Wuthering Heights - Feminist Criticism

The feminist criticism is perhaps the perspective that best applies to Wuthering Heights. For one, any personal possessions of a woman goes straight to the husband once she marries. It’s like the woman doesn’t even exist because she has to live under the husband’s name, who now owns her belongings. Thrushcross Grange would have been Isabella’s had she not married Heathcliff but, since she did marry him, Heathcliff automatically becomes the owner. In addition, the wives of men in the novel are treated at times like they’re below the “man of the house.” One example of this inferior treatment in Wuthering Heights is, again, with Isabella. When Heathcliff beats Isabella, there isn’t much she can do within the law to stop Heathcliff because, in order to make Heathcliff stop physically abusing her, she would have to prove (in a court probably partial towards men) that her life was in danger as a result of the abuse. The law back in Brontë’s day really favored men over women and put women at a great disadvantage.

I think the topic that will garner even more attention from contemporary feminist critics will be “the role of film and other popular media in the construction of the feminine gender” (Brontë 451). I remember the very first article our class blogged on about how people are reading less. With more people now turning to other forms of entertainment like watching movies, the creators of movies add their opinions in them and help shape the public’s ideas. Oftentimes, the public isn’t even aware that the shaping process is occurring. Feminist critics, then, will carefully examine these newer and more popular forms of entertainment and make serious efforts to raise the public’s awareness of underlying patriarchal ideology.

Reading the sentence, “French feminists tended to focus their attention on language, analyzing the ways in which meaning is produced,” reminded me of another article that our class read—the George Orwell article. In that article, Orwell talks about the power of language. Since certain words conjure up certain thoughts in readers, the writer can somewhat control their thoughts by carefully picking and choosing the words he writes down. I definitely think language should be one of the main focuses for feminists or, for that matter, any form of criticism.

            Noticing the paired, opposite terms such as masculine/feminine in the feminist criticism section at the top of page 452 reminds me of deconstruction. It makes me think about how the different categories of criticism aren’t completely separate from each other. It even says later in the section, “Categories obscure similarities even as they help us make distinctions” (Brontë 458). We should try to keep in the back of our minds that categories, while useful in showing differences between things, sometimes overlap and share similarities.

I found Lyn Pykett’s feminist criticism to be very persuasive. I liked her part at the beginning about older Catherine’s different names and that “Catherine Heathcliff remains an unfulfilled possibility, a route not taken, although some would argue that this unoccupied term in fact names Catherine’s true identity, and that she acquires this name-role beyond the narrative when her spirit joins with Heathcliff’s to wander the moors eternally” (Brontë 469). That argument reminded me of a humorous comment one of our classmates, Jessica Guthrie, commented on in her blog when she said, “Would they go on ghostly dates? It is fun to think of the possibilities” (Guthrie, “Wuthering Heights Blog 2”). It is interesting to think about different scenarios, like whether or not older Catherine would return Heathcliff’s forgiveness for his ruthless behavior.

I agree with Pykett’s criticism for the most part, but her discussion of younger Catherine and her choice between two men starting at the bottom of page 475 to the top of 476 didn’t really persuade me. Who’s to say that, without the experience of her first marriage, that younger Catherine would have thrown “Jane Austen’s prudence to the winds” and would have chosen to be with someone for love rather than for a high social status (Brontë 475)? The only reason younger Catherine is able to make the second choice—to be with Hareton—is because her first ‘choice,’ Linton, dies. It would have been very difficult for younger Catherine to leave Linton given the patriarchal law that was established then. Nevertheless, after Linton dies, younger Catherine does choose to go with her true nature and decides to marry Hareton, representing a move towards more freedom for herself.

Wuthering Heights - Marxist Criticism

I can see why many journals are using Marxist terms or models more often. There are people like Bill Gates and Donald Trump who make way more money than they really need. Although many of these rich individuals have worked hard and give away millions to charity and other worthwhile causes, their net worth is still a staggering sum. Journals, like the Wall Street Journal, aren’t advocating a switch from free-market capitalism to communism, rather they’re critiquing the free-market system.

The Marxist critic Pierre Macherey’s comment on page 380 about the purpose and function of more traditional forms of criticism amused me. His view that the more traditional forms of criticism attempt to coax the text “into giving up its true, latent, or hidden meaning” reminded me of the passage from Writing about Literature that talks about the myth of hidden meaning— that there is no such thing as ‘hidden meaning’ in a text (Brontë 380).

For the sentence starting on page 390 with “Finally” and ending on the following page with “changed man,” words such as ‘despicable’ could certainly be added to elaborate on Heathcliff being a changed man. Out of sheer cruelty, Heathcliff dedicated pretty much the rest of his life to exacting revenge on Hindley and everyone else whom he felt had betrayed him.

Reading the paragraph that starts on page 395 and ends on page 396 made me realize that Emily Brontë must have had a rich imagination in order to create such a magnificent work as Wuthering Heights and make it seem so real. It would be hard to disagree that Brontë’s imaginative-filled childhood helped her develop such a talent. As Eagleton says, only someone who “can synchronize in its [a work’s] internal structures the most shattering passion with the most rigorous realist control” can “produce the aesthetically superior work” (Brontë 396).

I agree with Eagleton that the pivotal event of Wuthering Heights is older Catherine’s decision between going with her passion for Heathcliff and having a high social standing with Edgar Linton. By choosing the latter, older Catherine acts as, in Eagleton’s words, “the decisive catalyst of the tragedy” (Brontë 396). After she chooses Edgar Linton, Heathcliff then starts on his own path to decadence and turns into a cruel and ruthless man. Brontë pulls the reader in and allows this chain of events to unfold before our eyes.

Wuthering Heights - pages 202-288

Heathcliff does everything he can within the law to get young Catherine to marry Linton so that he can finally get revenge on Edgar Linton once he dies. I could imagine how Heathcliff, in his deviant ways, approached Linton to find out the status of his relationship with young Catherine— not because he genuinely cares, rather so he can determine if his plan of obtaining Thrushcross Grange would work itself out or if it was necessary for him to intervene. When he confronts young Catherine about why she ended her correspondence with Linton, Heathcliff tries to blackmail her, informing her that, “I’ve got your letters, and if you give me any pertness, I’ll send them to your father” (page 206). Heathcliff goes on to insist that young Catherine pay Linton a visit because he is dying of a broken heart. Heathcliff even tries to use imaginary role-play to cajole young Catherine into seeing Linton. He says, “Just imagine your father in my place, and Linton in yours; then think how you would value your careless lover, if he refused to stir a step to comfort you, when your father, himself, entreated him; and don’t, from pure stupidity, fall into the same error” (pages 206-207). Heathcliff’s attempts to give young Catherine the guilt trip work, thus expediting the execution of his conniving scheme.

I’ve noticed how Ellen Dean’s feelings toward Heathcliff have flip-flopped throughout the novel. At first, she hates Heathcliff, then begins to like him, and finally is back to working against him. After Heathcliff was christened, Ellen Dean says, “Miss Cathy and he [Heathcliff] were now very thick; but Hindley hated him, and to say the truth I did the same” (page 52). “However,” Ellen Dean says on the next page, “I will say this, he was the quietest child that ever nurse watched over. The difference between him and the others forced me to be less partial: Cathy and her brother harassed me terribly: he was as uncomplaining as a lamb…thus Hindley lost his last ally” (page 53). Moreover, she felt bad for Heathcliff whenever he was abused by Hindley. Ever since Heathcliff’s return from the few years he was gone, though, Ellen Dean hasn’t really like him and tries to prevent his plan from coming to fruition. When advising young Catherine to obey her father’s wishes of not seeing Linton, she says, “I’ll not disguise, but you might kill him [Edgar Linton], if you…cherished a foolish, fanciful affection for the son of a person who would be glad to have him in his grave— and allowed him to discover that you fretted over the separation he has judged it expedient to make” (page 205). Here, Ellen Dean refers in a subtle manner to Heathcliff’s plan to take over Thrushcross Grange. She didn’t need to refer to Heathcliff but, by doing so, she shows her negative bias towards him.

In the end, though, there is nothing Ellen Dean can do to stop Heathcliff, as he finally completes his revenge on those who had wronged him many years before.

Wuthering Heights - pages 3-108

I definitely think that, with the death of Brontë’s mom when she was three years old, she developed differently than if her mom had been alive for a longer period of time. Instead of being taught conventional activities like cooking and sewing by her mom, Brontë instead acted and thought unconventionally, becoming someone who held “more important values: intellectual independence, unconventional thinking,…” (page 5).

            I like how Brontë defines the word ‘wuthering’ at the beginning of the book. It seems to foreshadow events that will involve major conflicts between the characters. I have an idea of how Mr. Lockwood feels when he “was thrown into the company of a most fascinating creature, a real goddess,…” (page 27). As soon as the woman glanced over at him, Mr. Lockwood says “And what did I do? I confess it with shame— shrunk icily into myself, like a snail, at every glance retired colder and farther…” (page 27). I can somewhat relate to this experience because I’ve kind of done the same thing. I liked this girl in high school, but I was very shy, so I never actually told her how I felt. Every time she looked at me, though, I seemed to just withdraw to myself. I didn’t mean to send mixed signals but, every time the girl I liked looked at me, I would sort of retreat to myself. In addition, it’s funny how Mr. Lockwood sarcastically refers to the woman sitting at the table in Wuthering Heights as “the amiable hostess” (page 31). She doesn’t answer the door when Mr. Lockwood loudly knocks and, when he is trying to be nice to her, she either sits in her chair silently, just staring at him, or replies with short responses. As far as Heathcliff, the host, he seems to be mean-spirited. When Mr. Lockwood was attacked by the two dogs after leaving Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff laughed at the spectacle. If I was in the same situation as Mr. Lockwood, I would probably be even madder at Heathcliff for laughing. When Mr. Earnshaw says “It’s as dark almost as if it came from the devil” (page 51), referring to the boy he brought home, it made me think that maybe it’s foreshadowing that the boy is going to cause trouble for the family. Including the word “devil” also goes with the gothic genre of the book because it brings a supernatural element to the story. Another possible foreshadowing I noticed is where the book talks about the boy being christened “Heathcliff” and that “It was the name of a son who died in childhood, and it has served him ever since, both for Christian and surname” (page 52). This sentence hints at the notion that someone close to Heathcliff is going to die or maybe Heathcliff will have a son who will die in childhood. I look forward to seeing how the title of the book ties into the characters and events of the story.