Wuthering+Heights+-+Death


 * Death in Wuthering Heights**

•	Over thirty years, many deaths occur in Wuthering Heights. Most of them are young and under middle age.

-	Catherine Earnshaw -	Frances Earnshaw -	Hindley Earnshaw -	Mr Earnshaw -	Mrs Earnshaw -	Linton -	Edgar Linton -	Isabella Linton -	Heathcliff
 * Death list…**


 * Research:**

//In the passion-driven characters–Catherine, Heathcliff, and Hindley–pain leads them to turn on and to torment others. Inflicting pain provides them some relief; this behavior raises questions about whether they are cruel by nature or are formed by childhood abuse and to what extent they should be held responsible for or blamed for their cruelties. Is all their suffering inflicted by others or by outside forces, like the death of Hindley's wife, or is at least some of their torment self-inflicted, like Heathcliff's holding Catherine responsible for his suffering after her death? Suffering also sears the weak; Isabella and her son Linton become vindictive, and Edgar turns into a self-indulgent, melancholy recluse. The children of love, the degraded Hareton and the imprisoned Cathy, are able to overcome Heathcliff's abuse and to find love and a future with each other. Is John Hagan right that "Wuthering Heights is such a remarkable work partly because it persuades us forcibly to pity victims and//

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/novel_19c/wuthering/themes.html


 * Part One:**

•	Death at the beginning of the novel is displayed by Catherine ghost haunting Lockwood; ‘My fingers closed on the fingers of a little, ice-cold hand! The intense horror of nightmare came over me: I tried to draw back my arm, but the hand clung to it’

•	Death in Wuthering Heights is not displayed only as a plot device or storyline it is more of a psychological and emotional issue

•	For example, Heathcliff’s experience with the death of his soul mate Catherine becomes the characters obsession

•	Again ghosts are used to display death when Heathcliff see’s Catherine ghost at the window, begging it to come inside; ‘Come in! Come in! He sobbed. Cathy, do come. Oh do once more! Oh! My heart’s darling! Hear me this time, Catherine, at last!’ This quote is important as it shows Heathcliff’s love even after death.

•	 “...Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living! You said I killed you--haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers. I believe--I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be with me always--take any form--drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh God! it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!”. This was taken from the scene where Heathcliff begs Catherine not to leave him. It’s not just about her death – but mainly about Heathcliff’s loss – the loss of his soul. Very much links into the theme of love – their love is only shown in a positive and free light when both of their souls unite in death and are wondering on the moors. Therefore, they can only be together only in death.


 * Part Two:**

•	Both suffering and death within Wuthering Heights leads characters to inflict pain onto others.

•	Can be argued that Heathcliff’s cruelty towards others is the loss of his parents and Catherine. Heathcliff’s obsession is the cause due to Catherine’s death. "Terror made me cruel..." "You have left me so long to struggle against death, alone, that I feel and see only death! I feel like death!"

When Heathcliff confesses to Nelly about his state of being; “You know, I was wild after she died; and eternally, from dawn to dawn, praying her to return to me – her spirit – I have a strong faith in ghosts: I have conviction that they can, and do exist among us!” Heathcliff looses all sense of perception and reality from Catherine's ghosts very presence.