The Power of Love in Wuthering Heights Essay

Though Bronte’s star-cross lovers have seemly bend gender roles, with Catherine exhibiting more masculine traits and Heathcliff with feminine, their relationship still epitomize Beauvoir’s views on the gender dual standard in relationships. The mysterious and untamed disposition of Heathcliff drew Catherine to him, they were very much a like and had a strong connection from childhood. As this love grew it became a part very much of them. However, despite their similar personalities, they were not equals. She modifies herself for love. Catherine went against her independent character and rejected herself to be one with Heathcliff. While, he remains the same. Heathcliff never truly sees Catherine as his equal, he persists on being the superior. Though he has called her his existence on numerous occasions, Heathcliff never refers to himself as Catherine. His love stems from his obsession to possess her and her adoration. Like, the slave owner, he is the master who needs his slave to perpetuate his superiority, she is a conquest to be collected. Ergo, as Heathcliff was losing Catherine to the clutches of death, he exclaims that would never forget her because she is his existence (Bronte 124). A master

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte was published in 1847 and received many contradictory judgements. One main judgement that criticized the novel was how multiple characters can have a change in characterization depending on the reader. Many of the novel's characters, such as Heathcliff, possess positive values, but readers tend to focus on their negative qualities which allows these characters to change. Growing up poor and homeless, Heathcliff’s character changes many times throughout the novel as he grows older and possess negative qualities towards other characters. Later residing as an old, lonely master, Heathcliff’s change in character at the end of Wuthering Heights signifies that he has gone mad and leads to intentions that Heathcliff has not committed suicide, but lost all will after all he has been through.

Things do not appear to go Heathcliff’s way after the death of his father, as Hindley can now enact his vengeance on Heathcliff without interference. This, however, is the least of his concern. Catherine leaves Heathcliff not long after these events to marry Edgar Linton. Edgar had money and prestige, two things that Heathcliff did not have to offer. Greed has now consumed Heathcliff, as he flees town in an attempt to accumulate as much worth as possible. He returns successful, and this leads to another change in his traits.

"What is it to you?" he growled. "I have a right to kiss her, if she chooses, and you have no right to object. I am not your husband: you needn't be jealous of me!"( Bronte’s Chapter 11). In this quote, Heathcliff has sought his revenge on Catherine, for snubbing him, and Edgar, for always dismissing him, by marrying Isabella. This act of revenge paves the way for future divisions between Heathcliff and the Lintons. It also further damages Catherine and Heathcliff as they adjust to life without each other. The deepening pain they experience adds intensity to their passionate fall out later in the

Before Heathcliff gained his wealth, Catherine told Ellen that “it would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he’s handsome, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I am” (Brontё 69). Catherine uses Edgar’s marriage proposal to stay comfortable in a lifestyle like the one she grew up in, never expecting Heathcliff to gain considerable wealth. When Heathcliff returned to Wuthering Heights, Catherine’s resentment towards her new marriage to Edgar and continuation of her romance with Heathcliff demonstrates the theme of love causing hate. Even though Catherine appears pernicious through her bullying of Edgar, Catherine’s missed opportunity to marry Heathcliff after he attained wealth rouses sympathy for the forbidden

Also adding to the fact that the two manors are better understood as two different worlds. Even though Catherine grew up in Heathcliff’s world, her move has caused her to change making their love impossible to pursue. Since then, she comes to spend more time with Edgar while cutting time to be with Heathcliff. She explains to Nelly her reasons for taking Edgars hand in marriage “the ground under his feet, and the air over his head, and every- thing he touches, and every word he says—I love all his looks, and all his actions, and him entirely, and altogether” (Bronte) It is undeniable that her love for Edgar is based off his prestige and not entirely for who he is.

To start with, Catherine and Heathcliff now have a different point of view in respect to the way they treat each other. For example, Catherine “burst into laugh” and started joking around with him, she showed enthusiasm and joy seeing him after being apart. Furthermore, in consequence to Catherine’s way of joking, he got upset at the way in which Catherine joked with him. As an effect, the way he got upset gave an impression of the relationship they had developed. Their relationship resulted in a bitter, petulant, and conserved relation. Because of Heathcliff’s different point of view than that of Catherine’s, their relationship resulted to be bitter and as if Heathcliff was resentful

In this passage from Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, Catherine reveals her love for Heathcliff to her maid, Nelly. Unbeknownst to Catherine, Heathcliff was audience to the most detrimental part of her speech, in which she proclaims it would “degrade” her to marry him. Love is not the same for everyone, and Catherine, an unconventional character, realizes sometimes soulmates comes from non-traditional places. Catherine couldn’t be with her soulmate, Heathcliff, because of his lesser social position. Her pleading, desperate tone in this passage is a testament to the deep level of her love for Heathcliff and how badly she wants to be with him, but can’t because their marriage wouldn’t be commonplace. Catherine compares her two lovers, Edgar

Catherine tries to make Heathcliff jealous by going with Edgar a few years after he fleed the country. When Catherine and Heathcliff were little she would try to have some power over him. When Catherine sees him after being away for five weeks she starts laughing and making fun of him “ Why , how very black and cross you look! And how-how funny and grim! But that’s because i’m used to Edgar and Isabella.

While Catherine’s intention for marrying Edgar may be to help her true love, Heathcliff does not perceive it this way. He feels that Catherine has betrayed her own affections for him. By marrying Edgar, Catherine has compromised her undying love for Heathcliff. Her words of love mean nothing to Heathcliff if she cannot express them in action. As a result of this, Heathcliff swears revenge against Edgar, the one who has stolen his precious Catherine from him.

This leads to him running away from the heights entirely, leaving Catherine to marry Edgar. “He had listened till he heard Catherine say it would degrade her to marry him.” (81). Upon his return (two years later), Heathcliff marries Isabella to get back at Catherine, and her speech about how marrying him would degrade her. Isabella is also taken against her and her family’s will. Heathcliff kidnaps her and locks her away at the heights. In a letter written to Nelly, Isabella confirms that it was truly against her will for her leaving, and that she cannot return in the time of crisis in her brother’s life. “… an entreaty for kind remembrance and reconciliation, if her proceeding offended him: asserting that she could not help it then, and being done, no power to repeal it.” (140). In the act of kidnapping Isabella, Heathcliff’s intent is to hurt Catherine. Catherine would develop almost a jealous-like temper towards the whole situation, as Heathcliff knew it would. Even on Catherine’s deathbed, there is a constant push and pull (in almost a literal sense) of the cruelty that goes on between the two of them. Between the crying, the vexing, and the constant apologies, comes the brutal cruelty of the words Catherine speaks to Heathcliff. “I shall not pity you, not I. You have killed me – and thriven on it, I think.” (164)

The gothic and often disturbing Wuthering Heights is Emily Bronte’s classic novel that contains undeniably powerful writing that created her timeless love story. Andrea Arnold transformed her masterpiece into a cinematic rendition to recreate the wild and passionate story of the deep and destructive love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff.

Living in a permanent state of childhood with Heathcliff, she displays ridiculous amounts of immaturity for her age, including temper tantrums, crying fits, and self-induced illness (Apter 178). She is overcome with intense jealousy, such as displayed in declaring Isabella’s affection for Heathcliff to everyone shortly after finding it out. Catherine’s immaturity eventually manifests into prolonged symptoms that affect her mental and physical health. “Once she has passed childhood, and her inability to integrate her emotions into her behavior shows its poisoning effects, she actually longs for her own death. The desire to return to childhood, the wish for regression and stagnation…” (Apter 179). These childlike attributes are what fuel her deviousness and natural tendency towards manipulation for the men in her life, for in the corrupted immaturity that inhabits her as a grown woman, she sadistically finds joy in the suffering of others. Catherine taunts Heathcliff with images of himself visiting her grave with wife and children, blames Heathcliff and Edgar for her death, and continues to see Heathcliff even though her husband Edgar explicitly tells her not to. She lives halfway between two romances with an “incapacity for significant action”, refraining from complete commitment to either man, and revels in their suffering at not having her entirely (Beversluis 71). It was

Catherine Earnshaw, a very complex character, happens to be fond of Heathcliff, whom was brought home by Mr. Earnshaw. Catherine’s love for Heathcliff was described by Nelly Dean as, “She was much too fond of Heathcliff. The greatest punishment we could invent for her was to keep her separate from him” (Brontë 37). Later on in her life she was proposed to by Edgar Linton, the rich young gentleman of Thrushcross Grange. She had decided to accept him despite her emotions towards Heathcliff. Catherine then chose to tell Nelly that she had accepted the proposal and that she cannot decide if she had made the right decision. At her age, Catherine should have felt the happiest she has even been after Edgar’s proposal, but her emotions toward Heathcliff change all that. And in

Catherine’s love for Heathcliff is deeply passionate, but ultimately all-consuming and destructive. Even as a child, Catherine is “much too fond of Heathcliff” (42). As she grows older, her affections for Heathcliff deepen and she eventually comes to believe her “great miseries in this world have been Heathcliff’s miseries” and that “he is more [her]self than” she is (80-81). Catherine’s ability to empathize with Heathcliff’s “miseries” reveals her deep emotional connection to him, as the events of the rest of the novel do not portray her as an especially empathetic character. Additionally, rather than saying Heathcliff is her “other half,” a more traditional statement, Catherine claims Heathcliff is more herself than she is, introducing the all-consuming nature of their love. After Catherine and Heathcliff are reunited following Heathcliff’s three year absence, Edgar and Heathcliff passionately argue; Catherine subsequently becomes violently ill. Her condition rapidly deteriorates and during her final moments with Heathcliff, Catherine proclaims he “[has] killed” her (157). Catherine herself acknowledges that her illness and impending death result from her love for