Lesson on Oppositions in Wuthering Heights

Mr Sadgrove began the lesson showing us this picture, first of all most of us saw a Mr Sadds' face but when we looked again we saw a person sitting out in the country.

We then filled out a table where we matched a list of adjectives to their appropriate character from the novel. Mine is below.

Earnshaws - Wild

Lintons - Civilised

Catherine Earnshaw - Nature

Hindley Earnshaw - Hateful

Frances Earnshaw - Hostile

Catherine Linton - Nurture ( she is nurtured and brought up by Heathcliff to become miserable and distant )

Edgar Linton - Tame

Thrushcross Grange - High Status

Isabella Linton - Weak

Heathcliff - Outsider

Hareton Earnshaw - Uneducated

Joseph - Religious

Lockwood - Human ( not that he is the most human characteristically but he is the most "normal" character who is most like the audience )

Nelly - Obedient

Wuthering Heights - Stormy

We then read an article called "Life on the Edge - Opposition and Fragmentation in Wuthering Heights" by Andrew Green which I have summed up below - you can access the article by clicking the link above

Green points out that the gothic genre "thrives on opposition and division and has at its heart, uncertainty, the unsettling and the indefinable" and we see this in Wuthering Heights from what we learned about the liminal. There are many oppositions in the novel and instead of having clear boundaries between the two forces, they often crossover and break down, the borders become unclear and this puts the reader at unease as they can't distinguish or feel comfort in feeling they know what is what. For example the character Heathcliff is liminal and the audience at some stages don't know whether he is a good character or is evil, and this uncertainty is an aspect of the gothic. The obscurity leads to fear beacuse "a novel in which such oppositions remained distinct would present a reassuring, morally certain world" when the gothic is all about creating a world where things aren't stable, but unreliable. "It is on this borderland that fear resides"

As David Punter suggests "(Gothic works are) fragmentary, inconsistent, jagged" and these fragments can be found in what makes up Lockwoods narrative. Lockwoods diary consists of fragments of Catherine's dairy, letters from Isabella, stories from Nelly and what Lockwood himself sees. The story being fragmented destabilises the reader, and again places the reader in a world of uncertainty. Even pointed out was "Brontes manipulation of the names, ensures that the reader, like Lockwood is repeatedly destabilised"

The oppositions in character also provide a sense of unclarity. At the beginning of the novel Lockwood identifies himself as similar to Heathcliff " Mr Heathcliff and I are such a suitable pair" however this similarity is instantly disproved with the differences between them when Lockwood watches Heathcliff in awe and not being able to understand Heathcliff's anguish at calling out for the ghost to return, he thinks it is folly ( stupid). Even the two's names oppose (wood vs heath[ an open area]). Lockwood "represents aceptable gentility (elegance)" and Heathcliff "is brutal without the patina ( appearance) of civilisation". But the set position of these characteristics are again blurred, it is never that simple. Lockwood may appear to be a perfect gentleman but in Chapter 3 he violently rubs the wrists of Catherines ghost against the broken window glass "to and fro till the blood ran down and soaked the bedclothes", and Heathcliff may appear to be a cruel misanthropist but later we are shown the pure passion he loved Catherine with. Catherine even breaks the opposition between self and other, when she declares "I am Heathcliff".

Green tells us that in Wuthering Heights "the rules by which we expect the world and society to operate are not simply broken, they are shown not to apply" and this is what creates the obscurity and then the fear of the gothic.

We were then rudely interrupted by the fire alarm!!!

But after (and during) that we read another article The Semantic Fields of Wuthering Heights which went like this...

Semantics in its simplest is the linking of clusters words that share similar meanings. In two descriptive extracts of Thrushcross Grange and Wuthering Heights we grouped words together that were similar. Wuthering Heights had a representation of being stormy, hostile and unwelcoming, but when we find these group of words: [ culinary utensils, copper saucepans and tin cullenders, oatcakes and clusters of legs of beef, mutton, and ham, chimney, roasting, boiling, or baking ] the place can feel quite homely and cosy. And with Thrushcross Grange we see words like: [ beautiful, splendid, pure, shimmering, heavenly, happy, soft, gold and silver ] but then this is contrasted with what is going on in this "splendid" place: [ screaming, shreiking, weeping, shaking, yelping and accusations ]. From using a sematic approach clusters of words can seem more powerful together and linking the words together can really emphasise a point for future essays.