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What Is Heathcliff's Abuse Of Power

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In Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, Catherine's death unleashes powerful emotions in both Hindley and Heathcliff that result in a bloody conflict from which Heathcliff emerges the true master of Thrushcross Grange. Though there are many different kinds of masters, in Wuthering Heights, masters are the people with power; the power that people like Hindley are born to have, and people like Heathcliff strive to gain. Hindley and Heathcliff have struggled for power ever since Hindley’s father brought Heathcliff home, and in chapter 17, Heathcliff finally wins their lifelong war. During Isabella’s narration, she recounts that, after having tried and failed to kill Heathcliff, who in return hit him in the face with a rock, “[Hindley] had fallen senseless… [Heathcliff] kicked and trampled him… He exerted preterhuman self-denial in abstaining from …show more content…

His weak condition and lack of allies makes his attempt on Heathcliff’s life useless, and, in return, Heathcliff takes the last of his dignity and, with it, the remainder of his power. Heathcliff rules through fear just as Hindley did, making even his wife too afraid to run away, and he uses this fear to overtake Hindley. Even his abstinence from “finishing him completely” (103) shows that Heathcliff has completely removed all of Hindley’s influence from Thrushcross Grange. He doesn’t need to physically kill him, because he has effectively cut off any influence Hindley once had over Thrushcross Grange, and reduced him to virtually nothing. Though Heathcliff has taken everything but Hindley’s life, he doesn’t stop there. Once Hindley dies, Heathcliff becomes “...the master of Wuthering Heights: he held firm possession, and proved to the attorney - who, in his turn, proved it to Mr. Linton - that Earnshaw had mortgaged every yard of land he owned for cash to supply his mania for gaming; and he, Heathcliff, was the mortgagee”

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