Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Wuthering Heights and Marxist Criticism
I enjoyed reading the Marxist criticism of Wuthering Heights. I find the effects of societal pressures in the novel fascinating. However, the phrase in the critical essay that had the biggest impression on me while I was reading had little to due with that issue. I loved the description of Catherine's marriage to Edgar as an arrangement in which "Catherine trades her authentic selfhood for social privilege" and compares it to "spiritual suicide and murder." this description, although perhaps melodramatic, I feel is very intriguing. In a way, this symbolic suicide leads to the deaths of many more characters, as well as the near death of the hereditary lines of both Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange. Does anyone else feel that this is a revealing description?
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Absolutely! I referred to that same passage in my blog, Trista. Cathy, by her attempt "to square authenticity with social convention," succeeds in neither; the effort kills Cathy, Edgar, and Heathcliff (397). Further down in that paragraph, Eagleton says, "Heathcliff himself is both gift and threat." That dichotomy, as much as the "social choice" Eagleton mentions, presents the crux of the story (396). Several of us have mentioned a feeling of empathy for Heathcliff (which usually becomes unfounded with his subsequent words or actions). This desire to make excuses, or at least see his point of view, begins when we see Heathcliff arrive at Wuthering Heights, "available to be accepted or rejected . . . for no good reason other than to be arbitrarily loved (397)." Unfortunately for each and
ReplyDeleteevery character, he is rejected. It is a lost opportunity where all are the lesser for it.
Trista,
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree! I especially enjoy the first half of that quote because that is exactly how I felt as I read the novel. I feel as thought she only married Edgar for the "social privilege" of being a Linton, something Heathcliff could I have never given her. Isn't it interesting that he calls it "spiritual suicide" and that she contracts, if I may quote Dr. Bowden, "generic literary disease" after she sees Heathcliff post her marriage to Edgar? I wonder is she would have died so early if she married Heathcliff and not committed spiritual suicide.
This was a good quote to choose. Catherine's marriage to Edgar was a "spiritual suicide" because she did not end up with the man that she loved. Instead she married for comfort. In my opinion Edgar was not a bad choice, she made a decision that she thought would learn to like. Then when Heathcliff came back to Wuthering Heights Catherine was completely caught off guard, and I agree with Savannah she contracted "generic literary disease" once she saw the effect of marring Edgar.
ReplyDeleteI am glad I was not the only one impacted by this quote! Deborah, I appreciate you bringing up the "gift and threat" quote, because I feel this describes perfectly not only Catherine's dilemma, but our discussions in class of Heathcliff's interesting position within the novel. I personally have very little sympathy for him, but I think it may be because I am prone to judging a character in a novel more on the way they choose to end their place in the narrative, rather than their history going into it. I feel that most of the people who feel deeply for Heathcliff concentrate on his admittedly tragic past, and ignore the havoc he wreaks even in innocent lives. Savannah, I agree that the term "generic literary disease" applies to Catherine (and to most other characters in the novel!) but, especially in Catherine's case, and also in Heathcliff's, I feel the term "spiritual suicide" is more accurate, as their deaths, although undefined, are obviously the causes of self-inflicted punishment. Billi Jo, I am glad you also think Edgar was a decent choice. I myself am much more sympathetic to Edgar, as his bad qualities arise entirely from an inherent upper class prejudice, rather than any real desire to harm anyone.
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