WUTHERING

WUTHERING HEIGHTS
HEIGHTS
HEATHC
Names play an important role in
Wuthering Heights. Early in the
LIFF
novel, for example, the love
story is foreshadowed in the
names scratched onto the
window sill. The circle is marked
out as Catherine Earnshaw who
marries and becomes Catherine
Linton, who marries and
becomes Catherine Heathcliff ,
who marries to become
Catherine Earnshaw.
Write 'Heathcliff' on an A4 sheet. Write all the
associations you have for each part of the name.
(heath - cliff). Do the same for Lockwood.
Do names influence our perception of character?
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HEATHCLIFF
my landlord (Lockwood) black villain (Nelly)

‘fierce, pitiless, wolfish man’ (Catherine [1],
‘you vagabond!’ (Hindley)
dark-skinned gypsy (Lockwood)
‘an unreclaimed creature, without refinement –
without cultivation; an arid wilderness of furze ‘Your worthless friend!’
and
whinstone’ (Catherine [1])
‘brute of a lad’ (Hindley)
A capital fellow! (Lockwood)
‘Frightful thing!’ (Isabella)
‘that foolish boy’ (Nelly)
‘You may come and wish
Miss Catherine welcome,
like the other servants’
(Hindley)
(Nelly to Catherine [1])
‘Heathcliff ... being of the
lower orders’ (Catherine [1])
‘imp of Satan’ (Earnshaw,
[Earnshaw told] a tale of his
seeing it starving (Nelly)

Mrs Earnshaw was ... asking how he could
fashion to bring that gipsy brat into the house.
(Nelly)
‘wicked man’ (Catherine [2] quoting her
father
Edgar Linton)
‘Judas! Traitor!’ (Nelly)‘wicked
man’ (Catherine [2] quoting her
father Edgar Linton)
‘Mr Heathcliff ! master!’ (Nelly)

‘Mr Heathcliff ! master!’ (Nelly)

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HEATHCLIF
‘the scoundrel’ (Nelly)

‘the fiend’ (Isabella quoting Hindley in her

F
‘a hero of romance’ (Heathcliff ’s
version of
Isabella’s perception of him)
account to Nelly)
‘Papa’ (Linton)
‘hellish villain!’ (Hindley recounted by
Isabella) ‘uncle’ (Catherine [2])

‘brute beast!’ (Isabella) ‘that devil Heathcliff ’ (A servant)

‘that wretch’ (Edgar) goblin (Nelly)

‘ungrateful brute’ (Catherine [1]) a ghoul, or a vampire? (Nelly)

Heathcliff was the mortgagee (Nelly) ‘my Heathcliff ’ (Catherine [1])

‘low ruffian’ (Edgar) ‘Poor wretch!’ (Nelly)

‘He’s a lying fiend, a monster, and not a ‘father’ (Linton)

human
being’ (Isabella)
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HEATHCLIF
Since its publication, Wuthering Heights has
F
been a battleground for literary critics.
Heathcliff – and
Emily Brontë’s presentation of him – is often
at the centre of the debate. Should we read
him as:

– a monster without redeeming features

– a social outcast
– an isolated individual misunderstood by
those around him
– a representative of a class struggle
– the hero of a love story
– something else altogether?
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HEATHCLIF
1. Focus on one of the readings (See
F
handout) and discuss the ways in which
the evidence from the novel has been
used to explore and support the critic’s
interpretation. (You might also go on to
think about ways in which you could
add to, or challenge, this particular
reading of Heathcliff and his role in
the novel.)

2. Share your thoughts on the ways in

which textual evidence has been
selected and analysed to support the
different readings.
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You are now going to explore one of these
readings in more detail, selecting and
analysing your own
textual evidence in order to construct a
convincing interpretation of Heathcliff ’s
character.

3. Working in pairs, share out the different

critical readings of Heathcliff listed here.
– Heathcliff as a child of the storm.
– Heathcliff as a social outcast and misfit.
– Heathcliff as ‘female’.
– Heathcliff as a Romantic or Gothic hero.
– Heathcliff as a fairy tale creation.
– Heathcliff as a product of circumstance.
– Heathcliff as a demon, an inhuman
monster.

4. Find a piece of evidence which supports

that critical perspective from the selected
quotations on the handout. Alternatively, find
evidence of your own from the text.
5. Go on to analyse the quotation to provide
support for the critical reading you have
chosen.
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Use what you have learned through the
analysis and discussion to answer the
question below,
inserting into the blank space the
argument that you would most like to
support.
‘Heathcliff is best seen as _____________’.
How far and in what ways do you agree
with this view?