《呼啸山庄》中两代凯瑟琳的性格对比分析--毕业
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】 《呼啸山庄》中两代凯瑟琳的性格对比分析
【作者】何灼平
【关键词】 凯瑟琳 性格 对比分析
【指导老师】唐玲
【专业】英语教育
【正文】
1. Introduction
1.1 Introduction to the Author
Emily Bronte (1818—1848) was born in the family of a poor country clergyman
at Haworth, Yorkshire. She and Charlotte, together with their two sisters, were sent to a charity school where they were cruelly treated and two of her sisters were dead there. They had little schooling, but wide reading and home education seemed to give free play to their imagination. They wrote stories and poems. Then they worked as governesses in rich families for some time. In1846, a small volume of verse was published under the pseudonyms of Emily and her sisters Charlotte and Anne. Although only two copies were
sold that year. The sisters were not frustrated. Then they started writing
novels. The year 1837 seemed to be a bright one for all the sisters: Charlotte’s Jane Eyre, Emily’s Wuthering Heights and Anne’s Agnes Grey
were all published. In1848 Emily died. Sharing the miserable life of the whole family, Emily differed from her elder sister Charlotte in having a more passionate and rebellious character. She is remembered and extolled chiefly as the author of Wuthering Heights. But at the turn of the century,
the fame of Wuthering heights was gradually rising; Emily Bronte was regarded as the most gifted of the three Bronte sisters. In particular, her reputation greatly rose after the thirties of the century. A large number
of critical essays on her work have come out in various viewpoints. We have found the Bronte sisters to be a curious and interesting phenomenon in English literature. The Bronte society was established in 1894 for the preservation of Bronte works, and a popular cult has grown about Emily and
her sisters.
1.2 Introduction to Wuthering Heights
Wuthering Heights, written by Emily Bronte, is one of the greatest curiosities, as it is one of the great masterpieces of literature. It is Emily Bronte’s only novel in her short life. Critics never are tired of accounting for it. However, upon the first appearance of the novel and for quite a long time afterwards, it was much neglected and regarded as a naive fantasy by a young writer. Not until 1950s did it begin to be highly valued;
and recently the western critics have exalted it as one of the greatest novels of the Victorian age. It is a novel of unique imaginative power. It contains a degree of emotional force and sophisticated narrative structure, not seen previously in the history of the English novel.
Lockwood, temporary tenant of Thrushcross Grange, who has stumbled into the violent world Wuthering Heights, the home of his landlord Heathcliff, narrates the story. The narration is taken up by the housekeeper, Nelly Dean,
who has been a witness to the interlocked destinies of the original owners of the Heights, the Earnshaw family, and of the Grange, the Linton family. Events are set in motion by the arrival at the Heights of Heathcliff. Heathcliff is picked up as a waif of unknown parentage in the street of Liverpool by the elder Earnshaw, and brings him home to rear as one of his own children. There Heathcliff is treated well by Earnshaw, but when old Earnshaw dies and his son Hindley becomes the master of the house. Hindley
bullies and humiliates Heathcliff; Heathcliff’s passionate and ferocious nature finds its complement in Earnshaw’s daughter Catherine. Their childhood collusions develop into an increasingly intense though vexed attachment, but Heathcliff, overhearing Catherine telling Nelly that she cannot marry him because it would degrade her, and failing to hear her declare her passion for him, leaves the house. He returns three years later, having acquired considerable wealth, and finds that Catherine has already
been married to Edgar Linton, a weak and insignificant man. He is now welcomed by Hindley and he seeks his revenge by making violent love to Catherine. Catherine soon dies of grief, as she is giving birth to a daughter, Catherine Linton. Heathcliff marries Edgar Linton’s sister
Isabella, but does not love her and treats her cruelly. In the course of time Heathcliff has Hindley and his son Hareton entirely in his power and treats the latter brutally as a sort of revenge for Hindley’s cruel treatment of himself during his childhood. Edgar Linton dies, after doing his best to prevent a friendship between Cathy and Heathcliff’s son Linton Heathcliff then lures Cathy to his house, and forces a marriage between her and his sick son Linton in order to secure the Linton property. Young Linton
dies, affection springs up between Cathy and ignorant Haraton, whom she does her best to educate. Heathcliff, now an old man is haunted by the memory of Catherine. At his death there is a promise that the two contrasting worlds
and moral orders represented by the Heights and the Grange will be united in the next generation, in the union of Cathy and Hareton. The novel is cyclical in structure, it moves in a tragic circle from relative peace and harmony to violence, destruction and intense suffering, and finally backs into peace and harmony again.
2. Analysis of Catherine Earnshaw’s Characters
Catherine Earnshaw in Wuthering Heights is a tragic heroine. She has rebellious characters and she is fierce. When she is twelve years old, she
has two kinds dual characters: one is her thought of freedom and spirit of
revolt, the other is her vanity and class prejudice. One is her ingenious cordiality; the other is her unruly nature. Just her vanity is the cause of her tragic fate.
2.1 Her Rebellious Character
2.1.1Her Revolt against Paternity
In patriarchal society, men are the central and represents in family. “Daughter”, “wife”, “mother” are belong to another main
body “family” and have no independence. Because of this, Catherine
revolts against paternity in order to seek independence. Because Catherine as a girl who is deprived of all powers in patriarchal society and has no inheritance, she longs for power. One time, her father Mr. Earmshaw goes out for some business, then he asks her what present she wants, but her answer is a horsewhip. “She was hardly six years old, but she could ride any horse in the stable, and she chose a whip.”1 From this we can know she wants to master all horses in the stable. “A horsewhip” represents the power. It
shows her strong desire for power in her heart. “In play, she liked
exceedingly to act the little mistress; using her hands freely, and commanding her companions.”2 Also she uses her bold, saucy look, and her ready words to defy everybody in her family. “She was never so happy when
we were all scolding her at once, and she defying us with her bold, saucy look, and her ready words;”3 “ doing just what her father hated most,
showing how her pretended insolence, which he thought real, had more power
over Heathcliff than his kindness: How the boy would do her bidding in anything, and his only when it suited his own inclination.”4 Her father treats the orphan as his own son, “He took to Heathcliff strangely,
believing all he said, and putting him up far above Cathy.”5 Heathcliff
helps Catherine get the power in some meaning. When she has power; she neglects her father’s authority in Wuthering Heights. Just before Mr. Earnshaw’s death, his only worry is “Why canst thou not always be a good
lass, Cathy?”6 What kind of girl does the father want her to be? He wants her to be an angelic girl----a gentle obedient daughter. The rebellious
Catherine mocks. “Why can not you be a good man, father?”7 The answer of Catherine shows a kind of exceptional rebellious characters.
2.1.2 Her Revolt against Her Brother’s Persecution
She revolts against persecution of her brother; she loves freedom, and is not constrained by the oppressive forces. When her father is dead, Hindley is the master of the Heights. Catherine is ill treated by her brother,
without getting a little warmth of the family. She is often punished to stand at the wall and is not allowed to eat. Both Heathcliff and Catherine are persecuted. They are forced to sit shivering in the garret, three hours in
the attic listening to Joseph reading sermons, while Hindley and his wife sit in the fatuous comfort by the fire. So their response to these conditions is to rebel against the regime. The love between Catherine and Heathcliff
as an emotional bond is forged in response to their ill—treatment.
“Against this degradation Catherine and Heathcliff rebel, hurling their books into the dog—kettle. And in their revolt, they discover their deep and passionate need of each other. He, the outcast slummy, turns to the
lively, spirited, fearless girl who alone offers him human understanding and companionship. And she, born into the world of Wuthering Heights, believes that to achieve a full humanity, to be true to herself as a human being, she must associate herself totally with him in his rebellion against the tyranny involves.”8
From this Catherine does not despise him for his status of an outcast. She offers him human understanding and companionship. Heathcliff gives her true self. The shackles on Catherine become heavier, she is not allowed to be
with Heathcliff, but is confined to the house with the model lady, Frances. Yet the more he oppresses, the more eagerly she will rebel. Her nature calls her to grow up as rude as savages in order to live a free life.
2.1.3 Her Revolt against Religion
Religion is a tool, which is used to confine thoughts of human beings in patriarchal society. The religious rules restrain Catherine of her liberty. Also, the “faithful” servant Joseph uses religious thoughts to constrain
Catherine for a long time. So she revolts religion. She laughs at Bible, even doesn’t go to church on Sundays. She always makes old
and “faithful ”servant Joseph angry. Then she dismisses with a
laugh. “Turning Joseph’s religious curses into ridicule, baiting me,”9
“ Saying this, he compelled us so to square our positions that we might receive from the far—off fire a dull ray to show us the text of the limber he thrust upon us.” “I could not bear the employment. I took my dingy volume by the scroop, and hurled it into the dog—kennel, vowing I hated
a good book” “Heathcliff kicked his to the same place. Then there was a hubbub!”10
2.2 Her Dual Characters
In her adolescence, the effects of the conventional Victorian society is so great that a girl of her sort of society requires that she cannot get
rid of or ignore the ideology. Catherine begins to take a dual character. In civilized Thrushcross Grange, she becomes ingenious cordial and gentle and cultivated. In her home Wuthering Heights, she reappears unconventional, wild and intractable.
In Thrushcross Grange, she becomes ingenious cordial and gentle and cultivated. One day, a bulldog in Thrushcross Grange bites Catherine, and Thrushcross grange takes in Catherine five weeks. She is influenced by the civilization of patriarchal society. Her dress, manners and social attitude are changed.
Instead of a wild, hatless little savage lumping into the house, and rushing to squeeze us all breathless, there lighted from a handsome black pony a very dignified person, with brown ringlets falling from the cover of a
feathered beaver, and a long cloth habit, which she was obliged to hold up with both hands that she might sail in.11
This is by no means the casual piece of description that it appears at first sight to be, but a deliberate piece of stylization. It indicates that Catherine is moving towards the “polite” world of Lintons. After five
weeks in Thrushcross Grange she is (also) unpleasantly aware of the
differences between Heathcliff’s roughness and the refinement of the
Lintons “why, how very black and cross you look! And how-how funny and grim!
But that is because I’m used to Edgar and Isabella Linton.”12 Catherine speaks to Heathcliff. From this, Catherine dislikes the dirty and “impolite” Heathcliff and admires the gentle, rich, polite Edgar
Linton. Their visit to the Grange preludes the tragedy of their love. Looking through the window of the Grange, Catherine sees a world completely different from the bleak and declining Heights. It’s an attractive place,
possesses everything that Heathcliff doesn’t have just as social position, wealth and comfortable life.
In Wuthering Heights, she reappears unconventional, wild and intractable.
Catherine had kept up her kept up her acquaintance with the Lintons since her five weeks’ residence among them; and she had no temptation to show her rough side in their company, and had the sense to be ashamed of being rude where she experienced such invariable courtesy, she imposed unwittingly on the old lady and gentleman, by her ingenious cordiality;
gained the admiration of Isabella, and the heart and soul of her brother: acquisitions that flattered her from the first, for she was full of ambition, and led her to adopt a double character without exactly intending to deceive any one. In the place where she had heard Heathcliff termed a “vulgar young
ruffian,” and “worse than a brute,” she care not to act like him; but at home she had small inclination to practice politeness that would only be laughed at, and restrain an unruly nature when it would bring her neither
credit nor praise. 13
She has both thoughts of freedom and spirit of revolt and vanity and class prejudice. Her vanity and class prejudice make her choose Edgar Linton, but her true self-makes her need Heathcliff.
Some of the Lintons’ worldliness and luxury have been rubbed on her and she is conscious of the social gulf between herself and Heathcliff. Catherine personally thinks she can have everything that the other life can offer her ----fine clothes, flattery and social status of a lady but still
retain the old relationship with Heathcliff. Catherine’s new values determine her choice of Edgar Linton rather than Heathcliff. Catherine declares her superficial love for Edgar and strong relationship with Heathcliff. In spite of that, she is prepared to betray Heathcliff and her own nature by accepting the values of the Lintons. The dual sides of her nature and the inner conflict are clearly exposed here. She chooses Edgar because he is “handsome, and pleasant to be with, ‘young and
cheerful’—but most of all because He will be rich, and I like to be the greatest woman of the neighborhood, and I shall be proud of having such a husband.”14 The grounds of her attraction to Edgar are wealth, position and social distinction. For that reason, she says Hindley has degrades
Heathcliff so much she cannot marry him. Only is Heathcliff an “idol” in
her mind. The love she devotes to him is deep and genuine. Her love for Heathcliff “resembles the eternal rocks beneath”. “But because he is
more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”15 Heathcliff is part of her, representing her innermost self. Such kind of the contradicted, violent passion, which is full of willfulness and faith, makes the lady distracted. She has killed herself in the trap that
she herself makes and she becomes a victim of the contradiction.
Vanity is a fatal weakness in Catherine’s characters, precisely her weakness causes the tragedy, she does not acknowledge her own shortcoming, but connives at it. She does not get down to solving problem from her inner heart but from outside ceaselessly. She dreams to control everything. So her marriage is doomed to be a failure.
2.3 Her Fierceness
She pinches Nelly with strong power. When she invites Edgar to her home as
a guest and lets Nelly leave, Nelly refuses, so she pinches Nelly. When Nelly shouts, Catherine pinches her; she says she does not do this. From this we can see she is fierce.
She, supposing Edgar could not see her, snatched the cloth from my hand,
with a prolonged wrench, very spitefully on the arm. “Oh, Miss, that’s
a nasty trick! You have no right to nip me, and I’m nit going to bear it” “I
didn’t touch you, you lying creature!” Cried she, her fingers tingling to repeat the act, and her ears red with rage. “What’s that, then?” she
stamped her foot, wavered a moment, and then, irresistibly impelled by the naughty spirit within her, slapped me on the cheek a stinging blow that filled both eyes with water.16
3. Analysis of the Characters of Catherine Linton
Catherine Linton is another heroine in this novel; she is a model lady in Victorian society. She is kind and cares about others; also she is a girl of filial piety. Her abortive marriage causes her rebellious characters. She revolts Heathcliff’s brutal and struggle against prejudice and discrimination in patriarchal society.
3.1 Her Kindness
Compared with her mother pinching Nelly, she looks after Nelly when Nelly is ill. When her savant Nelly is ill, little Cathy behaves like an angel
in coming to wait on her and cheer her solitude. At the same time her father is ill too. She leaves her father’s room, and then appears at her servant’s bed—side. Then she is in the company of Nelly. Her day is divided into two parts, one is for her father, and the other is for Nelly.
Different from her mother, little Cathy is well—educated by her father,
she is always considerate about other person. She loves little Linton, in order to protect her chicken—hearted cousin. She says to Nell “you know,
and wiser; less childish, am I not? And he’ll soon do as I direct him, and wish some slight coaxing.”17 When her permission to see little Linton is forbidden, she is very sad, just as she does something wrong.
3.2 Her Filial Piety
When her father Edgar Linton is dying, she and her servant Nelly are
imprisoned. She fights against Heathcliff in order to get the key to go home and to see her father. She is beat badly by Heathcliff. Yet Cathy does not think of herself, or her property, she only thinks of her father. Yet, she
has not the key to the room, she wants to exchange the key with her so-called
husband with some expensive, yet the illegal marriage makes her penniless. She offers to her husband the precious heart—shaped pendant, which contains
the picture of her daddy and mummy. Later Cathy steals out of the Heights at midnight and sees her father the last time. In order not to make her father sad, she tries her best to make her father believe she lives with Linton Heathcliff very happily. She loves her father and respects him.
3.3 Her Rebellious Characters
3.3.1 Her Revolt against Heathcliff’s Brutality
After her father’s funeral, she is captured back. Cathy says to Heathcliff “Linton is all I have to love in the world, and though you have done what you could to make him hateful to me, and me to him, you cannot make us hate each other! And I defy you to hurt him when I am by, and I defy you to frighten me.”18 Heathcliff hates Cathy Linton and beats her, but Cathy is not afraid of him. “I am not afraid of you!” “Mr. Heathcliff,
you have nobody to love you, you are miserable, lonely, are you not, like the devil and envious like him?” “Nobody love you, nobody will cry for
you when you die.”19 Little Cathy says, “I’ll not do anything, though
you should swear your tongue out, except what I please.”20 To face old generation and strong man Heathcliff, little Cathy is very brave.
3.3.2 Her Revolt against Patriarchal Society
3.3.2.1 Her Revolt against Noble Lockwood
Lockwood is a representative in patriarchal society. To live with him,
Catherine can’t have freedom. Little Catherine understands that without true self in marriage, the marriage is only a prison of individuality. Young and rich gentle man is the MR RIGHT in many Victorian girls’ heart. If Cathy marries him, she can escape Heathcliff’s control and can reinstate her rich and comfortable life in Grange, but she does not do it like this. When Mr. Lockwood shows his curiosity and kindness to her, she does not accept and treats him coldly.
3.3.2.2 Her Revolt against Prejudice and Discrimination
But her failed marriage educates her and makes her abandon her prejudice and discrimination against family status. She starts to take notice of Hareton. According to Hareton ’s rough appearance. Cathy finds that he is
kind-hearted by nature as she is. “It is me, another me beyond me” The
true lover appears in her heart. She decides to help Hareton and create himself. She begins to take a pity on Hareton, who loses parents from his childhood. When she comes back to show him favors, the fellow having been
heavily hurt before by Cathy, has swore to break away with the girl. The girl expresses her sincerity again and again, but the guy takes it as new tricks to mock him. At last, they become reconciled. A handsome book addressed “Mr. Hareton Earnshaw ”helps them to unit the knots in their
hearts. A book symbolizes friendship and knowledge. Both of them at last break through the obstacles created by “hatred” and overcome their own
prejudice and learn to respect each other. Cathy is Hareton’s spiritual
teacher. On the one hand, she lets Hareton open a flower garden for her, in order to make him appreciate the beauty. On the other hand, she is fearless to accuse Heathcliff’of his guilt, in order to light Hareton’s rebellious mood against Heathcliff. Because Hareton is lacking of knowledge and education in civilized world, she teaches him to read books in patience. Nothing is impossible to a willing heart. “His honest, warm, and
intelligent nature shook off rapidly the clouds of ignorance and degradation
in which it had been bred; and Catherine’s sincere commendations acted as a spur to his industry.”21 When Cathy educates Hareton also educates her.
“But both their minds tending to the same point—one loving and desiring
to esteem and the other loving and desiring to be esteemed—they contrived
in the end to reach it.”22 The bud of love comes out of the cold and frozen soil, and is rooted; no one can rob it any more. Heathcliff wants to destroy the love between his two oppressed victims, but they two unite to struggle
against him.
When she gives a handsome book with “Mr. Hareton Earnshaw”to Hareton, she
admits his status “Mr.”, which shows she accepts Hareton and thinks
Hareton is equal to her. At last Cathy marries Hareton and they live a happy
life in the Trushcross Grange. Little Cathy does not adopt her mother’s methods to seek answer from outside; she surpasses herself rapidly and overcomes her faults, gives up family status and finds true love.
4. Conclusion
Although two Catherine have so many differences, there are some similarities between them, Cathy inherits her mother’s role in her father’s heart, and has her mother’s name, and is as stubborn as her mother. Cathy loves Haraton just as her mother loves Heathcliff because Hareton and Heathcliff are rude
and stubborn. For Cathy, who shows a good share of her mother’s free spirit, heaven is “the whole word awake and wild with joy”,23 while the passive and spiritless Linton prefers “A hot July day spent lying from morning till evening on a bank of heath.” There is no reconciling them to
view—points, “I said his heaven would be only half alive, and he said mine would be drunk”. And, as well, something of Catherine Earnshaw continues in her daughter, in the similarity of their eyes, in something of their
desire for freedom.
Two heroines grow up in different environments. Because of their different characters, they have different outlook of life and values. The different environments are two houses. There is some social distinction between the
two houses though both the Earnshaw and the Linton families belong to the class of the gentry. But the two houses don’t live in equal status. There are striking differences of tone and atmosphere, of custom and convention. In a word, culture separates the two houses widely. The family in Wuthering Heights is closer to the land and farm labor. The Linton house stands in a deep valley surrounded by a park. The family has civilized luxury. Wuthering Heights is a token of the violence of Catherine and Heathcliff’s
obsessive feeling for each other. And the Grange belongs to the civilized young generation, little Cathy and Hareton. Catherine Earnshaw of Wuthering Heights becomes graceful and tasteful in manners in Grange, but Catherine Linton of the Trushcross Grange becomes irritable and unkind in Wuthering Heights. Mother and daughter have different ways to solve problems. Mother likes to seek answers from outside, but daughter solves problems from her inner heart.
Vanity is a fatal weakness in mother Catherine’s character, just as her
vanity causes her tragedy. She marries Edgar Linton and gives up Heathcliff. Her betrayal to Heathcliff is actually a sort of self—betrayal. She
alienates herself from her true nature and self—essence. Catherine becomes
a distorted person by betraying her humanity and by breaking up the relationship with Heathcliff. Only when she realizes the distortion and impossibility of reconciliation between Heathcilff and Edgar, does death seem to give her peace.
Daughter Cathy abandons her prejudice to and discrimination against family status; she helps Hareton sincerely and reopens his locked heart, and lets him have a spiritual desire. They learn to respect each other and love each other. They struggle against Heathcliff’s brutality.
In this essay, we know that one control one’s own destiny and happiness. If someone wants to depend on others or outside, she or he will fail.