master's heart. After Mr. Earnshaw's death only one person enjoys Heathcliff's company -- Catherine Earnshaw. The rest of the novel explains how the lives of Catherine and Heathcliff effect everyone around them. Through nightmares, dreams, narration and actions, these characters' tumultuous affairs come alive and seem almost real. Unfortunately, selfishness motivates these characters in their attempts to enjoy life. This selfishness can destroy even the most fortunate.

    Read More

  • Catherine Earnshaw

    804 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • A Comparison of Wuthering Heights and Heart of Darkness

    841 Words  | 2 Pages

    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...

    Read More

  • Nelly’s Importance in Wuthering Heights

    2073 Words  | 5 Pages

    ...he was able to interpret the events of her life, and for the first time tell a visitor of everything that has gone on. Since Nelly’s life was not personally haunted by regrets, like Catherine and Heathcliff’s, she is able to recite the past and present in a clear and rational way. Lockwood believes her story and is so intrigued by all the dreadful events that took place across a lifetime on these Yorkshire moors. From the outside looking in it may appear that the Earnshaws and Lintons were just a private family living their lives, but nobody really knows what goes on behind closed doors, except for the help, our Nelly. This is why her narration is crucial and without it, the story of Wuthering Heights may still exist, but would not be as believable.

    Read More

  • Tragic Family Relationships in Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

    1031 Words  | 3 Pages

    After falling in love with Catherine .She reject him for Edgar Linton who has money and status. Heathcliff run away with Isabella Edgar sister. Heathcliff becomes wealthy and respected. He takes over Wuthering Heights and Thrush cross Grange Heathcliff love Catherine in the story, although he is driven to revenge as he cannot have her.

    Read More

  • Class and Gender in Wuthering Heights

    698 Words  | 2 Pages

    Heathcliff's character parallels with the qualities possessed by The Heights; he is depicted as a member of lower class and does not have the qualities necessary to live at Thrushcross Grange. Cold, dark, and...

    Read More

  • How Is Heathcliff A Gothic Hero

    965 Words  | 2 Pages

    Furthermore, the heartbreaking separation between the two upon Catherine’s death and the ultimate downfall of Heathcliff as a character. Innocent at first when arriving to Wuthering Heights with Mr. Earnshaw, he was forced to however face the mistreatment of Hindley, humiliated, beaten , and kept filthy. The only light in his life is Cathy, the daughter of the Earnshaw household, with whom he makes a pact to love they will love each other into eternity. But she grows up, goes off to become a lady, and he is left alone and in despair. This despair is only worsened upon Catherine’s death.

    Read More

  • The Relationship Between Hindley And Heathcliff

    923 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, the Earnshaws, a middle class family, live at the estate, Wuthering Heights. When Mr. Earnshaw takes a trip to Liverpool, he returns with an orphan whom he christens “Heathcliff”. During their formative years, Catherine, Mr. Earnshaw’s daughter, plays with Heathcliff on the moors and becomes close with him. As a result, they form a special bond and Heathcliff and Catherine fall in love, unlike Hindley, Mr. Earnshaw’s son, who does not get along with Heathcliff. While Heathcliff benefits from his relationships, his connections are disadvantaged in terms of status, reputation, financial stability, and happiness.

    Read More

More about Wuthering Heights Character Analysis

Open Document