Wuthering Heights AO3 context

coverture

• legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman’s legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband

• Coverture was first substantially modified by late 19th century Married Women's Property Acts passed in various common-law legal jurisdictions and was weakened and eventually eliminated by subsequent reforms

• would have been viewed as increasingly archaic/unjust when the brontë’s were writing their novels - times were changing

the matrimonial causes act

• 1857 → reformed the law on divorce (widened its availability)

• significance of the brontë’s publishing their novels before the matrimonial causes act → they can be said to have helped prepare the way for this/subsequent laws by exposing the british public to stories of men and especially women unjustly trapped in oppressive legal unions

primogeniture

• common law (in the period of the novel) that the eldest male child inherited

portrayal of women in the novel

• portrayed as both strong, passionate individuals, and victims of the patriarchy

• while women are still subjugated and inferior to men, a feminist reading might highlight that both Isabella and Cathy escape their respective moulds in their own defiant ways - their passion triumphed

the corn laws

• an attempt to prevent foreign exports from challenging UK agriculture → backfired as prices at home remained high + countries didn’t trade w/ britain in protest

• law was repealed in 1847 and free trade reinstated

• but the impact on the economy and therefore on poverty was deeply felt by this point

• wuthering heights emphasises class divides, making it a reflection, perhaps, of the wider political atmosphere that was struggling with disparity in privilege and class divides itself

• the impact of industrialisation and the attitudes of new middle class industrial owners who often felt no responsibility to their working class employees (a newfound complacency)

presentation of class distinctions

• heathcliff as an allegorical figure for capitalism → stripping the linton’s of their inherited property rights and amassing wealth and land for himself

• acquiring wealth without the need for inheritance or education, thus evoking the fear of Capitalism’s democratising potential in society

• critique of the new economic ideology and the destruction it causes to rural communities in particular

• corn laws and widespread unrest generally

• the conservative brontë’s opinions on revolutionary spirit in britain → they would have sympathised with the workers, but were firmly on the side of tradition and were not advocates of reform

religion

• Their father being a clergyman, and growing up living in a parsonage, religion was ever present and deeply felt/discussed between the Bronte siblings

• Calvinism → belief that god pre-ordains who is to be offered salvation before birth

• methodism → sees salvation as possible to all

• Calvinism is mocked in Wuthering Heights through Joseph’s grumbling warnings and piety

• Nelly’s morality being based on good and evil is seen as lacking also as it too asks for perdition (a state of eternal suffering and damnation) rather than acceptance

• Heathcliff and Catherine present a more amoral vision of the universe → it is clear that Cathy and Heathcliff pursue their own version of spirituality and morality, negating the salvation of heaven and thus confronting society’s ideas on punishing damnation (which Nelly and Joseph represent). They ask their readers for empathy and acceptance, not conversion

patriarchy

• The sisters wrote under pseudonyms to prevent unfair criticism of their work, revealing society’s beliefs around women’s intellectual inferiority + unsuitability of women’s entry into the public sphere

• Sex and Subterfuge: Women Writers in 1850 (1982) by Eva Figes

  • Victorian women writers had been largely prevented from writing social or political criticism in their novels owing to their vulnerable position as women writing in a male-dominated cultural milieu

• in the era, women generally provided more protection/rights against domestic violence + granted greater rights to both women and children

the gothic

• the novel equally diverges from the Gothic trends by, for example, having a non-exotic, rural setting

• to call it a gothic novel would be ignoring Emily’s point of including psychological realism

• psychological realism → the events/emotions (although extreme) being viewed as an attempt at the realistic depiction of the minds of humans

• much less romantic and sensational in its second half

describe the byronic hero.

• descending from milton’s satan

• possesses a fatal charm to women

• demonic ruthlessness and drive for power

• fallen, satanic outcast, yet morbidly fascinating

what was emily' brontë’s last known poem - published posthumously by her sister - called, and what was it about?

‘no coward soul is mine’

• scorn felt towards doctrinal debates - no mention of redemption through christ

• affirms god’s presence in all aspects of the universe → individual connection to the universe (Romantic notion)

what is discordant narration?

• a sense of discordance arises when the narrator’s normative views seem to clash in some manner with the story he or she tells

• Nelly is discordant narrator in WH

Romanticism

• focused on the sublime potential of nature to enlighten and enliven the minds and souls

• The sisters were all heavily influenced by Lord Byron

• Brontë’s diverge from Romanticism as their presentation of nature/rural life, which is not seen as idyllic, but rather and harsh and unforgiving (avoiding Ruskin’s pathetic fallacy by depicting it as raw and uncaring)

• aligns with romanticism in the importance of childhood experience determining adult life = very Wordsworthian

• relying on self-knowledge as opposed to blind conformity and orthodoxy = key tenet of Romantic thinking → Romantics were often viewed as radicals