Wuthering Heights

One of the rare upsides to the current global pandemic is that it enables one to focus one’s leisure time on reading. The quarantine, which has been lasting almost an entire year now, forces a reluctant reader to open up a chapter book and devour its contents. I’ve never been an avid reader – reading has never been a top priority of mine. (I prefer going outside and exploring new places and meeting people). Yet, I do enjoy reading and have a number of titles which I treasure as my favorites. One of them is Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights.

I’ve read it at least twice, but I feel like I’ve read it much many more times. Perhaps it’s due to the fact that I happen to have a Korean manwha (comic book) of the said classic. Or maybe it’s because the novel has left such a strong impression on me the first time I read it. Whatever the reason may be, I feel as if I know the novel more than I do. (Perhaps it’s due to the fact that even after years since last reading it, I still vividly know the family tree of the Earnshaws and the Lintons without getting confused).

New Discoveries

I am exactly on the seventeenth chapter as I speak, and it’s fascinating how refreshing it feels to reread it. I am rediscovering new points and focusing on things I’ve never realized or felt, including how among the many victims of fate (and of Heathcliff), Edgar Linton suffers the most.

Upon my first reading, my focus was on Heathcliff and Cathy, and how tragic their love story was. And despite his wicked ways, I felt sympathy for the former, as he suffered from severe child abuse committed by Hindley. But after finding out that Heathcliff does the same to Hareton, I ceased to sympathize. Yet, I still viewed Heathcliff as a victim as much as a perpetrator of evil. I guess I still do. But he really is more of a perpetrator than a victim.

But now I have this immense sympathy for Edgar Linton.

In my opinion, he was the one who suffered the most, a victim of both Heathcliff and Catherine. He grows up with his parents and sister Isabella and falls in love with his neighbor’s daughter, Catherine Earnshaw. He cares for her and showers her with love and attention. But her illness passes on to his parents when they take care of her and they both pass away when he is still young. He marries his love and treats her with utmost admiration and gentleness only to be betrayed by her when Heathcliff reenters the scene. As everyone who has read the novel knows, Catherine’s love for him was shallow and fake as opposed to her love for Heathcliff, which is shown as transcending death.

Heathcliff, fully aware of the fact, makes snide remarks in front of Edgar. Meanwhile, Catherine repeatedly chooses Heathcliff over her husband. Though she never admits it verbally, she shows that Heathcliff matters more to her, even passing out in his arms right before her death.

On top of this…

Heathcliff tricks Edgar’s little sister, Isabella, into a loveless marriage in order to use her as “Edgar’s proxy in suffering” (Bronte 143, Barnes & Noble Classics). Isabella passes away with a son she has with Heathcliff (most likely unwillingly), who is manipulated and neglected by his father until his early death. And as the cherry on top, Edgar’s only daughter, Catherine Linton, is also manipulated and ruined in Heathcliff’s evil designs.

As mentioned earlier, Edgar even lost his parents due to Catherine.

It was inadvertent, but nonetheless due to her as it has been described. And he also loses his sister, nephew, and daughter to the relentless, vengeful Heathcliff, who hates him to death because of Catherine. Because she, by her will and decision, forsakes him (her only love) to marry Edgar instead. Edgar’s home Thrushcross Grange is devoured by Heathcliff as well.

Everyone in Wuthering Heights are, in one way or another, victims of fate.

Except, maybe, for Mr. Earnshaw who adopts Heathcliff on his whim without consulting his wife or asking his children. Hareton, Isabella, Linton, and Catherine Linton (Catherine Earnshaw’s daughter) are victims of Heathcliff who is a victim of Hindley, who is in a way a victim of Mr. Earnshaw’s imprudence and neglect. Heathcliff is also a victim of Catherine, who abandons him, her one and only soulmate, to marry the better-off Edgar.

But my greatest sympathies go to Edgar Linton, who fell in love and married his first love with her full consent and promise. Edgar adored his wife until the very end, but she hated him and coldly betrayed him. Rereading the novel, Edgar has suffered the most, losing his parents, sister, nephew, and daughter. All because of his wife and her selfishness and dishonesty along with her lover’s immorality and blinded hatred.