Catherine And Heathcliff The Uncanny

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

The Uncanny is a Gothic aspect and refers to the strange or the mysterious in an unsettling way.

In Freud’s theory, two words are used to describe it: "Heimlich"- homelike and "Unheimlich" – unhomelike. Freud states that it is only when these two interact, when the uncanny is possible: when the unhomelike elements invade our home.

Punter argued that the uncanny can be present even in the home, serving as a prime example Brontë’s "Wuthering Heights" of how the home is not safe and can be violent, mysterious and unsettling.

Starting from the title, "wuthering" suggests a dramatic weather which the author employs to represent her characters’ turbulent moods, mostly illustrated in the scene where Heathcliff leaves Wuthering Heights after discovering Catherine’s plans to marry Edgar Linton: "It was a very dark evening for summer: the clouds appeared inclined to thunder."

Comparing the house of Wuthering Heights with that of Thrushcross Grange, Lockwood observes strange elements concerning Wuthering Heights: "narrow windows", "large jutting stones" and "grotesque carving". Punter a spus, Lockwood a observat, acum urmeaza parerea ta, cum te situezi tu fata de cele doua afirmatii.

Another feature of the uncanny is that of the figure of the attractive yet dangerous man with a mysterious past. Heatcliff could be regarded as a Byronic hero in that despite his deeply vengeful character, his exotic appearance and passionate nature which inevitably exerts a powerful hold on Catherine Earnshaw:

"As it spoke, I discerned, obscurely, a child’s face looking through the window." (p.20)

The uncanny phenomenon appears to make an entrance in the narrative when Lockwood is beset by what seems to be the spirit of the long departed Catherine. Ai trecut prea brusc la fereastra, adauga un liant cu ce spuneai inainte.

This window could symbolically represent a temporary portal to another world.

After Heathcliff heard about Lockwood’s experience, he went to the window and begged Catherine to appear to him, too. This scene is recalled later when Heathcliff starves himself to death, convinced that he will be reunited with Catherine after he has died.

In Emily Brontë’s novel, the "real" ghost is not reflected in the looking glass, it appears just beyond the window that overlooks the moors:"Haunt me,then!... 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!" (p.139)

Heathcliff is the only one in the novel who not only expects Catherine’s return, but also for eighteen years feels her presence. "Nelly, I am Heathcliff – he is always, always in my mind – not as a pleasure, any more than I am a pleasure to myself – but as my own being – so, don’t talk of our separation again." (p.74)

Even as a spirit, Catherine confirms the idea that pleasure is not the mainstay of her being in Heathcliff. The relation they have suggests that pain, which takes the measure of the soul, its capacity for faith, is the tie that really binds.

"She showed herself, as she often was in life, a devil to me! And, since then, sometimes more, and sometimes less, I’ve been the sport of that intolerable torture! Infernal – keeping my nerves at such a stretch, that if they had not resembled catgut, they would, long ago, have relaxed to the feebleness of Linton’s." (p.230)

Pain is what the spirit of Catherine exacts from Heathcliff, who agonizes with no little satisfaction.

"It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how much I love him; and that not because he’s handsome, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same, and Edgar’s is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire."

Catherine’s statement that Heathcliff is "more myself than I am" shows how their relation often transcends a dynamic of desire and becomes one of unity. Catherine does not say "I love Heathcliff", but "I am Heathcliff". In following the relationship through to its painful end, the novel may attest to the destructiveness of a love that denies difference. Aici poti comenta mai mult, e o idee f. importanta.

In concluzie, citatele nu se pun in italice. Ai alineate prea scurte, incearca sa faci paragrafe mai mari, nu doar de o 2-3 propozitii sau de una singura, ceea ce inestetic si denota mai degraba trecerea prea rapida de la o idee la alta. Vreau o mai mare coerenta, nu idei trunchiate, vei complete cu analize mai ample ale aspectelor importante, nu trebuie sa le fugaresti, iarta-mi expresia ……… e literature for God’s sake!