Wuthering Heights: Love

A2 Wuthering Heights: Love

1. Isabella + Heathcliff

   • "If I lived alone with that mawkish, waxen face; the most ordinary would be painting on its white the colours of the rainbow, and turning the blue eyes black, every day or two; they detestably resemble Linton's."(Heathcliff to Catherine, Ch5)
   • "I'll not repeat his language, nor describe his habitual conduct" "a tiger, or a venomous serpent could not rouse terror in me equal to that which he wakens." (Isabella's letter to Nelly, Chapter 8)
     • Isabella thought he was a byronic hero type- reality of Heathcliff is much darker
       • "picturing in me a hero of romance, and expecting unlimited indulgences from my chivalrous devotion" (ch9)
         • "I don't care who knows the passion was wholly on one side, and I never told her a lie about it. [...] The first thing she saw me do [...] was to hang up her little dog" (Chapter 9)
   • Unrequieted love/"Love at first sight"
     • Isabella created an idealized Heathcliff which she fell in love with due to her jealousy of Catherine. She ignored his brutalities and married him only to find that they became much worse. Heathcliff uses Isabella as a punching bag to cope with his anger at Edgar and Cathy for getting married and making him feel alone. He beats her and likely rapes her until she runs away, showing that a naieve love can be truly sour and demonstrating the fine line between love and hate.

2. Catherine + Heathcliff

   • "death and hell- existence, after losing her, would be hell." (Ch9, Heathcliff)
   • Passion, heat, danger, devotion. Raw elemental love. Soul mates.
   • "Catherine has a heart as deep as I have; the sea could be as readily contained in that horse-trough, as her whole affection be monopolized by him. [...] IT is not in him to be loved like me, how can she love in him what he has not?" (Ch9)
   • "Be with me always- take any form- drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! [...] I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!" (Heathcliff, Catherine's death, volume 2 chapter 2)
   • "Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same, and Linton's as different as a moonbean from lightening, or frost from fire." Cathy, Chapter 4
   • "IF all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn into a mighty stranger." Cathy, Ch4
   • "My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods. [...] My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath. [...] I am Heathcliff." Cathy, Ch4
   • "I love my murderer- but yours! How can I?" (Heathcliff, Cathy's death)

3. Catherine + Edgar

   • "Linton's (soul) as different as a moonbeam from lightening, or frost from fire." Cathy, Ch4
   • Convenience, kindness, safety. Socially acceptable, comfortable love. Work together.
   • "My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods. Time will change it, I'm well aware, as winter changes the trees"
   • "Edgar Linton had his head laid on the pillow, and his eyes shut. [...] his was the hush of exhausted anguish, and hers of perfect peace." V2Ch2
   • "He posessed the power to depart as much as a cat possesses the power to leave a mouse half killed, or a bird half eaten" Chapter 8