Denial of the Idyllic in Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is layered with texturized commentary that disowns the constrictions placed on female characters. Brontë pairs a desire for unconventionality with the hyper-fixation on mobility, landscape, and character relationships as an effective technique to shed light on the tension between female autonomy and domestication. Catherine’s declaration, “I am Heathcliff,” showcases her disruption of an idyllic social standing – Catherine’s active denial of domesticated “comfort” is reflected in her relationship with Heathcliff, a character considered to be innately an exile (Brontë 82). The comparison Catherine makes between herself and Heathcliff –noting that their souls are the same – transports her character into a state of existence separate from conventional expectations of her status. Diving into the preliminary claim that Catherine actively destabilizes the societal restrictions placed upon the female desire through her verbal and physical responses surrounding Heathcliff requires an examination of Heathcliff, the bounds of their relationship, Catherine’s vocalization throughout the novel, and the effects of her remarks.

From the beginning of the novel Heathcliff is paired with descriptions of both exterior landscape and otherness. The text states that he was “a dirty, ragged, black-haired child,” and that he repeated “gibberish that nobody could understand” (Brontë 37). Heathcliff, entering the narrative from an outside environment (both landscape and culture beyond Wuthering Heights), encompasses divergence from what is considered conventional in other characters—his presentation, heredity, and language are altogether separate from the natural sphere of Wuthering Heights. When disclosing her emotions to Nelly, Catherine describes her rejection of heaven as the angels throw her out, “to be into the middle of the heath on top of Wuthering Heights,” (Brontë 81).  With the heath as uncultivated land, Catherine’s wish to be cast into the unfamiliar terrain (land representative of exile) reflects Heathcliff’s own disposition (a character that embodies exile). Catherine’s desire to reject heaven and be tossed into the landscape reflects her ultimate desire to renounce comfort for what is seen as unorthodox by the society which surrounds her. Before moving forward into discussing Catherine’s desire, it is necessary to point out the conflicting arguments centered around Catherine’s inclinations.

An altogether erroneous and assumptive reading of Wuthering Heights deems that Catherine, a fallible character of reproach, utilized the statement that she is Heathcliff in an ingenuine manner. To extend beyond this all-too-common false reading of Catherine’s account, one must examine the context surrounding her statement. Catherine fully rejects Edgar for Heathcliff shortly after her confession to Nelly, but she is never given the full opportunity to act on her rejection. In response to Hindley claiming he would toss Heathcliff out, Catherine states, “if you do turn him out of doors, I’ll go with him. But, perhaps, you’ll never have an opportunity – perhaps, he’s gone” (Brontë 88). Catherine rejects Edgar at this moment with her claim that she would willingly go with Heathcliff into a state of exile. What’s more, even though Heathcliff abandons Wuthering Heights and Catherine is never given the liberty to execute her account of departing the estate with Heathcliff, Catherine descends into her own form of exile—fulfilling her original claim that she is Heathcliff and linking herself with his character. The decline of Catherine plunges her into a state unfamiliar to herself and the characters around her, promoting her resistance to the active stability in a society that constricts the core of her character.  

Catherine’s descent into exile begins with Heathcliff’s departure—her state of displacement resembling Nelly’s previous comment in the novel that “the greatest punishment we could invent for her was to keep her separate from him” (Brontë 45). After voicing her deliberate account of rejection, Nelly states that Catherine “burst into uncontrollable grief, and the remainder of her words were inarticulate,” (Brontë 88). Catherine, in a state of despair, mimics Heathcliff’s original arrival to Wuthering Heights and his inability to connect through communication. Catherine’s grief without Heathcliff unfolds to become an uncontrollable catalyst into delirium; the incoherence Catherine experiences disrupts her future within a society that values upward mobility – her relationship to Edgar unable to be anything other than disjointed from her incongruity. The text notes that Mr. Kenneth “pronounced her dangerously ill; she had fever” (Brontë 88). Catherine’s outward display of pathology – places in the text where her body is maintaining a negative, physical reaction to Heathcliff’s absence – both deconstructs the idea that Catherine was ingenuine in her previous remarks that she and Heathcliff come from the same soul, and perpetuates her momentum toward exile (rejection of her body within the state of society she is expected to enter). The momentum toward exile resists interruption as the absence between Catherine and Heathcliff expands and collapses the narrative.

The lacuna within Catherine and Heathcliff’s relationship reflects the disruptions they provoke within the conventional society of both Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange – Heathcliff being a character who alters the narrative through his “otherness” and Catherine being a character who actively resists the narrative’s stability through her physical rejection of self and environment without Heathcliff. When Catherine falls ill later in the novel, she remarks to Nelly that “the whole last seven years of my life grew a blank! I did not recall that they had been at all” (Brontë 125). Without Heathcliff, Catherine refuses to acknowledge the existence of her “upward mobility” into Thrushcross Grange—claiming that the last seven years of recollection are a blank. Furthermore, Catherine doesn’t seem to recognize herself; when looking into the mirror she asks Nelly, “Don’t you see that face?” (Brontë 126). The active rejection of her physical self within the environment of Thrushcross Grange mirrors the rejection of heaven for the heath and underscores her comment that, “if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger” (Brontë 64). The absence between Catherine and Heathcliff dislodges Catherine from her place within the world around her; she ultimately becomes annihilated from her physical being within the deemed “appropriate” society. To extend this claim, Nelly notes that Catherine’s eyes are dreamy and that “they appeared always to gaze beyond, and far beyond—you would have said out of this world,” (Brontë 127). Although Nelly is able to see Catherine’s eyes, the sight extends beyond the confinements of physicality. Catherine completely rejects the space in the narrative where she is absent from Heathcliff: her soul has essentially departed, leaving only a physical container of disdain for the conventional society and marriage between herself and Edgar.

With the marriage between Edgar Linton and Catherine being representative of female upward mobility through domestication, Catherine’s resistance to Edgar poses as an active defiance to the confinements of marriage. Inevitably, Catherine becomes an outsider to herself and the environment she is placed in—she goes as far to state this truth herself when telling Nelly that she was “converted at a stroke into Mrs. Linton, the lady of Thrushcross Grange, and the wife of a stranger: an exile, and outcast, thenceforth, from what had been my world,” (Brontë 126). Catherine admits her form of exile as being thrust from her world of Heathcliff and into the domesticated expectation of wifehood. Perhaps the biggest tragedy for Catherine’s character is the unattainability of feminine satiation within the conventions of society; Catherine’s wish that Heathcliff and her never be parted was left unfulfilled throughout the seven years of absence. Within that time, Nelly remarks that within Catherine’s relationship with Linton, she “had seasons of gloom and silence” (Brontë 72). The consistent lack of vocalization attached to exile promotes the ideology that Catherine has been physically extricated from the space in her relationship with Linton and is unable to bridge the gap between them. However, even when Catherine maintains the ability to talk within her relationship, she meets Edgar with furious disdain–her frustration for the situation at hand both visible and indisputable.

Catherine’s vocal resistance to Edgar further establishes that Catherine is actively rejecting her relationship with Linton and genuinely desires Heathcliff. When Edgar meets Catherine with a distaste for Heathcliff–denoting him with unfavorable descriptors and stating that Catherine needs to choose between Edgar and Heathcliff–Catherine exclaims that she wishes to be let alone and states, “Edgar, you—you leave me!” (Brontë 92). Within her statement, Catherine vocally rejects Edgar and the discontent between the two characters collapses entirely. The separation between societal expectations (marriage with Edgar) and Catherine’s desire of exile (becoming a mirror of Heathcliff) builds on itself up until the moment of Catherine’s death. The text notes that while Edgar lay next to Catherine, “his young and fair features were almost as deathlike as those of the form beside him, and almost as fixed: but his was the hush of exhausted anguish, and hers of perfect peace” (Brontë 140). The separation between Edgar and Catherine is physically drawn out at this moment—Edgar in anguish and Catherine resembling a state of peace. Additionally, the moment sheds light on the disruption Catherine brings to the society that she rejects with Edgar’s disposition being one of painful exhaustion and pain.  Catherine’s active denial of domesticated “comfort” is reflected up until her death, though her disruption of an idyllic social standing continues to persist after her physical absence decays. 

Ultimately, when Catherine states that she is Heathcliff, she places herself into the state that Heathcliff resides in—an exiled character within the narrative. The remark not only disrupts the societal expectations innately placed upon Catherine’s character – to marry for upward mobility and remain confined to the domestication expected of females within society – but it also satisfies the additional claim that Catherine cannot live without Heathcliff and is genuine about her remarks of rejection for Edgar Linton. In her resistance, Catherine ultimately becomes an exile of her own; Catherine willingly departs from her physical flesh as a result of Heathcliff’s departure from Wuthering Heights. To actively become the unfamiliar (or reside in unfamiliar spaces) both destabilizes the “comforts” granted within her relationship to Edgar and undermines the societal standards placed upon her character. Moving forward, one must note the inability to fulfil Catherine’s wishes: the fixed positions in society surrounding the female maintain a requirement of physical presence. Although Catherine was able to spiritually depart from the narrative, her requirement to remain physically confined in society was not fully alleviated until her death.    

Work Cited

Bronte, Emily. Wuthering Heights. Penguin Random House UK, 1995.