A Baum's Worth of Self in Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights”

Have you ever read Wuthering Heights? It is a great tale of abuse, selfishness, revenge, ghosts and wealthy Victorian life. I once enrolled in a course on Carleton University's ITV about Romantic and Victorian Literature right around the time Milo was a baby. I loved it. We studied the history, culture and literature of the Romantics and the Victorians including Dickens' Great Expectations, Wordsworth's Prelude, a dramatic monologue by Browning entitled My Last Duchess, and, of course, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Another one of the course highlights was Wuthering Heights. Unfortunately, I had struggled to get course materials submitted on time because of my family life and work responsibilities. As such, my professor invited me to submit a 'make-up' essay on a book from the course of my choice. He was a ridiculous looking short, chubby man with a tremendously disproportionately huge ass compared to the rest of his body. His name was Arnd Baum and I will leave your imagination to figure out the hilarity of his physical appearance when combined with the various possible pronunciations of his last name. The original essay was supposed to be about four pages long, but as it was a 'make-up' for the course, I decided to let slip the dogs of passion and write until my heart was content. Big mistake. Baum wrote right on the paper after the fourth page, "I STOPPED READING HERE, MR. LONG - 4 PAGES!!" I believed him because his red pen marks ended abruptly on that page and he gave me a near failing grade - the bastard! Having re-read it, though, I don't think it is half-bad, at least in its entirety, and I thought you might like to read it - but please, read the whole thing. "Mr. Baum" - haha!


David Christopher.
Student Number: 198480.
British Literature II: The Romantics and the Victorians
ENGL 3502 (18.352) Section V.
March 14, 2003.

Essay #4, Self in Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights”

Wuthering Heights is clearly a novel that deals with the epistemology of one’s self-identity as it is developed by their social and physical environment. Bronte extensively demonstrates that if the environment is naturally imbalanced to include only negative stimuli such as abuse, starvation, neglect, isolation, lack of moral education and hatred it leads to a deluded state of self-misunderstanding and a resultant lack of fulfilment. Bronte incorporates such concepts as narrator reliability, bildungsroman, authenticity and appearances, to exemplify ‘selves’ which are reflections of the lacking environment from which they respectively hail. Wuthering Heights is a horrific tale of woe and revenge which Bronte uses to act as a warning to the reader not to succumb to our external environment but to make peace with our authentic selves. She does so mildly with the characterization of her narrators, Lockwood and Ellen Dean, and much more severely with such characters as Catherine and Heathcliff.

In order to access these characters, however, the reader must first navigate Bronte’s complex narrative structure. The words of the characters such as Heathcliff come to the reader through a pivotal narrator (Nelly Dean) and again through a primary narrator (Lockwood). By so doing, Bronte exemplifies the concept of self-delusion on several levels. Since the narrators are inherently involved in the story, they must be analyzed on two levels: first as pertaining to reliability as a narrator and secondly as to how they are affected by their surroundings.
The first narrator to whom the reader is introduced is Lockwood. He is the primary narrator in that he directly addresses the reader. Naturally, the reader is lead to question his motives for telling the story. After all, it is not his own. As he never reaches any anagnorisis as to the real motives of the characters around him, he is an example of self-delusion further to the characters in Nelly Dean’s story. As such, he is the example provided by Bronte to embody her warning of not being overly influenced by your environment and to remain loyal to your authentic self.
Lockwood’s reliability comes into question almost immediately. Early in the novel he demonstrates various inaccuracies in his assumptions about the residents of Wuthering Heights. He initially refers to Heathcliff as “A capital fellow!” because of his dwelling “so completely removed from society.”(1) The isolation is a living condition with which Lockwood has convinced himself he can sympathize. Being an external individual that has come to Wuthering Heights, he has the advantage of an external and, one would assume, normal socialization. Therefore, Lockwood should naturally be objective in his observations. On the contrary, his upbringing away from Wuthering Heights is exactly the cause for his inaccurate assumptions. He talks of his comprehension in chapter one: “Possibly, some people might suspect (Heathcliff) of a degree of underbred pride; I have a sympathetic chord within me that tells me it is nothing of the sort: I know, by instinct, his reserve springs from an aversion to show displays of feeling.”(3) He assumes the motives and behaviours of Heathcliff are for reasons similar to his own. Surely, the reader does not inevitably come to agree with his initial evaluation. Therefore he is unreliable in the sense that he is unable to properly interpret the significance of Heathcliff’s behaviour.

Lockwood further shows a lack of reliability in his own self-delusion. He has fully convinced himself that he desires to exclude himself from society to enjoy some solitude. The reader can see this as entirely inaccurate. He is so desperate for society that he braves the weather that he loathes so much to visit the unkindly Mr. Heathcliff at Wuthering Heights on at least two separate occasions. Furthermore, he spends the entire period of the novel reveling in the company of Nelly Dean to hear her gossip about the history of the fascinating people who populate her stories. Obviously, he is fooling himself as to the true nature of his character and is, therefore, somewhat unreliable.
However, he redeems himself quickly in the eyes of the reader and begins to show glimmerings of understanding. He re-evaluates his opinion of Heathcliff in light of his full knowledge, having heard Nelly Dean’s full story in the present in which he relays the story to the reader. He suggests that he has gotten ahead of himself and says, “I bestow my own attributes over liberally on him. Mr. Heathcliff may have entirely dissimilar reasons for keeping his hands out of the way when he meets a would-be acquaintance, to those which actuate me.”(3/4) The word “may” is very important here in that it points out that Lockwood has not entirely come to understand Heathcliff’s motives as separate from his own. As such, he is left to the reader as an ambiguously reliable narrator.

Ellen Dean, or Nelly, is the pivotal narrator in two senses: first in that she is the teller of the main story, and second in that our understanding of Heathcliff and Catherine as well as our faith in Lockwood’s reliability are dependent entirely upon her. That is to say that if she is lying we lose faith in Lockwood for being gullible and we can have no veritable understanding of Catherine and Heathcliff. However, if she is telling the truth Lockwood becomes more reliable and we can trust the facts pertaining to the story of Catherine and Heathcliff. Therefore, she is made fairly trustworthy and likeable.
Nevertheless, Ellen Dean is also a mildly unreliable narrator. She directly compares herself and her self-delusion to Lockwood when she says, “Mr. Lockwood; you’ll judge as well as I can all these things: at least, you’ll think you will, and that’s the same.”(159) As she tells her story, she admits in several places to Lockwood that she “was deceived completely, as you will hear.”(33)
She is much more implicitly involved in her story and, therefore, as affected by her surroundings as the other characters. We know that she has been within the environment of Wuthering Heights from the introduction to her story. She states, “Before I came to live here . . . I was almost always at Wuthering Heights . . . and I got used to playing with the children: I ran errands too.”(29) Undoubtedly, she is implicitly entrenched within the environment of the story.

She will begin to display more negative feelings as her time in the environment grows longer and she begins to lose sight of other environments. For example, just as Nelly Dean begins to find solace in her caring for the infant Hareton, she is stripped of him. She says, “Much against my inclination, I was persuaded to leave Wuthering Heights and accompany her here.”(76) She clearly blames Cathy for this unwanted departure and sees Cathy as a spoiled brat when she continues, “When I refused to go, . . . (Catherine) went lamenting to her husband and brother.”(76) It is at this point that the reader becomes aware of a feeling of malice toward Cathy from Nelly. Nelly begins to describe Catherine as a “thorn.”(78) Her disposition toward Catherine becomes impatient as with a tiring and petty brat. She chastises Cathy with the words, “They humour you: I know what there would be to do if they did not. You can well afford to indulge their passing whims as long as their business is to anticipate all your desires.”(84) Later, Nelly then goes so far as to facilitate Catherine’s death. She openly states her awareness that “Another encounter between (Heathcliff) and (Linton) would kill her altogether.”(127) Nevertheless she admits Heathcliff to see her anyway. She is in no imminent danger to carry out Heathcliff’s plan but allows herself to be convinced by him that she is. Quite obviously, Nelly has been affected by her situation.
The reader tends to sympathize with her opinion and treatment of Catherine. Her maternal loss of Hareton makes her all the more sympathetic as the only character engaged in any authentic love. Even so, she is still a victim of self-delusion in the face of an imbalanced environment. Her compliance with Heathcliff’s demands is due to his pathetic plea. He says, “I swear that I meditate no harm”(131) and refers to her as “my friend, as you have been hitherto.”(132) In her indifference toward Heathcliff’s brooding silence as a child, she has inadvertently played a role in creating the self that is Heathcliff. Evidently she was sympathetic toward him and malicious toward Catherine. Her environment is entrenched with Heathcliff and Wuthering Heights and she is unable to appreciate the consequences of her actions.

Her entire motive for telling the story would appear on the surface to be simply at the behest of Mr. Lockwood. However, she tells her story with particular detail and gusto as though she had been waiting for an opportunity to release it as a form of confession for the guilt she feels for her part played in the tragedy of the people whom she discusses. She goes out of her way to overwrite her own motives in an attempt to convince Lockwood to forgive her for her behaviour as a further victim of Heathcliff. In chapter fourteen for example she interjects, “Well, Mr. Lockwood, I argued and complained, and flatly refused him fifty times, but in the long run he forced me to an agreement.”(133) The text does not support her suggestion of having been compelled and she is clearly deluding herself.
In order to accept literally what is said to be the history of Catherine and Heathcliff, we must examine the reliability of the two narrators. With an unreliable narrator, the reader must be careful to take the factual reporting of events at face value (as is necessary for the author’s story to be told at all) but to analyze the insights or assumptions as a form of dramatic monologue intended by the author to render an opinion of the narrator based on how or why he or she is wrong: Lockwood by showing he is external to Wuthering Heights and therefore unable to accurately interpret what he sees and Nelly by her inability to see her own significance as a function of her inherent involvement with the surroundings at Wuthering Heights. Both narrators are factually accurate in their reporting of events and the reader can safely assume that Lockwood’s version of what he has been told by Ellen Dean is, therefore, correct. Having faith in a certain degree of verity in the tale of the unreliable narrators, the reader can access the true nature of the other characters Bronte uses to achieve her goal of negative socialization and characterization.

Catherine is a pathetic and selfish character who is entirely motivated by selfish opinions of herself based on what she experiences within two separate environments: namely, Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange. At Wuthering Heights, she seems to be developing honestly to herself, spending her joyful time with Heathcliff and chastising her brother for his abusive cruelty. Unfortunately, she loses her father’s guidance at a young age and her education is left to Joseph and Hindley. Joseph is the medium through which she is supposed to achieve a religious education where one would assume she would also receive a moral education. However, Joseph is grossly unqualified. He shows little affectation for his teachings and the lessons are described as more like punishments. His almost unintelligible mumbling makes her access to morality even more limited. Furthermore, Joseph is a hired servant and she is perpetually reminded by Hindley as to her superiority to servants such as Joseph, and particularly Heathcliff, as mistress in the Earnshaw household. Her isolation at Wuthering Heights exacerbates the situation as she has no other stimuli by which to compare her environment or rank.
Ironically, it is her escape to the separate environment of Thrushcross Grange which is the turning point in her self-delusion. It is the pivotal moment in her young impressionable life where her education about herself is completed. Her vanity and selfishness are catered to during her initial five week stay and she quite shuns her former life of joy with Heathcliff. Nelly reports that “The mistress visited her often in the interval, and commenced her plan of reform by trying to raise her self-respect with fine clothes and flattery, which she took readily.”(43) She has obviously seen what she ‘should’ be by the company at the Grange and has fooled herself into believing it is true of herself. Her environment as a child helped this development. Nelly points out in the introduction to her story that she played with the children at Wuthering Heights and assisted with chores. As such, both Hindley and Catherine have been conditioned to see playmates turn into servants. Upon Catherine’s return to Wuthering Heights, she is much more dismissive of Heathcliff with unthoughtful inquiries such as “Well Heathcliff, have you forgotten me?”(44) She demonstrates her selfish self-preoccupation when Nelly points out that “she could not comprehend how her remarks should have produced such an exhibition of bad temper.”(45) Her interpretation of appearances in her surroundings has left her completely selfish and self-deluded.

She finally convinces herself that Heathcliff is beneath her and offers proof that she doesn’t believe it herself. Her speech to Nelly about Heathcliff and her reasons for marrying is particularly revealing and has the double function of driving the final nail in the coffin of any hope of redeeming Heathcliff’s self-image. She says, “I’m convinced I’m wrong”(67) and “I’ve no more business to marry Edgar Linton than I have to be in heaven; and if the wicked man in there had not brought Heathcliff so low, I shouldn’t have thought of it. It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now.”(68) Although she is aware that she identifies with Heathcliff, in her selfish vanity to be “the greatest woman of the neighbourhood”(66) she deludes herself into believing that she “shall be proud in having such a husband.”(66) Catherine is quite a ‘dandy’ in her desire to achieve appearances over substantial love. She denies her authentic self and is correct only in that she will be proud.
Her petty selfishness is poignantly demonstrated through her treatment of Nelly. In chapter ten, Nelly describes Catherine’s behaviour when she wants to talk, regardless of the feelings of others: “About the middle of the night, I was wakened from my first nap by Mrs. Linton gliding into my chamber, taking a seat on my bedside, and pulling me by the hair to rouse me.”(83) Clearly Catherine has become a selfish brat who cares only for herself and her wants and needs. She shows no concern for the treatment or respect of Nelly as she has been conditioned to treat servants as underlings.

The depiction of selfish vanity in young women as developed by their environment is echoed by Bronte in the second Catherine. In chapter eighteen, Nelly reports that young Catherine had “A propensity to be saucy . . . and a perverse will, that indulged children invariably acquire”(163) Nelly goes on to note that “If a servant chanced to vex her, it was always - ‘I shall tell papa!’”(163) The reader immediately recalls Catherine’s tantrum in which she ran to her brother and husband to compel Nelly to meet her demands to accompany her to Thrushcross Grange. The repetition of such similar situations is striking evidence of Bronte’s intention to show disdain for such petty selfish behaviour. The second Catherine's environment as created by her father fosters her developing selfishness. Nelly notes, “I don’t believe he ever spoke a harsh word to her.”(163) She has been doted on extremely which results in her having an imbalanced education. That imbalance is a stark contrast to the imbalanced education Heathcliff received in his environment of abuse and neglect.
The most shocking self in the novel is Heathcliff. He becomes a villainous individual completely obsessed with robbing everyone around him from any little happiness they might achieve. Nelly notes that Catherine and Edgar “were really in possession of a deep and growing happiness”(78) in Heathcliff’s absence. She states openly that “It ended”(78) as a function of Heathcliff’s return. It is this dedication to malevolence in his life that makes him unable to accept a benevolent (or at least ambivalent) guest such as Lockwood when he arrives. That is to say that in his life he has dedicated no time to civility and all to hatred and simply does not know how to do the former.

Heathcliff is destined to fail. Bronte quite clearly states his initiation to life at Wuthering Heights. His first introduction to the family leaves his status unclear. He is described as Mr. Earnshaw’s favourite and to be cared for as a peer of the other children, but he is rejected by Mrs. Earnshaw when she questions “how he could fashion to bring a gipsy brat like that into the house”(30) and Catherine “showed her humour by grinning and spitting at the stupid little thing.”(31) Furthermore, they don’t give him his own identity. They “christened him ‘Heathcliff’: it was the name of a son who died in childhood.”(31) His status remains unclear throughout the novel to himself and others. As such, he never identifies a place for himself and begins to identify himself by the verbal assaults of others.
His self-identity becomes seriously damaged by the population at Wuthering Heights. The effect on Heathcliff’s development is explicitly stated by Nelly: “the kinder amongst us did not wish to fret the master, so we humoured his partiality (to Heathcliff); and that humouring was rich nourishment to the child’s pride and black tempers.”(34) The description given him by Mrs. Earnshaw is never abandoned by Hindley. As a child Hindley assaults Heathcliff when he calls him a “dog” and says “I pray that he may break your neck . . . you beggarly interloper . . . only afterwards show him what you are, imp of Satan. - And take that, I hope he’ll kick out your brains!”(33) Heathcliff is perceived by Hindley as an encroachment on his authentic aristocracy. Nelly says, “the young master had learnt to regard his father as an oppressor rather than a friend, and Heathcliff as a usurper of his father’s affections and his privileges, and he grew bitter with brooding over these injuries.”(32) His love for Heathcliff does not improve in adulthood. Nelly says, “Hindley became tyrannical . . . deprived (Heathcliff) of the instructions of the curate, and insisted that he should labour out of doors.”(38) The self-righteous opinion of the aristocracy is clearly aimed at Heathcliff when Mrs. Linton refers to him as a “naughty, swearing boy.”(45) To modern sensibilities, this opinion sounds very much like the segregation rather than integration of students with underdeveloped mental or physical abilities. Mrs. Linton makes him something to be marginalized as a petty servant, rather than to be pitied and understood as an equal.

Heathcliff spends his early years suffering from cold, starvation, abuse, neglect and hatred. He is a starving little wretch when discovered by Mr. Earnshaw. He is abused regularly by Hindley. Nelly says he was “hardened, perhaps, to ill-treatment: he would stand Hindley’s blows without winking or shedding a tear.”(31) He is again mistreated by the Linton’s when they eject him after Catherine’s accident with their dog, and he is neglected by Nelly, the only viable mother figure left in the house. Starvation, abuse and hatred are not conducive to the development of a healthy self. Heathcliff’s surroundings result in an underdeveloped self that can engage in nothing but malevolence and vengeance.
Heathcliff is very isolated pushing him further and further into a development of seething hatred. The environment at the Heights is physically isolating but he is regularly denied contact with those he loves. Firstly, he loses his only parental ally other than Nelly when Mr. Earnshaw dies. Unfortunately, Nelly is a poor comparison as an ally in her neglect. Later, he is systemically kept separate from Catherine by Hindley, then by Catherine herself when she chooses to spend more time with the Linton’s and finally by Edgar when he bars Heathcliff from the house. Experiencing the malice of Hindley, the isolation of the Heights and the lack of moral education that plagued Catherine, he becomes a victim of his environment and develops into a creature of almost pure evil.

The reader, however, is occasionally inclined to sympathize with him. The question brought to mind upon his initial introduction and behaviour toward Lockwood is, “Why is he this way?” Implicit to the question is a suggestion that there is a reason for his malevolence that might not be entirely his fault. Certainly Nelly has shown that she sympathized with him on more than one occasion. Early in his life at Wuthering Heights, she says, “The difference between him and the others forced me to be less partial. . . . (Heathcliff) was as uncomplaining as a lamb; though hardness, not gentleness, made him give little trouble.”(32) Nevertheless, she admits that her attention toward him might have been lacking when she says, “still I couldn’t dote on Heathcliff.”(32)
Most important is the way in which Heathcliff betrays his own benevolent instincts. He is quite capable of feeling compassion. When Mr. Earnshaw dies, Heathcliff “set up a heart-breaking cry.”(36) When he is physically abusive to the already bereft Isabella as his wife, he returns saying, “I have no pity! I have no pity! The more the worms writhe, the more I yearn to crush out their entrails! It is a moral teething; and I grind with greater energy, in proportion to the increase of pain.”(131) As shocking as his words and behaviour are, it seems as though he is repeating phrases like a mantra in order to convince himself that his malevolence is genuine. The most pivotal scene that reveals Heathcliff’s positive characteristics occurs when he catches the falling baby from the hands of his drunken nemesis, Hindley. Instead of natural malevolence, “by a natural impulse, (Heathcliff) arrested his descent, and setting him on his feet, looked up to discover the author of the accident.”(63) Later, Heathcliff displays self-loathing for his act of kindness when he showed “the intensest anguish at having made himself the instrument of thwarting his own revenge.”(63) It is important to note his natural motives as benevolent and his considered motives as vengeful.

His malevolent behaviour begins manifesting itself at an early age when he begins practicing unprovoked cruelty. Catherine, in her typically self-centred way, quite calmly describes how she “saw its nest in the winter, full of little skeletons. Heathcliff set a trap over it, and the old ones dare not come.”(105) His behaviour stuns the reader as to his malevolence and again makes one consider, “Why?” Bronte chooses to echo this blind malevolence in the next generation just as she echoed Catherine’s petty selfishness in her daughter. Hareton seems to be engaged in an equally malicious activity when Isabella notices him “hanging a litter of puppies from a chair-back.”(157) There is a clear repetition of abuse toward the young of any species.
Hareton’s behaviour is in turn blatantly a function of his environment. When Hindley dies, Heathcliff says, “Now, my bonny lad, you are mine! And we’ll see if one tree won’t grow as crooked as another, with the same wind to twist it!”(161) Heathcliff is vividly aware that an abusive environment will be detrimental to the development of Hareton’s character and yet he fully intends to turn Hareton into his own evil self by providing a similarly negative environment as a revenge upon Hindley.
His awareness of his own malice is interesting. He could have stayed away from Wuthering Heights during the creation of his fortune but he returns to his seething cauldron of hatred. It would appear that his only motive for bettering himself was revenge. He is the paradigm example of the failed bildungsroman. As a child, his efforts to improve himself were thwarted, mainly by Hindley, and as an adult, his efforts to better himself stem entirely from malevolent motives and therefore he dooms himself to remain in a world of hatred. In this sense, the novel acts as an essay on how the unnatural increase in wealth and squalor of the Victorian era have allowed unnatural courses of the ‘self’ to be achieved. Even the natural inspirations of the Romantics, namely the sublime nature about Wuthering Heights, and even when isolated from society the effects cannot be reversed.

Heathcliff perceives his authentic self to be entrenched with malevolence and hatred and cannot escape it. His return was unnecessary. Surely, he was experiencing more success in the wide world than at Wuthering Heights. He returns anyway, permanently denying himself any chance of a more complete self evolving away from the Heights. This self destructive behaviour raises a question as to his true authentic self. Can he escape or is he inextricably identified with the Heights?
He learns to view superficial appearances as a method of achieving goals. Catherine chooses Linton over himself based on his slovenly appearance as a servant as opposed to Linton’s elegant and gentle appearance. In his malevolence he will use appearances to achieve his own vicious ends. Upon his return, he presents himself as a civilized gentleman in order to gain access to Catherine at Linton’s house. He later presents himself as quite a dandy to Isabella. In his defense, he is quite honest with Isabella when he says, “And I like her too ill to attempt it . . . except in a very ghoulish fashion. You’d hear of odd things if I lived alone with that mawkish, waxen face: the most ordinary would be painting on its white the colours of the rainbow, and turning the blue eyes black every day or two: they detestably resemble Linton’s.”(91) It is only Isabella’s vanity that makes her assume his words were in vain and that he would develop a genuine attraction to her. Heathcliff openly states his ulterior motive to Catherine for courting Isabella. He reminds us that he has been taught by her to be cruel. “You are welcome to torture me to death for your amusement, only allow me to amuse myself a little in the same style.”(96) He had already stated, “thank you for telling me your sister-in-law’s secret: I swear I’ll make the most of it. And stand you aside.”(96) He is in full appreciation of how to use appearances to manipulate the people around him.

Heathcliff has money and power but an unloved, unromantic heart. He has learned to view people as chattel and to use them uncompassionately for his own cruel desires. That developed characteristic does not allow him to explore his authentic self. As a “gipsy,” as he is variously described by the other characters, one might assume that he should love the moors and be in harmony with the sublime natural setting of Wuthering Heights. Even his name suggests a connection with the sublime. It is a compound of the nouns of heath and cliff, both parts of a mountain. But, as mentioned earlier, he never manages to identify himself through this name and remains at odds with it for his entire life. He becomes stagnant in his motives of revenge and does not allow himself to realize his true potential.
Bronte’s theme of self-delusion is most poignantly ironic in that each character seems able to accurately evaluate their companions, but never themselves. Heathcliff sees Catherine as a selfish brat and tells her so on her deathbed, but cannot see his own true self. Catherine quite clearly expresses her opinion of Heathcliff to Isabella when she expresses a fantasy in him, but she never accurately evaluates herself, as is obvious in her conversation about her motives for marrying Linton before Heathcliff leaves. Even Nelly describes Heathcliff negatively throughout the story, but cannot see her own sympathy for him as it is manifested in her assistance to his whims and desires to be with Catherine. The characters never identify with themselves but succumb to what others see them as. They become what is expected of them and are examples of self-fulfilling prophecies. When we identify the self through the teachings of others, we cannot achieve our authentic selves, but only the appearance of self.

In the end, does his connection with Cathy in death finally complete his self? The answer is no. He is still in his environment, one from which they both can now permanently never escape. They have destined themselves to an eternity with each other and convinced themselves that it is what they are and what they want. In reality, one wouldn’t want to spend an eternity with either of them. She must be with a malevolent and vengeful villain, and he must be with a petty selfish brat: hardly an escape from the purgatory of Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange. As such, the novel concludes as a warning not to do succumb to the influences of our environment but to stay true to ourselves. Therefore, Lockwood is redeemed. He has convinced himself that he wants solitude due to his normal crowded and presumably urban surroundings, but he manages to stay true to himself and remain social with the characters in the novel.
Conclusively, the novel depicts selves that are negatively impacted by their environment. Indeed, the environment of the characters is at the very heart of what Bronte was writing. One need not stray farther than the title to find evidence. Comparing the novel to contemporary novels, we see a noticeable difference. The title of “Frankenstein” is that of Victor’s person. The development of the wretch is directly affected by the actions and motives of Frankenstein himself and it is his inability to come to terms with his own self that ultimately dooms the wretch to a life of vengeance. The title of “Great Expectations” deals with Pip’s situation and perception of the future. It is the mystery of the unknown source and purpose of these great expectations that lead to Pip’s underdevelopment. His expectations and assumptions as to the solution to this mystery stagnate the development of his authentic self. Only when he learns the truth does he begin to understand that he has behaved like a greedy, selfish snob when he admits, “my repugnance to (Magwitch) had all melted away, . . . I only saw a man who had meant to be my benefactor, and who had felt affectionately, gratefully, and generously towards me. . . . I only saw in him a much better man than I had been to Joe.”(Dickens 377) The title of “Wuthering Heights” obviously refers to the location. However, the novel is certainly a tale of people. Therefore one can assume that the location of Wuthering Heights is of paramount relevance to the development of those people. Otherwise the tale might have just as well been called “Heathcliff’s Revenge.”

A comparison of narrators supports this superficial assumption. In “Frankenstein,” the narrator addresses his letter to his sister. Since she is a particular person, the novel can be seen as a novel that focuses on individual persons. In “Wuthering Heights,” the narrator, Lockwood, is addressing a reading audience at large as though the focus is on anyone who might be within his environment. Either way, the novel of Wuthering Heights is certainly preoccupied with location and environment as opposed to specific individuals.
In Wuthering Heights, Bronte shows how each ‘self’ is seriously and negatively impacted by their environment. The bleak and isolated surroundings of Wuthering Heights, both physical and social, lead to a population of individuals characterized by such attributes as self-delusion, selfishness, cruelty and revenge. Her characters all show a basic lack of understanding of themselves. As such, each character is unable to recognize their authentic selves and achieve a balanced development of self.


Works Cited
Bronte, Emily. Wuthering Heights. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1993.
Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions, 1994.