Transcript Document
Wuthering Heights 2015/4/13 1 • She had been witness of the interlocked destinies of the original owners of the Heights, the Earnshaw family, and of the Grange, the Linton family. • In a series of brilliantly handled flashbacks and time shifts, Emily Bronte unfolds a tale of exceptional emotional and imaginative force. 2015/4/13 2 Events are set in motion by the arrival at the Heights of Heathcliff, picked up as a waif of unknown parentage in the streets of Liverpool by the elder Earnshaw, who brings him home to bring up as one of his own children. 2015/4/13 3 2015/4/13 Bullied and humiliated after Earnshaw's death by his son Hindley, Heathcliff's passionate and ferocious nature finds its complement in Earnshaw's daughter Catherine. Their childhood collusions develop into an increasingly intense though vexed attachment. 4 Wuthering Heights 2015/4/13 5 • Heathcliff overhearing Catherine tell Nelly that she cannot marry him because it would degrade her, and failing to stay to hear her declare her passion for him, leaves the house. 2015/4/13 6 • Heathcliff's destructive force is now unleashed; he marries Edgar's sister Isabella and cruelly ill-treats her, hastens Catherine's death by his passion as she is about to give birth to a daughter, Cathy. 2015/4/13 7 • Heathcliff has lured Cathy to his house, and forces a marriage between her and young Linton in order to secure the union properly. • He brings Hareton and Hindley under his power, brutalizing the latter in revenge for Hindley's treatment of himself as a child. Edgar dies after doing his best to prevent a friendship between Cathy and Heathcliff's son Linton. 2015/4/13 8 Linton, always sickly, also dies, and an affection springs up between her, an unwilling prisoner at the Heights, and the ignorant Hareton, whom she does her best to educate. Heathcliff's desire for revenge has now worn itself out, and he longs for the death that will reunite him with Catherine. 2015/4/13 9 • At his death there is a promise that the two contrasting worlds and moral orders represented by the Heights and the Grange will be united in the next generation, in the union of Cathy and Hareton. • Love and revenge are two main themes of the novel. Through the tempestuous love story, the author seems to be telling us the truth that love will overcome hatred. 2015/4/13 10 • In the theme of revenge, we may find the influence of racial discrimination and class discrimination. Heathcliff's revolt or revenge is not his own. • We may consider him to be one representative of those people in a lower social position. Heathcliff, the hero, is depicted successfully in that he is a round character, with changes and development. 2015/4/13 11 • Of primitive vitality, he is like lightening, fire and rock to Catherine. After Catherine's marriage, he becomes a conscious rebel and a spirit of the revolt against injustice. • Catherine is contradictory in herself: she loves Heathcliff the orphan but chooses to marry Edgar, who has social status but is like moon beam and frost. Thus her tragedy is caused by her own vanity. She betrays Heathcliff and kills herself. 2015/4/13 12 • The story is told in a perspective that is between the first and the third person narration. In this way, everything seems more believable and the structure of the book is complete. • The two narrators are important: Nelly has seen the two generations' growth and gives them warnings and suggestions every now and then. Lockwood is a conservative gentleman. 2015/4/13 13 • They are of common people's viewpoints and find it difficult to understand the love between Heathcliff and Catherine. This helps to show the main characters' feelings. • The selection here, Chapter 15, is about the last time Heathcliff and Catherine meet each other. Their intense love is vividly described. 2015/4/13 14