Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights and Isolation

This post contains spoilers.

My general commentary on this book is here.

On one level, Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is a case study on abusive people and their methods. The story’s main character is Heathcliff, who is an abusive man. While he perpetuates physical violence against his targets, his greatest harm might be psychological. He practices both emotional and verbal abuse. Moreover, he plans his cruelty and concocts elaborate schemes that run on for years with a goal of ruining people’s lives. 

One component to his abuse is the way in which he isolates people. Almost everyone who Heathcliff harms is, through his machinations, isolated from people who might protect or support him.  At one point, through complex scheming, Heathcliff manages to reduce Catherine the Younger to the status of a near vassal. He forces her out of her own home and requires her to move to Wuthering Heights, where he can control and mistreat her. Nelly describes the scene when she is forced to accompany him to her imprisonment. 

"He signed her to precede him; and casting back a look that cut my heart, she obeyed.   I watched them, from the window, walk down the garden.   Heathcliff fixed Catherine’s arm under his: though she disputed the act at first evidently; and with rapid strides he hurried her into the alley, whose trees concealed them."

I find the above to be an extremely powerful passage that symbolically describes the isolating process where Catherine the Younger is “hurried” into an alley of concealing trees. 

Heathcliff manages to isolate many other targets. 

When Isabella Linton makes the catastrophic decision to marry him, she is cut off from her family. When he brings her to Wuthering Heights, she is put into the position of a near prisoner. Heathcliff uses this opportunity to treat her with great cruelty. 

At one point in the story, Heathcliff demands that his son, Linton, come to live with him. In the process, Linton is isolated from his uncle and cousin who would have shown him compassion. Subsequently, Heathcliff introduces him to a cold existence that is completely manipulated by his father. 

Likewise, upon the death of Hindley Earnshaw, Heathcliff maneuvers to become the de facto guardian of Hindley’s son, Hareton. Under Heathcliff’s control, Hareton is raised to be illiterate and uncultured.

Both of these children, isolated by Heathcliff, are molded in ways that are harmful to them. Furthermore, Heathcliff attempts to turn them into tools to be used to harm others. 

Catherine the elder, though not really a victim and a generally unsympathetic character herself, is in the end destroyed by her relationship to Heathcliff. Her obsessive connection with him isolates her from any genuine connection with anyone else, including her own husband.

The pattern is consistent throughout the narrative. Heathcliff maneuvers again and again to gain physical and legal control of people. He keeps them as near prisoners or slaves at Wuthering Heights, and he treats them in horrible ways. He typically isolates his targets as a prelude to his abuse. 

When Catherine the Younger establishes a relationship with Hindley, the couple succeeds in breaking out of the isolation imposed by Heathcliff. This is the turning point in the story and seems to be a harbinger of Heathcliff’s decline. 

Heathcliff is a manipulative abuser. His penchant for isolating his targets is very realistic. In the real world, abusive people are often known to isolate and alienate their spouses, children, etc. from family, friends and the world at large. This is a well - known tactic of such personality types.  In this novel, Brontë is portraying an aspect of the real world in a very realistic way. 

Brontë, like many other Victorian novelists, seemed to be a keen psychologist. Her examination of this aspect of abusive people is brilliant. Though he is monstrous, Heathcliff is a complex and nuanced character that one can spend a lot of time and words exploring.   All of this is one reason of many that this book is well worth reading. 

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

This post contains spoilers.

Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is a world famous novel. This book, though disturbing in some ways, deserves the fame and accolades that it has garnered. This is the story of a man called Heathcliff and his malignant effects on those around him. It is a brilliantly written atmospheric masterpiece. 

Early in the story, the wealthy Mr. Earnshaw finds the orphaned and abandoned Heathcliff on the streets of Liverpool. He takes him to live with his family on his estate called Wuthering Heights, which is located on the desolate Yorkshire moors. 

The Earnshaw family unit also consists of elder brother Hindley and the tomboyish Catherine. Joseph is a servant who is a religious fanatic and a harsh and unforgiving person. Nelly Dean is also a servant who possesses a strong moral and ethical core (I should mention that there is a school of thought that contends Nelly is, in fact, immoral and that she is actually the true villain of this book. A Google search will yield various versions of this theory.)  Nelly narrates most of the story.

Though Mr. Earnshaw shows Heathcliff love, he dies within a few years. Subsequently, Heathcliff is treated cruelly by Hindley and others. Simultaneously, Catherine and Heathcliff develop a love that can only be described as obsessive. This bond seems to transcend any conception of a conventional relationship and is a major driver of the remaining narrative. 

Like many of the characters in this book, Catherine’s personality can only be described as unconventional. The proper and bookish Edgar Linton is simultaneously courting her. She eventually agrees to marry Linton with the seemingly bizarre intention of using Linton’s financial resources to raise Heathcliff’s standing in life. When Heathcliff discovers the engagement, he flees the area and disappears for several years.

When Heathcliff returns, he finds that Catherine and Linton are married. Heathcliff spends the subsequent decades vengefully destroying both the Lintons and Earnshaws. He reestablishes his connection with Catherine and threatens Edgar. The emotional turmoil helps drive Catherine to her death in childbirth. Simultaneously, he marries Edgar’s sister Isabella and treats her with extreme cruelty. He gains control of Wuthering Heights and, eventually, the Linton properties. In plot developments that are even more sinister, he also gains control of people. Among those that he brings under his yoke are his own estranged son, Linton the Younger; Hindley’s son, Hareton; and the Lintons’ daughter, Catherine the Younger. He strives to destroy all of these people in Machiavellian ways. This leads to great suffering. His manipulative abuse is both physical and mental and makes parts the story difficult to take. 

There are multiple themes contained within these pages, each containing multiple levels of complexity. The characters and their interrelationships are also multifaceted. This book is full of deep yet enigmatic characters. The dynamics of abusive personalities and how they interact with others are explored in all sorts of ways.  Brontë also delves deeply into the themes of destructive love here.  The nature of good and evil is also explored. 

I want to share a few words relating to the theme of culture and literature and how this fits into the worldview that Brontë is trying to portray. Heathcliff has become a monster. Though he is intelligent, in many ways he represents the negation of civilization and learning. Books play an important part in this representation.  At one point he forces Catherine the Younger to live at Wuthering Heights, where he can control her. In one of many acts of cruelty that he perpetuates against her, he destroys her beloved book collection. Books were an important part of Catherine the Younger’s life. They represented hope to her. This act of destruction seems to represent an antagonism between literature and the dark forces that crush hope and also despise learning. 

Later, an important development occurs involving Hareton.  Heathcliff is trying to raise the young man as an illiterate brute, devoid of learning and culture. This fits in perfectly with the contention between malevolence and anti-culture contained in this work. However, there are signs that there is humanity inside Hareton despite his inadequate upbringing.  He is struggling to become literate and is collecting books that he attempts to read. He begins to develop an attraction to Catherine the Younger. At one point, after she mocks his efforts to read classic literature, he responds with hurt and rage and proceeds to destroy his own secret collection of books. 

“He afterwards gathered the books and hurled them on the fire.   I read in his countenance what anguish it was to offer that sacrifice to spleen.   I fancied that as they consumed, he recalled the pleasure they had already imparted, and the triumph and ever-increasing pleasure he had anticipated from them; and I fancied I guessed the incitement to his secret studies also.   He had been content with daily labour and rough animal enjoyments, till Catherine crossed his path.   Shame at her scorn, and hope of her approval, were his first prompters to higher pursuits; and instead of guarding him from one and winning him to the other, his endeavours to raise himself had produced just the contrary result. “

Again, the destruction of books is linked to despair and human failure. By scorning his attempts to better himself, Catherine the Younger has temporally allied herself with the dark forces in the world. Her vitriol is emotionally devastating to Hareton. It translates into the destruction of culture and literature. I think that the above represents the point in the narrative where morality and hope are at their lowest ebb.

Later, when the bond between Catherine the Younger and Hareton is being formed, it is books that bring them together. When Catherine gives him the gift of a book, it helps to spark their budding relationship. This relationship is the ultimate driver of hope at the novel’s end. 

After Heathcliff’s death, when sanity has been reestablished in the world, Catherine the Younger is seen helping Hareton to improve his reading. The theme of reading books and yearning being connected to the good and virtuous aspects of the world is complete. 

This book is often compared to Jane Eyre, written by Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë’s sister. I thought that Jane Eyre was one of the greatest novels ever written. That work seemed to unify vital themes about humanity and the universe with unparalleled characterization. While I do not hold this novel in as high esteem, it deserves its reputation as a great and important classic. 

I have barley scratched the surface above. Thus, I will be posting at least one additional entry on this work. Brontë has melded so many brilliant elements into this novel that it deserves additional posts. Though disturbing in its depiction of an extremely abusive personality, it is full of ideas, brilliant characters and superb writing to name just a few of its virtues. 

Reading is a Vaccination Against Questionable Ideas

The world is filled with bad ideas and bad belief systems. There are also a lot of valid ideas that are taken too far, or applied when not appropriate.  Though there is enormous variation on what reasonable folks consider bad ideas, there is a consensus among most rational and ethical people that some ideas and ideologies are downright toxic. Nazism and Stalinism are a few clear- cut examples. Though I would add a long list of much less extreme belief systems to the list of belief systems that I fundamentally agree with, this post is not about delimiting which ideologies are better then others.  Instead it is about how reading books, especially a selection of books that include a diversity of ideas, even untenable ideas, can help vaccinate the mind against falling prey to bad ideas or misapplying good ideas.

This concept can work on all sorts of levels. A simple example is illustrated relating to reading about totalitarianism.  Reading history about the rise of Nazism, Stalinism as well lesser know tyrannies can encourage a healthy wariness to certain popular movements with authoritarian undertones. Likewise readng fiction like George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty - Four fiction or Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We provides us with parables that help keep us keep alert to tyrannical ideologies. Likewise, works such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky Demons can give us insights into less obviously dangerous and less far sweeping fanaticism. In turn reading about Democratic ideals espoused by thinkers such as John Locke and Thomas Jefferson can provide a strong counterbalance to totalitarian thought. 

Many people, including myself, believe that what is rising  in America is a form if totalitarianism. Much of our arguments are propelled by the above mentioned, and other, books. Some folks disagree with us. I find that some of  best counter arguments are themselves driven by the ideas contained in other books. 

One can take this concept further. Reading books written by a diverse set of thinkers who present us with a smorgasbord of ideas can teach us to reject and question certain ideas from otherwise insightful people who may have certain ideas that we choose not to accept.  Friedrich Nietzsche is a good example of this. I find some of his ideas extremely astute and useful, particularly his criticism of popular culture and conformity of thought. 

However his theory, as spelled out in On the Geneology of Morals, of  “Master and Slave Morality”, where he rejected values such as “Good” and “Pity” and he dismissed the concept of equality are ideas that I do not accept. Armed with a knowledge of thinkers who extolled values that Nietzsche excoriated, ranging from Plato, the writers of The New Testament, René Descartes to modern day theorists such as Steven Pinker, my mind is buttressed with counterarguments. Even if one is in agreement with Nietzsche on this issue, the point remains the same; Knowledge of contrasting viewpoints can prepare us to examine and reject belief systems that otherwise seem appealing. 

Likewise Nietzsche’s critique of morals allows us to examine and apprise all the thinkers that I mentioned above in a different critical light. Even good ideas benefit from examination and critical scrutiny. Acceptance of an idea or belief system is vastly stronger after one has considered counter arguments and still chooses the embrace the criticized system. Just knowing that there are other ideas and belief systems out there can be very valuable. 

There are also cases where valid belief systems run into trouble.  A herd mentality sets in and dissention and contrary views become demonized. For example, lately many have expressed concern that some elements of modern social justice movements are descending into extremism and intolerance of even slightly dissenting views. Dedicated members of these movements themselves have raised some of these apprehensions. Examining this situation from a point of view of someone who has read about historical Left wing overreach, both from Leftist dictatorships and from radical movements, provides a context to question these excesses.  A careful examination, partially through reading, of both Liberal and Conservative ideas yields good ideas from both sides. Such reading can also brings to light criticism of concepts that group pressure might otherwise discourage. Thus I am questioning what I think are some very illiberal trends increasingly emanating out of the Left. I think that that this example is valid regardless what one’s views are on these issues as this concept applies to many other situations. It is that reading helps us to question ideas and belief systems, even if they come from directions that one is usually sympathetic to. 

Being exposed to a wide range of ideas immunizes us in a way. We are not so easily seduced to arguments that appeal to our emotions, focus on limited aspects of truth, or turn insight into dogma. Being well read provides us with armor when delving into the conflicts involving ideas. It also protects us from blindly accepting bad ideas that may be part of otherwise worthy belief systems. 

I have provided just a few examples above. One could write volumes about the value of reading diverse and conflicting opinions. The marketplace of human ideas is as vast as it is rich. A sampling of multiple products from this market provides one with intellectual balance and understanding that cannot be achieved any other way. 

State of Siege

Donald Trump has been elected President of the United States. This post is not about the complex reasons for this unprecedented event in  human history. It is about the potential consequences. 

The operative word here is uncertainty. While I would  consider a Right Wing government a terribly harmful development, if that is the only result of this event I would consider that a consequence of democratic process that one could live with. Though an inexperienced President is also extremely undesirable thing in a dangerous world, I also consider that the price that a democracy sometimes needs to pay. 

We will be lucky if the above were the worst of it. The United States is a military, economic and social power the like of which the world has never seen. Donald Trump, from the best that I can tell is a manipulative abuser. He may be a sociopath. He is an extremely dangerous man. His movement is similarly  malevolent.  

As a result of this event American Democracy is threatened. There is reason to believe that our basic civil liberties may come under siege. Even worse, as he is dangerously reckless and unprepared for the job, we face the increased chance of a nuclear war. Economic chaos and perhaps collapse is another potential consequence of these events. There are numerous other potential horrendous outcomes that may result from this potential calamity. 

In short my nation is threatened. Our global civilization is threatened. Perhaps we are even threatened as a species. Every human being on this planet is threatened. I fear for everyone's future. I fear for everyone I know, and everyone I do not know. 

Up until this time I have been more or less been an optimist about the future of humanity. Though I am not without hope I now fear that my optimism may have been misplaced. I am not unaware of the reliance of post - industrial democracies. I am not unaware of the good that exists in the world. However, at this moment  it seems like those things may become easily overwhelmed. 

At this moment thinking about the future is difficult. I am not sure what the future of this blog holds. Given the current situation it is hard to imagine just going back to blogging about books. Though it is perhaps far fetched, I also am concerned that those who speak out about Trumpism may find their families under threat.

The world seems like very dark place right now.

Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

Several book bloggers read this novel as part of a read-along. The link to our discussion can be found here. The read - along is part of the Witch Week reading event which celebrates fantasy books and authors. More posts that are part of the event can be found here. Thanks to Lory at The Emerald City Book Review for hosting.

 I read Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury twice as a teenager, but it has been decades since I had last read this work. I found this to be a superb book the first time that I read it, and I still do.  It works both as a fantastical adventure as well a philosophical romp into the mysteries of life

The story is set in a small American Midwestern town. The protagonists are two 13-year-old boys, William (Will) Halloway and James (Jim) Nightshade. Will’s father, 52-year-old Charles Halloway, the janitor at the local library, also plays a major role in the story. 

Early in the narrative, the boys’ world is disturbed when a traveling carnival comes to town. All sorts of strange and sinister happenings begin to occur. The carnival is owned and staffed by various malevolent characters including Mr. Dark and Mr. Cooger, the two bizarre leaders of the group. The attractions include a strange mirror maze that traps people and shows them images of their older selves, as well as a carousel that is capable of making a person younger or older, depending upon which direction it runs in. These odd attractions play a major part in both the plot and the themes of the book.

Eventually, various town residents begin to disappear or are transformed in ghastly ways. As Will and Jim get closer to the carnival’s mysteries, Mr. Dark and his minions begin to hunt the boys. 

The story is dreamlike and surreal. There is an alternate sense of wonder at the Universe itself and an ominous sense of evil and malice coming from the carnival and from the people associated with it. Bradbury’s prose is often poetic throughout his works. That is very true here. 

What I love about Bradbury’s writing is encapsulated in the below quotation.  When the boys enter the library, their sense of wonder is described. 

“Out in the world, not much happened. But here in the special night, a land bricked with paper and leather, anything might happen, always did. Listen! and you heard ten thousand people screaming so high only dogs feathered their ears. A million folk ran toting cannons, sharpening guillotines; Chinese, four abreast, marched on forever. Invisible, silent, yes, but Jim and Will had the gift of ears and noses as well as the gift of tongues. This was a factory of spices from far countries. Here alien deserts slumbered. Up front was the desk where the nice old lady. Miss Watriss, purple-stamped your books, but down off away were Tibet and Antarctica, the Congo. There went Miss Wills, the other librarian, through Outer Mongolia, calmly toting fragments of Peiping and Yokohama and the Celebes. Way down the third book corridor, an oldish man whispered his broom along in the dark, mounding the fallen spices....”

I am aware that some find Bradbury’s style not to their liking, but the above exemplifies why I like his writing.  I find it both whimsical and serious at the same time. This prose seems poetic. The above quotation also illustrates Bradbury’s wonder and awe of books and what they contain. The way that the above is connected to Charles, who is the “oldish man,” is also elegant. 

The book is also full of philosophical and metaphysical musings that come both from the 3^rd person narration and characters. Charles Halloway is the book’s philosopher and seems to be the voice of Bradbury. 

I first read this book way back when I was around the age of Will and Jim. I particularly related to the world that the boys came from. The setting is of the book is similar to that in which I grew up in. I am now three years short of Charles’s age. One of the major themes of this work also centers upon aging. Thus, the experience of rereading this book now, is striking for me. 

The themes of life, death, aging, happiness, good and evil are examined in all sorts of complex ways within this work. Like many good books of this sort, I could explore the characters, themes and philosophy in a series of blog posts.

I want to devote a few words to the examination of the nature of good. In this passage, Charles Halloway speculates on the origin of goodness and love in humanity. 

“I suppose one night hundreds of thousands of years ago in a cave by a night fire when one of those shaggy men wakened to gaze over the banked coals at his woman, his children, and thought of their being cold, dead, gone forever. Then he must have wept. And he put out his hand in the night to the woman who must die some day and to the children who must follow her. And for a little bit next morning, he treated them somewhat better, for he saw that they, like himself, had the seed of night in them. He felt that seed like slime in his pulse, splitting, making more against the day they would multiply his body into darkness. So that man, the first one, knew what we know now: our hour is short, eternity is long. With this knowledge came pity and mercy, so we spared others for the later, more intricate, more mysterious benefits of love.” 

In the above quote, several themes that are repeated multiple times in this book are encapsulated. First, the idea that goodness and love originate with empathy is illustrated here. Also, it is the specter of death that motivates us to be good. The despair driven by the potential end of life generates positive emotions, such as pity and mercy and, in the end, love.

Later on these ideas are further developed in several passages. At one point Charles observes, 

“we share this billion-mile-an-hour ride. We have common cause against the night. You start with little common causes. “

I think that Bradbury is on to something here. Though not the sole source of human goodness, empathy towards others is, in my opinion, one of the key components to human virtue. As Stephen Pinker pointed out in his The Better Angels of Our Nature, peoples’ tendency to become more empathetic to one another is one of the leading factors driving humanity’s improvement. 

Similar explorations of evil, as well as of aging, the power of books, life and death are also contained within these pages. This book is full of ideas.  

This novel is a modern fable. On one level, it is an atmospheric and poetic adventure tale of young boys encountering supernatural horror. On another level, it is a philosophical journey into life and the Universe. I have only scratched the surface on the philosophical musings above. It is a tale that can be enjoyed and pondered by readers of all ages. As the story concerns itself with time and aging, readers who experienced it while young might find it particularly enlightening if, like myself, they read it again when older. It is ultimately, a fantastic book. 

The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman

Written in 1962, Barbara Tuchman’s The Guns of August is a Pulitzer Prize winner. Though not for everyone, in my opinion this book deserves the accolades that it has received.   The work covers both the events leading up to the outbreak of the First World War, as well as the early months of the conflict. 

The early chapters in the book cover the diplomatic and political situation prior to the war’s outbreak. In some ways, this book is a character-based history, as it focuses on various members of the European Royalty, politicians and generals. A clear but selective picture of the diplomatic and political maneuverings prior to the war is presented. The later chapters are an account of the military and political developments that occurred during the first months of the conflict. Though the book covers action in both the Mediterranean and along the eastern front, the majority of its words are dedicated to events that occurred on the western front. 

This book is full of information and is extremely interesting to read. Yet, there seems to be gaps in the picture that Tuchman presents. I would not classify this as a comprehensive history of the outbreak of the First World War. Tuchman tends to focus on certain aspects of important events and omit others. This seems to be the result of her trying to illustrate particular themes that she deems important. Thus, this book is best viewed as the examination of particular events and themes.

For instance, regarding the causes and events leading up to the Ottoman Empire’s entry into the war, Tuchman devotes many pages to the German Warships’ Goeben and Breslau’s voyage and diplomatic/military mission to the Ottoman Empire in 1914.  This event is extremely interesting, and it is of great historical importance. It played a key role relating to the Ottoman’s entry into the war. Yet, the author provides scant information on the political events within the Ottoman government beyond that relating to the German ships and their mission. An understanding of these political maneuverings seems instrumental in understanding how and why the Ottomans entered the conflict. Such omissions exist elsewhere in this history. 

It is clear that instead of a comprehensive history, Tuchman is attempting to highlight particular points that are both interesting and important. With all of that, she accomplished her goal brilliantly. 

A good example of the many exceptional points in the narrative is highlighted in the account of one small incident that occurred at the war’s onset. When the German ambassador delivered his country’s declaration of war to the Russian minister, both men initially traded angry words. However, they both quickly came to the realization that monumental and terrible events were beginning and attempted to comfort one another. 

“The curses of the nations will be upon you!” Sazonov exclaimed. “We are defending our honor,” the German ambassador replied. “Your honor was not involved. But there is a divine justice.” “That’s true,” and muttering, “a divine justice, a divine justice,” Pourtalès staggered to the window, leaned against it, and burst into tears. “So this is the end of my mission,” he said when he could speak. Sazonov patted him on the shoulder, they embraced, and Pourtalès stumbled to the door, which he could hardly open with a trembling hand, and went out, murmuring, “Goodbye, goodbye.””

Another significant point about this book is that it is approximately half military history. I read a lot of this sort of history book when I was younger. Though I generally stay away from such works these days, I found these parts to be interesting and, at times, riveting. The fact that they were well written and understandable helped a lot. With that, if the movements of armies and ships are the kind of history that one would rather stay away from, this book may not be the best choice. 

The writing is often suburb. This high quality prose melds very well with the themes that Tuchman chooses to highlight. In the book’s opening lines, she describes the last gathering of European Royalty before the war at the funeral of Edward VII. This assembly was symbolic of the end of the era that the war brought.

“So gorgeous was the spectacle on the May morning of 1910 when nine kings rode in the funeral of Edward VII of England that the crowd waiting in hushed and black-clad awe, could not keep back gasps of admiration. In scarlet and blue and green and purple, three by three the sovereigns rode through the palace gates, with plumed helmets, gold braid, crimson sashes, and jeweled orders flashing in the sun. After them came five heirs apparent, forty more imperial or royal highnesses, seven queens— four dowager and three regnant— and a scattering of special ambassadors from uncrowned countries. Together they represented seventy nations in the greatest assemblage of royalty and rank ever gathered in one place and of its kind the last. “

This is a great history book. It is reflective of the author’s view of events. Her view is illustrated with insight, intelligence and in a convincing way. It paints a strong and coherent picture of many events that set the stage for this terrible conflict. If one does not mind a good chunk of military history mixed with a general history, this will be an informative and enjoyable read for anyone interested in this subject. 

I also read Tuchman’s A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century which I found to be excellent. My commentary on that book is here.