Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

Throughout the Victorian-era novel Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte utilizes religion to examine how a character’s beliefs influence not merely his or her treatment of other characters, but also the decisions that he or she makes and the reasoning behind these decisions. Jane Eyre, on her search for autonomy, searches for God’s guidance when she needs Him most. While Jane has trust in God, and acknowledges that God’s presence is everywhere, she affirms that God gives humans the power to make their own fate. Jane’s view of religion, as well as human nature, is impacted by her relationships with Helen Burns, Mr. Brocklehurst, and St. John, as religion plays a key role in the course of the lives of these three characters. By contrasting the different religious beliefs of Helen, Mr. Brocklehurst, and St. John, and by highlighting the effects of their religious views on their actions and thoughts, Bronte is asserting that a person’s religious beliefs are not consistently a strong measure of that person’s character.

Within the specter of the Gothic fictions arises the atmosphere of gloom, terror, and mystery with some elements of uncanny challenging reality. One major characteristic function of the Gothic fictions is to open the fiction to the realm of the irrational and perverse narratives, obsessions, and nightmarish terrors that hide beneath the literally civilized mindset in order to demonstrate the presence of the uncanny existing in the world known rationally through experience. At certain points, the interactions between the conventions of the Gothic fictions with other thematic, ideological, and/or symbolic functions of the narrative would rather be challenging. However, though the analysis of Jane Eyre written by

The Victorian Era encompassed a time of great discrepancy between the sexes, especially for women. The polarization of gender roles reflected on a basis of gender sexuality where men and women were granted certain advantages and disadvantages. Women were expected to realize a specific position in society based on morals of submission, passivity, and a complete lack of selfishness and independence. Constrictive notions such as these prevent individual expression and expansion. Therefore, while struggling to fill the pre-conceived expectancies of society, one forces true desires and happiness to pass as a scant priority. Charlotte Brontë's Victorian novel, Jane Eyre, explores the significance of individual fulfillment in an oppressive

“This book might have been written by a woman but certainly not a lady.” It is bildungsromane (Triska); a type of novel concerned with the education, development, and maturing of a young protagonist (Dictionary.com). Jane Eyre was a very shy, plain, and reserved person. Even though she had a very plain look she had a passion that wasn’t expected of her (Green). She also had hopes and dreams and aspirations. So I wonder, how might Jane Eyre react to the women of today?

The curious life Emily Bronte, author of Wuthering Heights and a collection of poems, has been highly analyzed alongside those of her sisters and fellow writers, Charlotte and Anne, for decades. Born in 1818, Emily was the fifth of six children born to Patrick and Maria Bronte. Her father was curate of Haworth parsonage in Yorkshire, England, a home for local clergymen, where Emily spent nearly all of her life. The lonely parsonage offered few companions for Bronte besides her family, but included a large library which consumed her childhood. Bronte never married, and much of her later life was filled with caring for her alcoholic brother, Branwell. This solitary life and experience with Branwell seems to have heavily influenced Wuthering Heights, the only novel written by Bronte, which centers on a similar setting of isolated, lonely households and contains a heavily alcoholic character.

Presently, society is constructed in such a way that the upper class and the lower class cannot work to change places unless they are extremely fortunate. The ladder of society has always existed in this manner, and many authors have chosen to explore what pushing the constraints of a set society will do. In Wuthering Heights, a novel by Emily Brontë, the social constraints of the community in which the characters live, are constantly being pushed as the characters change social classes, through marriage and hard work, and in the treatment of other characters. The actions are often motivated by a superficial impression; many interactions between the characters are based on the influence of social classes, and the changes that shift the characters from one social class to another which Brontë occurs as an overlaying theme in the story. Brontë illustrates the differences in the classes using the literary devices of imagery, symbols, dialogue, and irony. A change in the social class for a certain character leads to a change in the interactions with that character.

Belonging, equality, and society verses self are all common ideas in the media. These themes will always be present in the world because humans are always searching for self-actualization, to be treated as equal or better, and to keep self-morals despite pressuring societies. The novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontё explores these themes. Authors tend to write what they know and these themes can reflect how Brontё viewed the world around her. Charlotte Brontё uses Jane Eyre to explore 19th century feminism, sense of belonging and family, and how to keep individual morals when society does not favor those morals.

Jane experiences issues in each of the settings she resides in. In Charlotte Brontë’s novel, Jane Eyre, the Reed family abuses Jane at Gateshead. Similarly, Mr. Brocklehurst harms and strips Jane of her self confidence at Lowood, the institution he manages. After her time at Lowood, Rochester betrays Jane in his home, Thornfield Hall. In order to rid herself of that hurtful emotion, Jane escapes to the Moor house. However, at her supposed sanctuary, St. John, one of the members of the household, takes Jane’s power away. Jane drifts through multiple settings in the plot as a way to cope with the insecurities instilled in her.

Susan Myer’s central argument is that the racial other and stereotypical white woman of the nineteenth century, have both been excluded from social structures and subjected to an oppressive disempowerment of the British empire. She argues that in Wuthering Heights Emily Brontë employs a metaphorical link, an intersection of gender and race, between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff in order to identify their shared limitations and oppression while exploring their potential powers of resistance to social structures of British imperialism. Catherine and Heathcliff are both victims of suppression and subordination, Heathcliff through the expressed superiority of the British empire toward alien or dark races and Catherine through a domestic and

Vengeance at Wuthering Heights Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte, includes character with vengeful motivations during two generations of conflict. The novel exhibits vengeance by Heathcliff towards several people, but his main motives are towards Edgar Linton, who married Catherine Linton, when Heathcliff loved Catherine. Mr. Heathcliff’s evolving vengeance started with Hindley Earnshaw, Catherine’s brother. Edgar Linton despised Heathcliff due to talking harsh to his wife and his daughter. While there are several conflicts in the story, the main conflict is the rivalry between Heathcliff and Edgar Linton.

Robert Stevenson’s gothic adaptation of Jane Eyre (1943) was produced during World War II, where a shift in gender roles saw women move away from their domestic roles and step into men’s roles in the workplace. In critiquing Loira Brosh’s study on Stevenson’s adaptation, Margaret Stetz challenges Brosh’s thoughts on the film being a propaganda piece to see middle-class women give up their paid work and return to the domestic sphere, and claims that when the film was made ‘the industry was desperately trying to draw women into factory and office jobs.’ What is significant in the adaptation is the presence of fear, suspicion, and paranoia that is rooted in the film’s noir style, a reflection of the anxieties brought on by the Second World War.

In Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë explores how Jane wants to find love--not just romantic love but to value and sense of belonging. The book challenges how the language of middle-class love affects the way a character’s self-identity can alter the action, how Jane sees herself later when she found love and sense of belonging as independent women. When Jane was a child she struggles to find her own identity Jane begins to change through her journey once she realizes her own identity and this helps her recognize where she belongs and that she seek independence.

Catherine’s intense love for Heathcliff combined with her attachment to Edgar is the reason for her pain and sickness throughout the novel. When asked by Nellie she says, “My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I 'm well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary.” (Bronte 82). Catherine’s love for these two men, especially Heathcliff, is the reason that many of the conflicts in Wuthering Heights occurred. When Heathcliff overhears Catherine’s decision to marry Edgar and runs away, Catherine waits for him in the cold rain for hours and catches the cold that eventually leads to her death. The fight between Heathcliff and Edgar causes her to go three days without eating and she weakens herself enough to get to the condition she’s in when she dies. Catherine battles with her decisions and feels deep emotions for both men. She marries Edgar, and despite their happiness, the relationship lacks the intense love that she feels with Heathcliff, as heard when she tells Nelly, “If all else perished and he [Heathcliff] remained, I should still continue to be; and, if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the Universe would turn to a mighty stranger” (Bronte 81). However, when she is with Heathcliff, the passion is what hurts her the most, as the two lovers juggle anger and joy because love and hate are so closely linked. Catherine’s love and

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brönte voiced the radical opinions of Brönte on religion, gender, and social class. Jane Eyre, a young orphan who lived with her vituperative aunt and cousins, strayed away from the Victorian ideals of a woman and established a new status for herself. Jane Eyre was originally written in 1827 and was heavily influenced by the late gothic literature of the 19th century. Gothic literary aspects such as supernatural occurrences, mysteries and dark secrets, madness and danger, and overall suspense created the basis for Jane Eyre. Although Jane Eyre embodied a strong female figure with confidence and intelligence, Jane constantly struggled to find balance between freedom and love in her life.

Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice were written in consecutive literary eras. Pride and Prejudice was written prior to Jane Eyre; Pride and Prejudice was written during the Regency Period and Jane Eyre was written in the Victorian Era (Kalikoff, Chin-Yi). Elizabeth, from Pride and Prejudice, marries a man named Mr. Darcy who was of a higher social class. Jane Eyre marries Rochester after she gains wealth from her uncle so their classes are equal. Marriage was the survival tool for women; women would marry so that they would have money to survive in the world. Marriage was the survival tool for women. Women would marry so that they would have money to survival in the world. All of the money and land that was in the family’s name was to be given to the eldest son. The daughters were married to men within their social class and depended on their husbands for everything (Chin-Yi). Within the short time period the role of women evolved so that Jane Eyre was able to be an independent woman without a man defining who she is; whereas Elizabeth would have to be married to a man.