Choose a recurrent image that you have noticed and list 2-3 instances of it. Offer a sentence or two of explanation as to how it interacts with the novel’s larger thematic interests.
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Choose a recurrent image that you have noticed and list 2-3 instances of it. Offer a sentence or two of explanation as to how it interacts with the novel’s larger thematic interests.
Comments are closed.
I’m testing “chat” vs “general” posts…
A recurrent image I’ve noticed throughout the novel, thus far, has been the metaphorical and literal delineation of a stormy atmosphere. The name of the titular manor, Wuthering Heights, certainly has the reader subconsciously associating it with feelings of tumult, disorder, and instability. As has been made self-evident in accordance to Mrs. Dean’s storytelling sessions with Lockwood, the manor housed innumerable heated exchanges between Hindley and Heathcliff, with inheritance of the estate often being the underlying catalyst for their ideological clashes. This came to a fever pitch when, in Chapter 17, an envious, drunken Hindley attempted to murder Heathcliff with a knife-pistol, not long after Catherine Linton’s funeral. What followed was a severe retaliation by a distressed Heathcliff that left Hindley virtually unconscious on the floor, all while a blizzard was raging outside. Furthermore, whenever Catherine’s presence was in a state of decline or melancholy, most notably her ghostly intrusion on Lockwood earlier in the novel and the intrafamilial fights of the Earnshaws that ensued as a biproduct of her untimely demise, what accompanied these events was inclement weather. It was as though her very soul had manifested itself in the climate of the region.
This is a good choice of image, Paul, with great examples! I think Bronte makes all sorts of parallels among her different story levels with lots of images–here, I think of the way the weather drove the plot in the opening Lockwood scenes.
Even though I also chose storms as an image to discuss, I seem to have thought about them a little differently! I thought of the events of the novel as being influenced by the weather, so it was really interesting to think of the weather as being a manifestation of the characters’ emotional states instead. I’m glad you brought it up!
A recurring image I’ve noticed was of fireplaces and how it reveals something emotional for the characters. Catherine and Heathcliff realized that their father had died peacefully in his sleep by a fireplace. Mrs. Dean noted, as she had lead Heathcliff by a fireplace, just how much he had changed and matured. Finally, after Isabella goes to Wuthering Heights after marrying Heathcliff, she sees just how decrepit the house had become under the light of the fireplace. What this does for the novel is create a sense of drama in how the characters begin to see how what they’ve known has changed. These instance also occur as the characters undergo a surprising development in their lives.
I love this detail–interesting that fireplaces are places of domesticity and calm, while fire imagery itself in the novel evokes the idea of HELL.
One of the recurring images I noticed in the novel is the fall of the high standing characters who eventually pay a price for such privilege and fall down in some way. Even those who have risen will go down (Heathcliff). It reminds me a three that will let its leaves to shine trough the spring and summer and then let them go in the fall. This will happen every year. Interestingly enough the character of Nelly, who’s actually sits pretty low (like a root of that three), happens to be the most stable. As a matter of fact she is the one who lives longer and tells her story. She knows all the characters and what they’ve done.
There is a lot of emphasis placed on the importance of weather, and in particular, raging storms, in Wuthering Heights. The first storm in the novel forces Lockwood to spend the night at Wuthering Heights (leading to his encounter with the ghost of Catherine). Another instance occurs on the night that Heathcliff runs away from the manor; Nelly describes it as being so violent and destructive that it reminds her of a great biblical storm, and fears that God is passing judgement on her and the other residents of Wuthering Heights. The final storm described in the novel occurs at the same time as Hindley’s violent confrontation with Heathcliff. The way that climactic plot points seem to coincide with dramatic, violent, weather, seems to imply that weather, and by extent nature, have some effect on the emotions and actions of the characters. The state of nature seems to be inextricable from the state of humanity.
I love your final sentence here in particular! I’m reminded of Hobbes’s idea that life is “nasty, brutish, and short” in the state of nature.
That must be the scene where Catherine and Heathcliff reunited. He embraced and kissed this woman he loved with his life with a tenderness he had never seen before. Although she is not good looking anymore. This was the tenderness and affection first seen on this man, just like Hindley treats his wife with the same devotion.
I think this is one of the climaxes of the novel. In this whole novel, everyone is struggling in the dark reality. But every character has a love in their hearts that supports them through their life.
True to the Victorian era, Wuthering Heights has many gothic themes that haunt the novel. There is a lot of superstitions, especially ghosts. There is also a distinction between people who fear God, ghosts, hell, and the like, versus people who don’t. The people who respect the dead and the people who don’t. Heathcliff is one who seems to dance the line between reality and horror, unafraid of his own death and the idea of hell for the things he does on earth without Catherine. The first instance is the ghost of Catherine, who haunts Lockwood in his dreams in chapter 2. While most would cower away at this omen, Heathcliff opens the window and screams, “Come to me, Cathy!” In chapter 16, upon hearing of Catherine’s death, Heathcliff agonizingly exclaims, “Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living; you said I killed you—haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be with me always—take any form—drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!’” Torturous.
Page 40 in my edition:
“[O]nly, afterwards, show him what you are, *imp of Satan*”
Page 67
“And, truly, it appeared as if the lad were possessed of something *diabolical* at that period.”
Page 138
“Is Mr Heathcliff a man? If so, is he mad? And if not, is he a *devil*?”
The novel overall has a dark, creepy tone to it and it is not surprising that they often make comparisons to the devil. However, it always aligns with Heathcliff. Heathcliff is consistently compared to the devil and it is curious to consider whether it is because Heathcliff is a person of color. It can be birthed from a racist mindset or the simple inclination that darkness/black is associated with the devil and because Heathcliff is not fair-skinned, Brontë associates him with the devil to keep the tone up.
I agree that there are many instances where the idea of “evil” is associated with Heathcliff in ways that is not associated with other characters. Nelly even refers to him as an “evil beast” whose arrival at the Grunge comes with a hidden motive to “spring and destroy” the structure the Lintons have carefully cultivated since Catherine married into their family.
“But it was one of their chief amusements to run away to the moors in the morning and remain there all day” (37)
“In the morning, he rose early; and, as it was a holiday, carried his ill-humour onto the moors, not reappearing till the family were departed for church. Fasting and reflection seems to have brought him to a better spirit” (44)
The moors are representative of a sanctuary between Thrushcross Grange and Wuthering Heights in which Catherine and Heathcliff are most at peace. Out in the moors they are able to exist away from societal norms and expectations, allowing a sense of freedom while their relationship cultivates away from prying eyes.
A recurrent image that I’ve noticed has been dogs. Brontë has used dog attacks multiple times to advance the plot. Twice, she has used dog attacks to introduce characters, first when Mr. Lockewood was attacked and we met the main cast, then when Cathy and Heathcliff were attacked and we met the Lintons. The use of dog attacks allows Brontë to easily force characters to stay in place advancing the story AND forcing character development.
A recurrent image I noticed was the description of characters using flora. In one instance, Nelly describes Catherine’s move to the Grunge as, “It was not the thorn bending to the honeysuckles, but the honeysuckles embracing the thorn,” (72). Catherine is a coarse character, with the inability to be accommodating to her new family. Meanwhile, the Lintons still accept Catherine despite her informality and lack of class, which Nelly looks down on her for. In Chapter 14, there is another instance of floral imagery, when Heathcliff says, “He might as well plant an oak in a flower-pot, and expect it to thrive…in the soil of his shallow cares?” (120). Catherine is unwell and her husband is incapable of taking care of her properly. As Heathcliff says earlier, Mr. Linton nurses her to health not out of real concern to his wife, but out of a custom of duty and charity. This points to the idea that class and etiquette are prized in their society rather than something such as Heathcliff’s genuine love for Catherine.