Wuthering Heights is a hot mess - and here's why

Wuthering Heights, written by Emily Brontë and first published in 1847, is a renowned classic. But what is so special about it? Why is it considered a romance? In this video, I will be discussing why I don't think it deserves its reputation as a classic romance - or even a classic *anything*. Prepare for a rant.

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TIMESTAMPS:
Part 1 - Synopsis: 00:01:09
Part 2 - POV Issues: 00:15:43
Part 3 - Plot Issues: 00:19:35
Part 4 - Character Issues: 00:24:55
Conclusion: 00:31:34

MY YA FANTASY NOVEL "LEAVES OF HOLLY":

#booktube #wutheringheights #emilybrontë

[michelaconti]

Well, there's actually a good reason why the romance in the book it's treated so "poorly": Wuthering Heights it's not a romance, that's totally not the point. I don't get why so many people think the genre is romance, it's not. The main theme is abuse, and the cycle of abuse. Also, yeah, Heathcliff sucks, and that's totally fair. We should not feel for him, nor should he have rediming qualities. He is an abuser, he is also the "villain" (well not as a narrative figure, but he's the bad guy).

I agree with some of what you say, but I think that most of the problems you talked about aren't problems, because the book is not romance.

[melenatorr]

The first couple of times I read "Wuthering Heights", I didn't like it either. Upon a further read, I started paying attention to the structure and asking myself why Emily chose to write this way.

The very fact that we never meet our central characters face to face is, for me, a key to the story, which is not about romance. It's about (in part) abuse and its consequences. Heathcliff and Cathy evolve into what they are because of what they have come from. They are surrounded by people who do not understand them, and it is through these people, both Nelly and Lockwood, that we are challenged by Emily to dig beyond. Lockwood, in this case, is not only useful but essential, because, basically, he is us at the start of own journey. The romance between Heathcliff and Cathy is toxic; Emily knew it was toxic: she goes through great pains to show us how, why, and what happens. So, this is a romance, but not a love story. It takes a full generation for the poisons of Hindley, Heathcliff and Cathy to work themselves out; a key to this is young Cathy's defiance, the way she recalls her mother to Heathcliff, and burns the life and will out of him.

Seeing the novel from this perspective changed my whole attitude toward it: it is now, for me, a wonderfully-compacted and many-faceted structure of a story, with questions and challenges tossed to us by Emily like so many gauntlets. If we refuse the challenge, we are turned off of the novel. If we accept it, the going won't get any simpler or more enjoyable. But you'll emerge from it like Lockwood is at the end: he starts out ignorant, and rather delusional about his affection toward young Cathy. He finishes pondering things his mind had never approached before. And so might we.

[succubusy]

Edited: This piece is about TRAGEDY. Pivoting thru a gothic scene.
Not tragedy of a romance, but of tragedy resulting to new romances.

Cycles of indirect revenges which resulted to relationships that recreated the past thru alter-egos.

Hindley being jealous, revenged to Heathcliff.
Heathcliff being heartbroken revenged to Edgar's sister.
Heathcliff taking advantage stripped off Hindley who is on a personal vendetta, resulting to abandonment of Hareton. (another orphan)

The two Catherine are the soft spot of the story.
Catherine is the hope of Heathcliff.
Cathy is the hope of Hareton.

... do you see the similarities (Heathcliff & Hareton growing up as servants/orphans)

ALTER EGOS:
There are obvious recurrence of events from the 2nd gen to the 3rd (1st gen are the Earnshaws & Lintons).
And Cathy evidently took succession of events in the 3rd gen. (as the love interest of the story)

Catherine choosing Edgar for social rank instead of her love Heathcliff.
Cathy in love with Linton who is already on a social rank, yet still ended up with Hareton.

Heathcliff despite of being divisive is slowly in cognizance of the repetition of the past, which I conclude started his madness.
He witnessed Cathy's affection to Linton. Like Catherine to Edgar.
And later on witnessing Cathy as the comfort/solace of Hareton. Like Catherine to Heathcliff.

He avoided Cathy & Hareton because he can see his past, and maybe deep inside know that eventually they will end up together.

IRONY:
He died thinking he is with Catherine.
Their alter ego Cathy & Hareton lived and plans to be together in marriage.

Cathy and Hareton is the could have been of Heathcliff. 🤷🏼‍♀️




1st Entry:
I believe that Bronte's purpose of writing WH is to explore human emotion, to bring scandal and despair, that passion will often result to disappointment.

The story is about the cycle of abuse. Hindley did not feel loved. Hindley abused to Heathcliff to Isabella, but Heathcliff can never make Edgar and Hindley suffer directly. He wants revenge but indirect.

It is dragging, really and frustrating as if no hope is left for anyone who is controlled by Heathcliff.

Heathcliff, despite accomplishing his devises, never experienced gratification. After Linton's death, he knew that there's no sense for all of it (Linton as his only pawn).

Heathcliff may have had the control of all the people around him (even Nelly) never came to have control over his wishes of being with Catherine.


All that's left are the legacy of 2 of his most hated persons, Hareton the son of the abusive Hindley, and Cathy child of his rival Edgar.

[link]

I know that Heathcliff and Catherine's love is not so relevant. However, Catherine's confession to Nelly about her love for Heathcliff is probably the most powerful confession of love in all literature. Catherine appears to Lockwood as a ghost because she wants to be with Heathcliff and because she repents that she did not had a life with him. She says that she has been a waif for twenty years! That means that her home has always been Wuthering Heights. When she is dreadfully sick, she hopes dearly that she would be in her home again. She is even haunted in her bedroom at Thruscross Grange! Heathcliff begs for her to be with him. She hears his prayer and his wish becomes real. I think that Catherine as a ghost visits Heathcliff and as a ghost she punishes herself because she didn't had a life with Heathcliff and tries to enter the house where she met the love of her life. Obviously she wants to be with him and that describes the cries of despair that Lockwood hears from her as a ghost. Of what I have learnt, i think that the unforgivable sin mentioned in Lockwood's dream is the separation between Heathcliff and Catherine. However, I do understand you.

[veronicanicholls]

I watched it all and loved every bit . You are enchanting and weave magic to an already magical story. I love Jane Eyre, so glad it had a happy ending.

[reginawhitlock]

One of my favorite novels I first read it when I was 11, one million years ago. It made perfect sense to me me then, or it seemed to. It would have been better if I'd read Austen before the Brontes.

[KatTalks]

What a brilliant video! I love your analysis of what worked and what didn't. Wuthering Heights was actually one of the books we studied for Alevels, and people went mad over the "romance" of Catherine and Heathcliff, but I sided with you - I couldn't see it ever ending happily.

[Heleyrine]

Thank you for this wonderful review.
I do agree that perhaps at times, revealing the ending in the present (whilst presenting a plot belonging to the present) might work at times.
A good example would be The Tenant of Wildfell Hall in which, we of course, don't know all about Mrs. Graham, but we know she eventually ends up somewhere away from her home and marriage which we see, rather early on in the book.

Oh, and I believe another reason why she married Edgar, if i remember correctly was that she could gain a position, not only for her vanity (which was of course, evident too), but so she could raise Heathcliff's position and place with her marriage in some way, as she told Nelly. But...Heathcliff didn't hear that part, and sneaked out of the house before hearing those words; which for me, creates another plot hole, in which why on earth, did they never fixed such misunderstanding in Heathcliff's many many visits to them after the pass of the three years.

[p_nk]

It’s Wuthering - not Withering! Otherwise I like your videos!

[ReligionOfSacrifice]

"ElfQuest" sort of did a good job on the topic of this book you are speaking about. This half troll and half elf is trying to figure out which part of his blood makes him better. He is not the main characters, but was still a good view of how people can want answers.

"Wuthering Heights" is sort of a guy who sees himself passed over for the intellectual male when he is the strong idiot. He sort of wants his intellectual weak son to succeed, but thwarts him as he wants the strong fool to win the girl in the second generation. Perhaps he is trying to answer some question, but if the book had ended with the girl in the next generation saying both those men were okay, but he (Heathcliff) who is in the older generation who is using the kids to answer his question should have been judged by him as the problem and thus his death could have had meaning. Especialy if he had killed himself after being so judged.

7) "Vilette" by Charlotte Brontë
57) "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë
85) "Agnes Grey" by Anne Brontë
124) "The Professor” by Charlotte Brontë
148) "Shirley" by Charlotte Brontë
151) "Wuthering Heights" by Emily Brontë

I am reading "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall" by Anne Brontë right now as I began this journey of the Brontë sisters this year and since one was the only book by a woman to make my top ten books of all time and thus I want to read all these girls and enjoy all these books.

[driftwood]

Very interesting thoughts. It's been a few years since I've read Wuthering heights, so I do appreciate the summary of the story.
I can say, I didn't particularly enjoy the book and found it rather confusing at times.
I wasn't bothered by the POV and it's changes, though hearing your criticism I can see where you're coming from.
How I've felt through it, wasn't the lack of tension, but the feel of inevitability for the tragedy that is bound to happen. Sure it puts you out of the grand story, but it gives you the option to see through it as an outsider, that only through time gets connected with the events, but no more than just an observer.

I can't say characters stuck with me. I do remember Heathcliff and his barbarism, but others have left me, if that speaks of their shallowness.
What I do remember is Heathcliff returning from the army (I believe?) and the tension that arose right after. I thought that was well made.
The thing this entire novel left with me, I'm surprised you haven't mentioned. It is the Wuthering heights itself. With Heatcliff being the master of it, we see this slow decline. Bronte is very descriptive of the rooms, their darkness and decay that's happening.
I've connected Wuthering heights with Heathcliff himself. He is rotten to the core and the same is happening to his home. The one place where he never could have had the life with Catherine, because she chose another (both man and home).
Because of that I saw the ending as predictable instead of anticlimactic.
I saw the novel being gothic in this descriptions of Wuthering heights and the poorly done tragic love of its owner intertwining with each other.
You had some interesting points I never thought about, for which I'm really grateful.
A really enjoyable video and I hope you do more like these in the future.
(side note: you really tore those characters up!)
Cheers!

[tennysontableau]

I never read the book, and my first exposure to the story was the 2011 movie directed by Andrea Arnold. The first half of that movie, portraying young Catherine and Heathcliff, was so impressive I began to wonder what potential joy could further be attained from this story, only to crash into the second half with confusion and sadness. Thus began my awkward attempt to understand this story without reading the book, viewing a few weird movie versions on youtube, then skipping through several utterly confusing videos about the plot, I finally found this video, which summed it all up so perfectly - A Hot Mess.
Thanks so much for clearly explaining the "plot" and offering some insight into the issue of "romance".
Perhaps one last character issue to add would be that of Emily Bronte, herself. What did she really want to convey in this story?

No one mentions that Heathcliff is a victim of Hindley's abuse. He wasn't evil to begin with and his behaviour is a reaction to the abuse, ; it's made even worse when Catherine rejects him for Edgar..

[terrybryce]

I agree wholeheartedly. I’ve always said that Wuthering Heights was about a bunch of terrible people doing terrible things to each other! It’s nice to hear someone else who has a similar conviction! Thanks! Jane B.

[Algorithmicgeneratedwordsalad]

I only read the book when I was in elementary school because I really like the Kate Bush song and my mom tried really hard to get me into the Bronte sisters I didn't enjoy them as much as my mom seemed too and it was actually her older sister that introduced me into Jane Austen which I preferred a lot more

[GreenLanternFarms]

What a prudish and shallow reading of one of the greatest novels in English. The silliest part is misunderstanding the embedded narratives. It goes even further. At one point, it's Isabella telling Nelly telling Lockwood. And everyone is an unreliable narrator. That is an essential ground of the novel.

[AliEmmkaPique]

You are so cute with your tea. 💝💝💝 Thnx for your analysis, I can now take the final exams hahaha

[tenorsfan]

I think I'll stick with the readers who feel this is greatest novel ever written

[manueluribe]

Loved this. Thank you for saving me time in trying to read this Wes Anderson meets Tim Burton meets AlienVsPredator.

[ramizday]

Wuthering Heights Choose Novel. Yes hot mess but intense mess.