Wuthering Heights

CharlasSomeone explain it to me...

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Wuthering Heights

1citygirl
Dic 11, 2007, 8:44 pm

Heathcliff was a brute and not sexy at all. Catherine Sr. was totally irrational and annoying. Neither of them had any redeeming qualities. I didn't care if they lived happily ever after or burned in hell.

Why do people love this story?

2Always_Reading
Dic 11, 2007, 8:55 pm

Don't know either, kinda like Pride and Predjudice in my eyes. Although, other works of Bronte are very good...

3alcottacre
Dic 11, 2007, 9:49 pm

I cannot explain the appeal of Wuthering Heights either. I did not find any of the characters redeeming. It just feels to me like one of those books you know you should read, but why anyone continues to boggles my imagination.

4scaifea
Dic 12, 2007, 9:27 am

Okay, so I have no defense for Wuthering Heights (I just read it for the first time recently), except to say that it's worth the read just to be able to appreciate the Monty Python spoof better :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0vgZ2UNS54

5Nickelini
Editado: Dic 12, 2007, 10:56 am

I defended Wuthering Heights awhile back over at the book compared group. Here is the link to the conversation comparing it to Jane Eyre.

http://www.librarything.com/talktopic.php?topic=22087

--------- I like the twisted, dark broodingness of WH.When I read the book, I had a limited experience with books from that time period, and everything I had read up to that point was so proper and almost didactic about class and manners. So I was intrigued by these characters who weren't all prim and proper and polite, and who were actually quite nasty. I like the book for its atmosphere, and not because the characters are nice people who I want to see happy.

I don't look at it as a romance, but maybe as a story with a touch of horror (I mean, the scene with her coming to the window at night was creepy!). Heathcliff is an anti-hero, and Cathy is attracted to him because he's a bad boy. Imagine a his character as a Johnny Depp-type. (Actually, there was a movie a ways back with Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche that was pretty good). Heathcliff is rather mysterious, and I wish Emily Bronte would have given us more info on him. He's described as dark . . . what does that mean? He was found in Liverpool. Did he come off of a ship from the Americas? Is he a mulatto, perhaps the child of a slave who had been raped by her owner? Or is he Irish? Or gypsy? At any rate, Cathy's dad adopted a boy that was not from their class. He never fit in, but we don't know the real source of his nastiness and grudge against the world.

The book is definitely flawed, in many ways. Most of the story is in the first third of the book (roughly), and then it does kinda go on and on. But I love its dark, twisted, storminess.

Hope that helps. If not, I understand. It's not for everyone.

6Nickelini
Dic 12, 2007, 11:06 am

Oops . . . did I mix up the generations with Catherine/Cathy? I hate it when authors have similar names in a book.

Cathy is much quicker to type, and I'm feeling really lazy this morning, but I'm sorry if I confused anyone.

7Nickelini
Dic 12, 2007, 11:20 am

Me again . . . scratch everything I said. I just realize that the reason I like Wuthering Heights is because I've always loved the Kate Bush song (which I listened to for years without ever knowing what Wuthering Heights was about). Someone put together a montage of movie scenes to the song, if anyone is interested:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UI5qEQAvOcY&feature=related

8joehutcheon
Dic 12, 2007, 11:23 am

I read Wuthering Heights at school, aged 15 or so, and really liked it. We also read Persuasion by Jane Austen and we all complained about how 'boring' it was compared to WH. I've no idea what I'd make of WH if I re-read it but Persuasion now seems anything but boring.

9citygirl
Dic 12, 2007, 11:33 am

I really enjoyed that clip. I'll have to check out that movie. Not one of my favorite Kate Bush songs, though.

Still think Heathcliff's a sociopath. Maybe Mr. Fiennes can change that. I can forgive gorgeous men a lot ;-)

10nperrin
Dic 12, 2007, 11:35 am

Did he come off of a ship from the Americas? Is he a mulatto, perhaps the child of a slave who had been raped by her owner? Or is he Irish? Or gypsy?

Or is he their father's illegitimate son? Possibilities, possibilities.

I believe I also defended Wuthering Heights on that thread (or some other one), but my favorite thing about it is the narration--a combination of Nelly Dean telling her story to gossipy Mr. Lockwood and Lockwood telling his own story (while he is ill, and thus quite unreliable), etc etc.

11Nickelini
Dic 12, 2007, 12:19 pm

#10 - Or is he their father's illegitimate son? Possibilities, possibilities.

----------

Yes, nperrin, I enjoyed going back and reading your comments in the other thread. Very interesting theory, indeed.

If Heathcliffe is the father's illegitimate son, maybe it was the father who raped some poor slave girl. Hmmmm . . . I can certainly see how current authors get ideas to write sequels and prequels and beside-quels to these classic stories. :-)

12Nickelini
Dic 28, 2007, 4:01 pm

I thought of another reason why I like Wuthering Heights. It really doesn't have anything to do with the book itself, but with the author. Emily Bronte grew up in a remote part of England, and had very little contact with anyone outside of her family for her entire short life. I find it interesting that out of that extreme isolation she created this particular novel. Her story is as strange and fascinating as Wuthering Heights itself.

13fannyprice
Dic 28, 2007, 4:39 pm

The one thing that I really enjoyed about Wuthering Heights was the story-within-a-story/unreliable narrator aspect to it. I liked that the whole thing was actually being related like second or even third-hand. I did not really enjoy the book much beyond that.

14Bookmarque
Dic 28, 2007, 6:55 pm

WH has always been on my "why do people like this?" list and now that I have some other ideas, I may revisit it sometime. I did loathe reading it though. I wanted to shake everyone in it and give them a good smack. Never found Heathcliffe the least bit attractive...sociopath about sums him up. And Cathy...don't even get me started.

But who knows...maybe a re-read somewhere down the line, pared with a clinical attitude (and not expectations of a romance which this has always been categorized as) will help a great deal.

15fannyprice
Dic 28, 2007, 7:36 pm

I want to read some good literary essays about Wuthering Heights, as I find that the more I know about a book and its background, the more I tend to appreciate it, even if I cannot "like" it. I think the selling of the story as a romance in popular culture possibly prejudices readers when they come to it and find nothing "romantic" in it by contemporary standards.

16citygirl
Dic 28, 2007, 8:04 pm

Tell us what you find out, fannyprice. I'm too lazy to read literary essays myself (and I read & do too much analysis for my work), but I'd love to know some of the ideas explored.

17CarlosMcRey
Abr 1, 2008, 11:55 pm

I think I had read this thread before reading Wuthering Heights, and I didn't think about commenting when I finished it. I thought WH was pretty good, but I think I brought different expectations into it, since I thought of it as a Gothic more than a romance. And when you look at Heathcliff in relation to other Gothic villains/anti-heroes, he's a pretty interesting character. He's more well rounded than most of his counterparts but loses none of the sinisterness. I also couldn't help but think the characters may have been a bit outsized as being a product of their isolation. Then again, if I'm reading a work as Gothic, I tend to be a little more forgiving of characters with somewhat neurotic personalities.

18Sandydog1
Editado: Jul 2, 2011, 7:08 pm

I too thought WH was excellent and considering when it was published, it must have created quite a stir. Yes, the characters weren't admirable, but the ghosts, broodiness, years of resentments, maliciousness, etc., what fun! I liked it better than Jane Eyre.

19jenreidreads
Jun 7, 2008, 11:28 pm

I read Wuthering Heights in a Women in Pop Culture class in college. We had to write papers comparing it to modern romance novels. That was a really fun project (I'm a nerd, I know), which helped me appreciate the novel. It's not very romantic, of course, but it was interesting learning how it influenced the modern romance genre.

20Nickelini
Jun 7, 2008, 11:43 pm

Did you get a list of possible romance novels for the comparison, or would any old Harlequin do?

21jenreidreads
Jun 7, 2008, 11:47 pm

We were able to pick any old romance novel we wanted. I stuck with Nora Roberts, because I figured she'd follow the standard romance formula. Some people picked Danielle Steele, and there were several people who picked Harlequin Blazes (the really steamy ones), but their papers didn't turn out that great. I'm sure I still have that paper somewhere...I had such a good time writing it, lol.

(Sorry, touchstones aren't working)

22chelsye
Dic 17, 2008, 12:52 pm

WH is my #1 read for my 2009 50 book challenge. Ugh. It's slow going. I really thought that since I love Austen I would love the Bronte sisters but it doesn't seem to be so. I'm about halfway through and this book seems to be a tragedy. I'm in love with no one, not even a crush. Sometimes I think we attribute importance to books just because people are still reading them 100 years later, not because they are really that great.

23Nickelini
Dic 17, 2008, 1:10 pm

I love Wuthering Heights (which I've probably said here before). I think people get confused when they approach it as a romance, expecting, well, romance, and expecting to like the characters. I thought the main characters were despicable, but I enjoyed watching their twisted behavior. Do you think you can like it if you approach it differently?

24chelsye
Dic 17, 2008, 1:14 pm

Hmmm...interesting thought. I read somewhere that previews and titles can really effect the success/failure of movies because if people walk-in expecting a certain thing and the movie doesn't live up to those expectations, people won't like the movie. The Mexican with Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts was the example given. It makes sense that it would be the same for books.

Okay then, what is this book about? What should I expect?

25Nickelini
Dic 17, 2008, 1:33 pm

Not sure what to tell you other beyond what is said in this thread. I look at WH as a story about a family of dysfunctional people living in isolation on the moors of England, and think that's interesting in itself. Did you get a chance to check out the other WH thread? (see link above in message #5.) I personally find the Brontes very different from Jane Austen, although they often get lumped together. I like them all, and I guess a lot of other readers do too. I used to prefer the Brontes because things actually happened and it wasn't just a bunch of people sitting around in drawing rooms talking (I've come to like those drawing room conversations now). But to tell readers to read the Brontes because they liked Austen is setting them up for disappointment, because they're not the same at all. (and now I think I'm rambling, so I'm going to quit talking)

26fannyprice
Dic 17, 2008, 5:36 pm

>25 Nickelini:, I agree, Nickelini. I think people say link Austen and the Brontes because they are all female English writers from the 1800s, so of course if you like one, you'll like the other. Very silly. From what little of the Brontes I've read, even the three sisters are very different from each other, but popular perception persists that they all have the same style & attitude. I've actually come to appreciate JA, EB, and CB for their own unique traits, despite an aversion to the Brontes that developed when I read Wuthering Heights shortly after an Austen binge and after receiving the same bad advice that I would like one because I liked the other.

27CarlosMcRey
Dic 17, 2008, 7:10 pm

fanny, I was thinking those same reasons that they get linked together. I think their fiction does have some superficial similarities, since they all wrote about middle-class women living in rural England.

I'm curious why WH gets called a romance. I picked it up because it was on a list of gothic works, and thought it was just superb as a gothic work. But as a straight romance, I imagine it wouldn't be that appealing.

28Nickelini
Dic 17, 2008, 7:17 pm

Fanny--I didn't want to get into the differences between the Brontes, but you're right, of course. And Carlos, I agree with WH as a gothic rather than a romance. I don't think of Jane Eyre as a romance either, as I dislike Rochester even more than Heathcliff. At least with Heathcliff we pretty well know he's evil right off, while Rochester tries to hide it.

29fannyprice
Dic 18, 2008, 8:56 am

>28 Nickelini:, Haha, Nickelini, you and I are on the same page about Rochester there. And I know you've read Wide Sargasso Sea, which complicates Jane Eyre even more.

30Morphidae
Dic 18, 2008, 5:13 pm

I'm giving up on WH. It's too depressing and I don't like any of the characters. It's just too yuck for me. I'd be reading just to say I read it and not because I'm getting any enjoyment out of it.

31ncgraham
Mar 24, 2009, 11:34 pm

Correction to Always_Reading ... Wuthering Heights was the only book Emily Bronte wrote, though her sisters wrote others....

32Gail.C.Bull
Editado: Jul 13, 2010, 11:46 am

Wurthering Heights is one of the few works of Victorian literature I actually like. The trouble is that critics often lump Emily Bronte in the romance catagory just because she is a 19th century female writer. Wurthering Heights is a gothic horror story not a romance. The gothic horror story has more in common with the modern day psychological thriller then modern horror, so don't go into it expecting a Edgar Allen Poe either. If you don't like gothic stories or psychological thrillers you will not enjoy Wurthering Heights.

Heathcliff got labeled as a romantic hero because of the Hollywood film made in the 1940s which had almost nothing in common with the book. In the film, he is an emotionally damaged brooding lover. In the book, he is a vindictive, slightly deranged man who takes brutal revenge on anyone who came between him and the object of his affection. He ends up brutalizing two generations of two different families. The man is supposed to be a headcase, and you aren't supposed to like him. If you know someone who read the book and fell in love with Heathcliff, get them psychiatric councilling before they end up married to a monster.

33eddybearz
mayo 19, 2010, 3:29 pm

When I started to read it, it was because it was the only unread book on my e-Reader. My friend told me how romantic it was, which I didn't see.
I did like it, but for other reasons. I imagined how life must have been for Emily, stuck in that little house, probably never going anywhere. Nothing to do but reading and brooding. Her world was so small compared to ours, and she had to invent her persons. Not like us, who can look around and find people to picture.

Reading it in that historic perspective made it an acceptable book. I am glad I've read it, but I don't think I'll ever do it again.

34Gail.C.Bull
Jul 11, 2010, 11:58 am

There was a literary movement in the nineteenth century called the "Romantic Movement." Wurthering Heights was certainly a part of this movement but that doesn't mean it is romantic in the 21st century meaning of the word. Perhaps that's what is causes so much confusion.

35karen_o
Feb 25, 2014, 5:04 pm

A friend and I just finished reading this and both thoroughly hated it! I wish I'd searched for this thread before and taken a different POV in my reading: I certai ly couldnt see the black-hearted, nearly evil Heathcliffe as any sort of romantic figure -- or at least not romance as I know it! Now I see I was never supposed to! LOL

36chatmaw
Abr 22, 2014, 3:21 pm

As Gayle says above, Wuthering Heights is a Romantic (with a capital 'R') novel, part of a movement in which writers and artists explored the sublime (as in awesome and terrifying) power of nature. Heathcliff, with his ambiguous origins (African? Native American? Gypsy?) is a romantic figure inasmuch as he represents an unpredictable, violent, elemental force in the novel. It is about a society anxious about everything: race, gender, sexuality.

As people have hinted at, I suspect people come to Wuthering Heights expecting something very different - perhaps a more cute, sentimental narrative - and are disappointed by the bleakness of what they find. It's a pity, as it is a startlingly modern, compelling story about the redemptive and destructive nature of desire. Wuthering Heights is gritty and urgent and sensuous.

Don't be put off.

37Nickelini
Abr 23, 2014, 6:46 am

#36- that's an excellent summary.

38citygirl
Abr 23, 2014, 1:50 pm

Oh, my. I started this thread 6 1/2 years ago. Thanks for the perspective. I still remember it as one of the most vivid books I've read and I think I want to read it again, this time not expecting a love story with a hero and heroine. I imagine I will still find Catherine inexplicable and I doubt my opinion if HC will change.

39Sandydog1
mayo 8, 2014, 9:18 pm

#37

I agree 100%

40Tess_W
Jul 7, 2016, 8:56 am

I LOVE Wuthering Heights! It's my favorite piece of fiction of all time. Heathcliff, while a brute has been molded this way by his environment. Here is a man who loves deeply and grieves for years about his lost love. He invites death so that he and Cathy can be together.

41oldthoughts
Ene 27, 2023, 9:10 pm

Dwell more upon the Reason ... I have spent the greater part of 60 years being regarded as "weird" for having never owned a television. Because I do not "fit in" with the Multitude, the multitudes have, without exception, delighted to regard me as Inferior for refusing to wallow in their swamp.

The acccepted conduct and 'standards' of "Society" intruded into the Simple Love that had begun between Heathcliffe and Cathy. Once Cathy prostituted herself to the superficial, Herd Mentality of the world - "Be Part of the Crowd" - the cruelty-from-betrayel came out in Heathcliffe. His revenge was to "enter" that world (overseas, success, wealth) and use it to inflict torment upon those who live its lifestyle. The yearning
for his "old life" and the tempestuous conflict as a result, is the appeal of the book. I have never followed the multitude in any thing, and can assure you that if you 'stand out' the hordes will "hammer you in" ... And that is an exceedingly difficult reality to accept.

How was Heathcliffe treated in the beginning? Human beings are tribal, selfish, and vicious - Name-Calling emotional infants - towards anyone who will not do as they do. Witness the past few years. Heathcliffe was taunted, degraded, isolated - treated like dirt: This brings out either tears or, as Heathcliffe - cruelty in 'fighting back'. Please Consider that it is the Frustration - the inner turmoil of Heathcliffe and Cathy ... that is the appeal of Wuthering Heights.