Introduction
Wuthering Heights, which has long been one of the most popular and highly regarded novels in English literature, seemed to hold little promise when it was published in 1847, selling very poorly and receiving only a few mixed reviews. Victorian readers found the book shocking and inappropriate in its depiction of passionate, ungoverned love and cruelty (despite the fact that the novel portrays no sex or bloodshed), and the work was virtually ignored. It was not until 1850, when Wuthering Heights received a second printing with an introduction by Emily's sister Charlotte, that it attracted a wide readership. And from that point the reputation of the book has never looked back. Today, Wuthering Heights has a secure position in the canon of world literature, and Emily Bronte is revered as one of the finest writers—male or female—of the nineteenth century. And it is also widely recognized as one of the great novels of English literature.
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I. Background Analysis
A. A Brief Review of Wuthering Heights
Wuthering Heights showed us a story about love and revenge: the abandoned boy Heathcliff was adopted by Mr. Earnshaw and lived with Mr. Earnshaw’s son Hindley and daughter Catherine. Hindley disliked Heathcliff. He insulted and maltreated Heathcliff in every possible way after Mr. Earnshaw’s death. At the same time, peculiar emotion occurred between Catherine and Heathcliff. Because of vanity and ignorance, Catherine decided to marry Linton. Heathcliff left Wuthering Heights in a dark night with anger. Catherine looked for him in rainstorm, and she was ill badly after that. A year later, Catherine and Edgar got married. Three years had passed, Heathcliff returned. He became a handsome man. But his eyes was filled with wildness, he came back to revenge. Hindley, who was the host of Wuthering Heights, kept Heathcliff staying in Wuthering Heights due to his fortune. Heathcliff induced Hindley to play cards, drink alcohol. At last, he bankrupted, mortgaged the whole Wuthering Heights to Heathcliff. Heathcliff often went to the Thrushcross Grange, Edgar’s sister, Isabella, fell in love with him. Edgar prevented Heathcliff from coming to the Thrushcross Grange. But Isabella eloped with Heathcliff to the Wuthering Heights, and got married. After marriage, Heathcliff took action to revenge, Isabella was like a servant, she wanted to return to Thrushcross Grange, but his brother refused her. Having a child, Catherine was ill badly. When Edgar was not in, Heathcliff came to see her, they hugged each other crazily, scolded each other. Their eyes were full of tears. Catherine gave birth to a girl named Cathy in unconscious, and passed away. Heathcliff was in deep grief. He asked Catherine's ghost stay with him all the time, didn’t leave him alone.
Hindley died, Heathcliff became the master of the Wuthering Heights, he nurtured Hindley’s son, Hareton as an impolite and uneducated boy. Isabella escaped to London; she had a boy named Linton. 12 years later, Linton grew up a beauty, too.
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Heathcliff abused to his son, Linton, when Edgar got worse and worse, he took Cathy to Wuthering Heights, He forced Cathy to marry Linton, Edgar passed away, Heathcliff refused to send to the doctor, and didn’t allow anybody to look after him, only Cathy accompanied his husband until his death. A few days later, the maidservant came back, Heathcliff didn’t talk with anybody. Hareton got close to Cathy; Heathcliff saw Catherine’s spirit from Cathy’s face. His hope of revenge disappeared.
One morning, Heathcliff peddled in the swamp for a night, then came back, he was very happy. He thought that he saw Catherine, and desired to stay with Catherine. He groaned and called Catherine’s name. He asked the maidservant to bury him next to Catherine, and shut him into Catherine’s room. The next day, the maidservant found that Heathcliff passed away.
At last he succeeded in annexing all the property of Hindley’s and the Linton’s, but his revenge, he got nothing though Cathiner’s ghost pestered him all the time, he died in mental disorder.
B.A Brief Review of Emily Bronte
Emily Bronte was born in Thornton, Yorkshire, in the north of England. Her father was the rector of Hawort from 1820. After their mother died in 1821, the children spent most of their time in reading and composition. To escape their unhappy childhood, Anne, Emily, Charlotte and their brother Branwell created imaginary worlds - perhaps inspired by Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726). Emily and Anne created their own Gondal saga, and Bramwell and Charlotte recorded their stories about the kingdom of Angria in minute notebooks. Between the years 1824 and 1825 Emily attended the school at Cowan Bridge with Charlotte, and then was largely educated at home. Her father's bookshelf offered a variety of reading: the Bible, Homer, Virgil, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron, Scott and many others. The children also read enthusiastically articles on current affairs and intellectual disputes in
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Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Fraser's Magazine, and Edinburgh Review. In 1835 Emily Bronte was at Roe Head, but suffered from homesickness and returned after a few months to the moorland scenery of home. In 1837 she became a governess at Law Hill, near Halifax, where she spent six months. To facilitate their plan to keep school for girls, Emily and Charlotte Bronte went in 1842 to Brussels to learn foreign languages and school management. Emily returned on the same year to Haworth, where she stayed for the rest of her brief life.
Unlike her dear sister—Charlotte Emily had no close friends. She wrote a few letters and was interested in mysticism. Her first novel, Wuthering Heights (1847), a story-within-a-story, did not gain immediate success as Charlotte's Jane Eyre, but it has acclaimed later fame as one of the most intense novels written in the English language. In contrast to Charlotte and Anne, whose novels take the form of autobiographies written by authoritative and reliable narrators, Emily introduced an unreliable narrator, Lockwood. He constantly misinterprets the reactions and interactions of the inhabitants of Wuthering Heights. More reliable is Nelly Dean, his housekeeper, who has lived for two generations with the novel's two principal families, the Earnshaws and the Lintons.
Emily Bronte died of tuberculosis in the late 1848. She had caught cold at her brother Branwell's funeral in September. After the appearance of Wuthering Heights, some skeptics maintained that the book was written by Branwell, on the grounds that no woman from such circumscribed life could have written such passionate story. In 1848 Charlotte and Anne visited George Smith to reveal their identity and to help quell rumors that a single author lay behind the pseudonyms. After her sisters' deaths, Charlotte edited a second edition of their novels, with prefatory commentary aimed at correcting what she saw as the reviewers' misunderstanding of Wuthering Heights. The complex time scheme of the novel had been taken as evidence by the critics, that Emily had not achieved full formal control over her narrative materials. However, her model in layering narrative within narrative may have been Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818). Emily's refusal to reduce ambiguity to simplistic clarity did not have any immediate influence on the novel form until Willkie Collins experimented
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with multimodal first-person narratives in such works as The Woman in White (1860) and The Moonstone (1868).
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ІІ. The Forming Course of Heathcliff's Distorted Character
The main reason of Heathcliff's distorted character: his growth background, the man who he treat him as an animal, and the love between Catherine and him was the antidote of his soul mate(the right medicine to cure his revenge ),but the news about Catherine will marry Linton nearly took him died and so on. Now we will analyze why he become such a man just know revenge and forget the essential humanity—kindness. I will analyze it from three era—the growth background of Heathcliff; the superficial phenomenon of Heathcliff's distorted character; the indwelling phenomenon of Heathcliff's character.
A. The Growth Background of Heathcliff
Heathcliff is an orphan with unknown family background. By chance, he is picked up and adopted by old Earnshaw. Earnshaw’s dote on Heathcliff leads Hindley’s jealousy and resentment. After Earnshaw’s death, Hindley begins to persecute Heathcliff. During the revolt, the love between Heathcliff and Catherine develops. But due to some worldly reasons, Catherine finally betrays Heathcliff and their love. All the sorrow leads him to fulfill his crazy plans of revenge. But when he accomplishes his revenge and catches the love between Cathy and Hareton and their resemblance to Catherine, humanity finally returns to him. Then reveals that it is impossible for the hatred to dominate the world, while the love is the right medicine to cure hatred and is the final home of the human society. People cannot gain happiness in pursuing revenge. On the contrary, to tolerate and forgive is a perfect method to obtain happiness.
Heathcliff's lowborn sent him as a man who was always looked down upon, he was adopted by Mr. Earnshaw, and brought him from Liverpool back to Wuthering Heights. Mr. Eearnshaw's children disliked him, including the man who served in
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Wuthering Heights; just because of his appearance was different from them. When Mr. Earnshaw took Heathcliff home, he said some things like that:
\"And at the end of it, to be flighted to death! ' he said, opening his greatcoat, which he held bundled up in his arms.' See here, wife! I was
never so beaten with anything in my life: but you must e'en take it as a gift of God; though it's as dark almost as it came from the devil.\"1
And these words will show us how Mr. Earnshaw and Mrs. Earnshaw like Heathcliff--a gift from the God; but the one who live or servant at Wuthering Heights were curious about Mr. Earnshaw's words; they looked at him and found a black boy behind him:
\"We crowded round, and over Miss Cathy's head, I had a peep at a dirty, ragged, black-haired child; big enough both to walk and talk: indeed, its
face looked older than Catherine's; yet, when it was set on its feet, it only stared round, and repeated over and over again some gibberish that nobody could understand.\"2
Though Heathcliff begun his new life in Wuthering Heights with Mr. Earnshaw and Mrs. Earnshaw's love, and he looked like an evil. Mr. Earnshaw's children didn't like him; they thought Heathcliff was gloomed their things. So Hindley and Catherine treat him badly, especial Hindley. And Heathcliff also be an emperor by Mr. Earnshaw and Mrs. Earnshaw’s love. For example:
Mr. Earnshaw once bought a couple of colors at the handsomest, but
it soon fells lame, and when he discovered it, he said to Hindley: ' You must exchange horse with me: I don't mine and if you won't I shall tell your father of the three thrashings you've given me this week, and show him my arm, which is back to the shoulder, ' Hindley put out his tongue
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and cuffed him over the ears.' You'd better do it ay once, 'he persisted, escaping to the porch (they were in the stable):'you will have to; and if I speak of these blows; you'll get them again with interest. ''Off, dog!' cried Hindley, threatening him with an iron weight used for weighting potatoes and hay. 'Throw it, 'he replied, standing still,' and then I'll tell how you boasted that you would turn me out of doors as soon as he died, and see whether he will not turn you out directly.' Hindley threw it, hitting him on the boast, and down he fell, but staggered up immediately, breathless and white; and, had not I prevented it, he would have gone just so to the master, and got full revenged by letting his condition plead for him, intimating who had coasted it,' Take my colt, gypsy, then!' said young Earnshaw.' And I pray that he may break your neck: take him, and be dammed, you beggarly interloper! And wheedle my father out of all he has: only afterwards show him what you are, imp of Satan.—and take that, I hope he'll kick out your brains!'3
When Mr. Earnshaw died, Heathcliff's life just like \"Angle drop into the hell\Linton treated Heathcliff badly just like an animal. He was no longer the master of Wuthering Heights, a servant, and how cruel Hindley treat Heathcliff will send it back from himself by Heathcliff. One day, Hindley hold a party, he rejected Heathcliff attended it and put him down. Hindley talked to Linton who was Heath cliff's enemy, this make Heathcliff so sick.
They met, and the master, irritated at seeing him clean and cheerful;
or, perhaps, eager to keep his promise to Mrs. Linton, shoved him back with a sudden thrust, and angrily bade Joseph 'keep the fellow out of the room —send him into the garret till dinner is over. He'll be cramming his fingers in the tarts and stealing the fruit, if left alone with them a minute.'
'Nay, sir,' I could not avoid answering, he'll touch nothing, not he: and I suppose he must have his share of the dainties as well as we.'
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'He shall have his share of my hand, if I catch him downstairs again
till dark,’ cried Hindley.' Be gone, you vagabond! What! You are attempting the coxcomb, are you? Wait till I get hold of those elegant locks—see if I won't pull them a bit logger.'
'they are long enough, already,' observed Master Linton, peeping from the doorway;' I wonder they don't make his head ache. It's like a colt's
name over his eyes!'4
These words from the book tell us that how the relationship between the Earnshaws and Heathcliff is, and the life in Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff was a happy guy who has got the love from his father and the mother—―the Earnshaws.’’ And the love from Catherine made him full of energy though she betrays him at last.
B. The Superficial Phenomenon of Heathcliff's Distorted Character
Character is someone’s steady attitude of reality and habitation of one’s behavior mode. And the character outs up by means of the way one speaks or what he says, behavior and appearances. Now we will analyze Heathcliff's character by the superficial phenomenon, how Heathcliff's characters become so terrible? And there are so many phenomenon to show us, how his distorted character like .And I will analyze at tow parts; the way he treated his father -in-law; the love between Catherine and him.
1. The Way Heathcliff Treated His Brother-in -law
Mr. Linton was Heathcliff's brother-in-law, also his wife—Isabella's brother, but the family put him down and robbed his lover—Catherine, so he must revenge and possession all of Mr. Linton's things.
Edgar Linton was born and raised a gentleman. He is graceful, well-mannered,
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and instilled with civilized virtues. These qualities cause Catherine to choose Edgar over Heathcliff and thus to initiate the contention between the men. Nevertheless, Edgar’s gentlemanly qualities ultimately prove useless in his ensuing rivalry with Heathcliff. Edgar is particularly humiliated by his confrontation with Heathcliff in which he openly shows his fear of fighting Heathcliff. Catherine, having witnessed the scene, taunts him, saying, ―Heathcliff would as soon lift a finger at you as the king would march his army against a colony of mice.‖ Edgar as ―an example of constancy and tenderness,‖ Edgar’s inability to counter Heathcliff’s vengeance, and his naïve belief on his deathbed in his daughter’s safety and happiness.
After Linton married Catherine, Heathcliff came back with a vast and mysterious wealth, and immediately sets about seeking revenge on all who have wronged him. Edgar Linton ,the host of Thrushcross Grange who robbed his lover—Catherine and put him down would receive his revenge.
When Heathcliff came back, he lived in Wuthering Heights, where he was growing up, and the host Hindley who was his enemy. He often visited Thrushcross Grange, and Edgar's sister—Isabella fall in love with him. He never rejected Isabella though he loved Catherine, because he want to revenge, and at last he and Isabella eloped, which made Edgar lose his only sister. After Heathcliff married Isabella, he told her that she must instead his brother-Edgar Linton to receive his revenge, which he does for Edgar Linton. And the way he treat Isabella is a way he treat Edgar Linton. How he treat Isabella? Let us see some words which Isabella wrote to Nelly by a letter after they got marry:
I have great interest in; it is this-Is Mr. Heathcliff a man? If so, is he mad? And if not, is he a devil? Is hadn’t tell my reasons for making this inquiry; but I beseech you to explain, if you can, what I have married:
that is, when you call to see me; and you must call, Ellen, very soon. Don't write, but come and bring me something from Edgar.
Gladly did I take advantage of this intimation; and the minute I flung myself into a chair, by the fie, I nodded, and slept. My slumber was deep
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and sweet, though over far too soon. Mr.Heathcliff awoke me; he had just come in, and demanded, in his loving manner, what I was doing there? I told him the cause of my staying up so late—that he had the key of our room in his pocket. The adjective our gave mortal offence. He swore it was not ,nor ever should be, mine and he'd— But I'll not repeat his langue, nor describe his habitual conduct: he is ingenious and undressing In seeking to gain my abhorrence! I sometimes wonder at him with an intensity that deadens my fear: yet, I assure you, a tiger or a venomous serpent could not rouse terror in me equal to that which he wakens. He told me of Catherine's illness, and the accused my brother of casing it; prolong that I should be Edgar's proxy in suffering, till he could get hold of him. I do hate—I am wretched—I have been a fool! Beware of uttering one breath of this to anyone at the Grange. I shall expect you every day-- don't disappoint me! 5
In order to revenge Linton, he often visited Thrushcross Grange, and met Catherine, stay with her lonely. Do something to put Edgar down. One day, he visited Thrushcross Grange and talked something with Catherine in the kitchen, when Linton found that Catherine asked Linton have a duel with Heathcliff to prove the love:
'How is this?' said Linton, addressing her; ''What notion of propriety must you have to remain here, after the language which has held to you by that blackguard? I suppose, because it is his ordinary talk, you think nothing of it; you are habituated to his baseness, and, perhaps, image I
can get used to it too!'
'Have you been listening at the door, Edgar?' asked the mistress, in a tone particularly calculated to provoke her husband, implying both carelessness and contempt of his irritation. Heathcliff, who had raised his eyes at the former speech, gave a sneering laugh at the latter; on purpose, it seemed, to draw Mr. Linton's attention to him. He succeeded; but Edgar did not mean to entertain him with any hing flights of passion.
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'I have been so far forbearing with you, sir, 'he said quietly; 'not that I was ignorant of your miserable, degraded character, but I felt you were only partly responsible for that; and Catherine wishing to keep up your acquaintance, I acquiesced—foolishly. Your presence is a moral poison that would contaminate the most virtuous: for that cause, and to prevent worse consequence, I shall deny you hear after admission into this house, and give notice now that I require your instant departure. Three minutes' delay will render it involuntary and ignominious.'
Heathcliff measured the Height and breadth of the speaker with an eye full of derision.
'Cathy, this lamb of yours threatens like a bull!' he said. 'It is in
danger of spiriting its skull against my knuckles. By God! Mr. Linton, I'm mortally sorry that you are not worth knocking down!'6
No one could bear for that their lover stay with the fore-lover lonely in a place, especial, they still love each other deeply, this awareness made Edgar deeply angry. And Heathcliff also made Edgar felt his self esteem was missing regularly. But what a pity, it seemed that he haven't made Edgar Linton so hurt, and Edgar seemed never impacted by hi revenge.
Catherine died after she got birth a girl—little Cathy, when Cathy grow up she married her brother-in-law, Linton Heathcliff, when Linton Heathcliff died ,Heathcliff got Thrushcross Grange, he become the host of it. And this is also maenad that the revenge to Edgar Linton came to an end.
2. The Love Between Heathcliff and Catherine
Catherine and Heathcliff's love was based on their shared perception that they are identical. Catherine declares, famously,\" I am Heathcliff,\" While Heathcliff, upon Catherine's death, wails that he cannot live without his \"soul,\" meaning Catherine.
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And their love denies difference, and is strangely asexual. The two do not kiss in dark corners or arrange secret trysts, as adulterers do. Catherine and Heathcliff' love is based upon their refusal to overtime or embrace difference in others.
When Catherine met Heathcliff for the first express is that a dirty boy, black, low-class and so on. She never thought that she would fall in love with this gay and considered him as her soul mate for some day. And Heathcliff, when he first met the girl—Catherine, he had felt nothing except one thing, she was Mr. Earnshaw's daughter. He known that he could not do something which beyond the class between the line higher and lower. Though Catherine detests Heathcliff at the first, she quickly comes to fall in love with him, and the two soon grow inseparable, spending their days playing on the moors. The love between Catherine and Heathcliff was very immaculacy, and this often showed in daily things:
Catherine and he were constant companions still at his seasons of respite from labor; but he had ceased to express his fondness for her in words, and recoiled with angry suspicion from her girlish caresses, as if conscious there could be no gratification in lavishing such marks of affection on him. On the before-named occasion he came into the house
to announce his intention of doing nothing, while I was assisting Miss Cathy to arrange her dress: she had not reckoned on his taking it into his head to be idle; and imagining she would have the whole place to herself, she managed, by some means, to inform Mr. Edgar of her brother's absence, and was then preparing to receive him.
'Cathy, are you busy, this afternoon?' asked Heathcliff. 'Are you going anywhere?' 'No, it is raining,' she answered.
'why have you take that silk frock on, then?' he said,' Nobody coming here, I hope?'
'Not that I know of,' at amerced miss:' but you should be in the field now, Heathcliff. It is an hour past dinnertime I thought you were gone.'
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'Hindley does not often free us from his accursed presence,' observed
the boy.' I'll not work any more today: I'll stay with you. 7
Though Heathcliff and Catherine's love was moved, and this affection is a tragedy love, which will lead Heathcliff into evil. Because Catherine betrays their love, she choice to marry Linton, just for the status and money, kept herself in a high standard of everyone. Catherine abandoned the love among Heathcliff, which was the most thing her lose in her life. And when Heathcliff heard the words she said, made him left Wuthering Heights, left her.:
I've no more business to marry Edgar Linton than I have to be in heaven; and if the wicked main there had not brought Heathcliff so low, I shouldn't have thought Heathcliff so low, I 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. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton's is as different as a
moonbeam from lighting, or frost from fire.
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When Nelly found that Heathcliff had heard what Catherine said and told her, she felt nothing and said that was impossible. She thought Heathcliff would understand her; he also wished she have a better life, she insisted that ―I am Heathcliff!‖And constantly her speeches like that:
'He quite deserted! We separated!' she exclaimed, with an accent of indignation.' Who is to separate us, pray? They'll meet the fate of Milo!
Not as long as I live, Ellen: for no mortal creature. Every Linton on the
face of the earth might melt into nothing, before I could consent to forsake Heathcliff. Oh, that's not what I intend—that's not what I mean! I shouldn't be Mrs. Linton were such a price demand! He'll be as he has been all his lifetime. Edgar must shake off his antipathy, and tolerate him, at least. He will, when he leant my true feeling towards him. Nelly, I see now, you think me a selfish wretch; but did it
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never strike you that if Heathcliff and I married, we should be beggars? Whereas, if I marry Linton, I can aid Heathcliff to ruse, and place him out my brother's power.'
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For our mind if someone wanted to marry other man, not the one he or she love so much, that means betray. But for Catherine that she considered that she never betrayed her soul mate— Heathcliff, she loves him as Heathcliff loves her, but she forget one thing, there are nothing can involved into the lovers, otherwise the love will prostrate quickly. And for her love theory, what she felt was more important:
'It is not,' retorted she;' it is the best! The others were the satisfaction of my whims; and for Edgar's sake, too, to satisfy him. This is for the sake
of one who comprehends in his person my feelings to Edgar and myself. I cannot express it; but surely you and everybody have a notion that there is or should be an existence of yours beyond you. What were the uses of? my creation, if I were entirely contained here? My great miseries and I watched in living is himself. If all else perished, and be reminded, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it. 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. Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He's always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being. So don't talk of our separation again: it impracticable; and—' 10
Catherine's decision let Heathcliff felt sick, his lover betrayed him in a certain case. And then he escaped from Wuthering Heights with hatred, three years later, Catherine got marry. And Heathcliff came back after half year of Catherine and Linton's wedding, back for revenge and constant their love. And Heathcliff's back also
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means Catherine must paid for her betray. Heathcliff loved Catherine so much, He ever said that: ―if I forget you that means I forget myself.‖ And the Catherine's betray ever led Heathcliff into hell, and if Catherine died, how he would be? Let’s come to some words:
She put up her hand to clasp his neck, and bring her cheek to his as he held her; while he, in return, covering her with frantic caresses, said
wildly:
'You teach me now how cruelly you've been --cruel and false. Why
Did you despise me? Why did you betray your own heart, Cathy? I have not one word of comfort. You deserve this. You have killed yourself. Yes, you may kiss me, and cry; and wring out my kiss and tears: they'll blight you--they'll damn you. You loved me--then what right had you to leave me? What right--answers me--for the poor fancy you felt for Linton? Because misery and degradation, and death, and nothing God or Sayan could inflict would have parted us, you, of your own will, did it. I have not broken mine.
So much the worse for me, that I am strong. Do I want to live? What
kind of living will it be when you--oh, God! Would you like to live with your soul in the grave?'
'Let me alone. Let me alone,' sobbed Catherine.’ If I have done
wrong, I 'm dying for it. It is enough! You left me too: but I won't upbraid you! I forgive you. Forgive me!'
'It is hard to forgive, and to look at those eyes, and feel those wasted hands,’ he answered. 'Kiss me again; and don't let me see your eyes! I forgive what you have done to me. I love my murderer--but yours! How
can I?' 11
Catherine was dead at last, Paid for the betray of her lover –Heathcliff. Heathcliff left Wuthering Heights by Catherine’s love, and he also come back for it.
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How their love is? The answer is that Catherine and Heathcliff’s love was come into another degree—a world was just only themselves—mentally love. When Heathcliff back, he lived in Wuthering Heights, where Hindley invited him to. No one recognized him, just considered him as a wealthy man with well-born. To know about that Heathcliff lived in her brother's house, Catherine went that frequently and with her husband's sister—Isabella who loved Heathcliff so much, when she was first met Heathcliff, had fall in love with him. When Catherine found that she asked Heathcliff and wanted let Heathcliff got marry with Isabella that made Heathcliff so sadly. Heathcliff felt that Catherine didn't know how much he loved her; this made him deeply hurtled and revenge.
All the things happen in Heathcliff around made him lost himself .One's character is not only impact on the outside environment—his grown background, the things he meet in daily life and the experience; but also impact on his metal quality. And the things happen around Heathcliff Just show us the superficial of what his character like, and why his distorted character become badly? And now we will talk something mentally.
C. The Deep Reflection of Heathcliff's Distorted Character
There are some words describe Heathcliff, \"He seemed a sullen, patient child; hardened, perhaps, to-ill-treatment‖12, that means he have an unhappy childhood, whether a man is outstanding or not when he grow up, his childhood was very important.’ Sullen'' maenad he was a pessimistic man, he never told others what he feel, and how he feel? Though he has a well life, he was lonely in some certain degrees. He has no friends, family (who he had look as had betrayed him). A man who lacked these things would had an uncompleted character, and Heathcliff was such a man .Heathcliff's dark points were caused by the environment which he grown up: examination by everybody, from a childe to an ugly labor, betrayed by his lover, all these are because of the society which he stayed in.
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Heathcliff begins his life as a homeless orphan on the streets of Liverpool. When Bronte composed her book, in the 1840s, the English economy was severely depressed, and the conditions of the factory workers in industrial areas like Liverpool were so appalling that the upper and middle classes feared violent revolt. Thus, many of the more affluent members of society beheld these workers with a mixture of sympathy and fear. In literature, the smoky, threatening, miserable factory-towns were often represented in religious terms, and compared to hell. The poet William Blake, writing near the turn of the nineteenth century, speaks of England’s ―dark Satanic Mills.‖ Heathcliff, of course, is frequently compared to a demon by the other characters in the book.
Considering this historical context, Heathcliff seems to embody the anxieties that the book’s upper- and middle-class audience had about the working classes. The reader may easily sympathize with him when he is powerless, as a child tyrannized by Hindley Earnshaw, but he becomes a villain when he acquires power and returns to Wuthering Heights with money and the trappings of a gentleman. This corresponds with the ambivalence the upper classes felt toward the lower classes—the upper classes had charitable impulses toward lower-class citizens when they were miserable, but feared the prospect of the lower classes trying to escape their miserable circumstances by acquiring political, social, cultural, or economic power.
Heathcliff who lived in such a society, was betrayed by his lover Catherine who persuited for the wealthy life, being a lady in the rank and fashion. As a labor, who was in the low-class, could not give her a wealth life except love. For an older saying, Bread and Money, which will you, chose? When you meet this problem, what would you do so? For this novel, Catherine, Heathcliff's lover, she chosen the ''Bread''--that means she gave up the love between she and Heathcliff; gave up the common life which she eager to at last. And the 'Bread' made Heathcliff mad, did much sick thing under the hatred, revenged to the people who had treated him badly before.’ Bread' means the money, status, power and so on. In that day 'Bread' was more attractive than other things. Say nothing of the people who live in a society which value is
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''money is everything'', ''money is power'', no one would disdain it. And Heathcliff was a victim of the society.
Heathcliff's distorted character was deeply impact on the society which he lived in, the environment he grows up. People disliked the man without the whit skin and the blue eyes. An unwhited skin made Heathcliff felt inferiority, when he came to the Earnshaws' family; no one liked him except the Earnshaw couple, for his appearance. Heathcliff ever dreamed to be the same as others,‖ I wish I had light hair and a fair skin, and was dressed and behave as well, and have a chance of being as rich as he will be!\" 13 But what a pity! His dream never come true and he will receive many unfair treatments. And those unfair treatments he received would made his character gradual changed.
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Ⅲ. Conclusion
Wuthering Heights centers on the story of Heathcliff. The first paragraph of the novel provides a vivid physical picture of him, as Lockwood describes how his ―black eyes‖ withdraw suspiciously under his brows at Lockwood’s approach. Nelly’s story begins with his introduction into the Earnshaw family, his vengeful machinations drive the entire plot, and his death ends the book. The desire to understand him and his motivations has kept countless readers engaged in the novel.
Heathcliff, however, defies being understood, and it is difficult for us to resist seeing what they want or expect to see in him. The novel teases the reader with the possibility that Heathcliff is something other than what he seems—that his cruelty is merely an expression of his frustrated love for Catherine, or that his sinister behaviors serve to conceal the heart of a romantic hero. We expect Heathcliff’s character to contain such a hidden virtue because he resembles a hero in a romance novel. Traditionally, romance novel heroes appear dangerous, brooding, and cold at first, only later to emerge as fiercely devoted and loving. One hundred years before Emily Bronte wrote Wuthering Heights, the notion that ―a reformed rake makes the best husband‖ was already a cliché of romantic literature, and romance novels center around the same cliché to this day.
However, Heathcliff does not reform, and his malevolence proves so great and long-lasting that it cannot be adequately explained even as a desire for revenge against Hindley, Catherine, Edgar, etc. As he himself points out, his abuse of Isabella is purely sadistic, as he amuses himself by seeing how much abuse she can take and still come cringing back for more. Critic Joyce Carol Oates argues that Emily Bronte does the same thing to the reader that Heathcliff does to Isabella, testing to see how many times the reader can be shocked by Heathcliff’s gratuitous violence and still, masochistically, insist on seeing him as a romantic hero.
Though each one has the own idea about Heathcliff, for me, Heathcliff, the victim of the society, never got a happy ending ,he die of the missing of Catherine.
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Though he did many unforgiving things, he comes to his senses of kindness. No matter how later it is, Heathcliff awoke. So for that one person's character is not only formed by the outside things--backgrounds, society, politic, and so on, but also formed by the inside--how much pressure he or she could bear? And Heathcliff's distorted characters so.
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Bibliography
Bronte, Emily, Wuthering Heights. Beijing: Foreign Language Education and
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Bronte, Emily, Wuthering Heights, Zhuhai: Zhuhai Publishing House, 2004.
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技翻译出版公司, 2003。
杨苡译 《呼啸山庄》,南京:译林出版社, 1990。
黄希庭著 《心理学导论》,北京:人民出版社2001。
陈和芬著 《―呼啸山庄‖中希思克厉夫的复仇》,郑州:郑州大学出版社,1983。
陈和芬 ―论凯瑟琳和希克历夫之间的超人间的爱,‖ 《浙江学刊》1999(5),第
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刘炳善著 《 英国文学简史》, 开封:河南大学出版社,1993。
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