catherine earnshaw as the spine of a book : the

九州大学学術情報リポジトリKyushu University Institutional Repository

Catherine Earnshaw as the Spine of a Book : TheDuplication of Self in Wuthering Heights

Ukai, NobumitsuKyushu University, Faculty of Humanities, Department of Language and Literature : AssociateProfessor : English Literature

https://doi.org/10.15017/7664

出版情報：文學研究. 103, pp.43-74, 2006-03-31. Kyushu University Faculty of Humanitiesバージョン：権利関係：

Catherine Earnshaw as the Spine of a Book----.;The Duplication of Self in Wuthering Heights-

Nobumitsu Ukai

The symmetrical pedigree of the Earnshaws and the Lintons, as Charles

Percy Sanger has pointed out, somewhat resembles the form of a book

which, when opened, becomes like a bird with its wings spread (73). Like

Heathcliff and Catherine whose longings for the union of their souls seem

to be satisfied at the end of the novel, the two wings of a book, when read

through, are closed and thus unified. Or like the spine of a book which

cannot be, like a bird, without its two wing-like covers, Catherine refuses

to choose between her two indispensable wings, Heathcliff and Edgar.

"Thrushcross," the name of the estate of the Lintons, seems to be related

to the cross·like shape of a bird with spread wings, symbolising Catherine

who, like a bird's body, or the spine of a book, is the centre of a cross-like

symmetry.

It may seem fanciful to give too much attention to the motif of a single

book in examining a novel which was published in two volumes before its

author's death; but "the book" in Wuthering Heights is so singularly

recurrent an image as to have attracted much critical attention (McKib

ben, 159-69). Like an audience watching an audience on the stage

watching a play within a play, the reader of Wuthering Heights often sees

characters reading a book. Deprived of the chance of book learning,

43

Catherine Earnshaw as the Spine of a Book

Heathcliff in his boyhood has to anguish over his increasing distance from

Catherine. Having hurled books on the fire in a fit of anger at Catherine

Il's insult, and thus been ever more alienated from her, Hareton, later,

after receiving a book offered by her, is reconciled with her and acquires

her affection. And as we will see in the first section, Catherine and

Heathcliff are split up, as if revenged on by the two books of Joseph's

which they hurled and kicked into the dog-kennel.

I

The outset of the alienation between Catherine and Heathc1iff is their

expedition to Thrushcross Grange, where Catherine has her foot bitten by

a watchdog, and is taken care of by the Lintons. About the disappear

ance of the two on that day, Nelly Dean only scantily narrates, "One

Sunday evening, it chanced that they were banished from the sitting

room, for making a noise, or a light offence of the kind, and when I went

to call them to supper, I could discover them nowhere"(36; ch. 6). Yet

from the day's being a rainy Sunday not long after the death of Mr.

Earnshaw, and the dairy woman's cloak's being borrowed to keep out the

rain in both the descriptions (17; ch. 3) (39-40; ch. 6), we can infer that

Catherine's diary scribbled in the margin of a book, which Lockwood

reads during his stay at Wuthering Heights describes the happenings

before their fatal expedition on that day.

The heavy rain preventing their churchgoing on that Sunday, Joseph

assembles Catherine, Heathcliff and the plough-boy in the garret and

preaches for three hours before the shivering congregation. Freed at

length from this ordeal, Catherine burrows herself with Heathcliff in the

44


arch of the dresser and they make themselves "as snug as" their means

allow, hanging up their fastened pinafores for a curtain. But Joseph, who

has come on an errand to the living room, boxes Catherine's ears and

scolds her for her indecency just after her father's burial, perhaps suspect

ing some sexual intimacy between the two. He then proceeds to inflict

on them the perusal of two religious books, "The Helmet of Salvation,"

and "The Broad Way to Destruction," the former of which Catherine

hurls into the dog-kennel, seizing it by the spine, which is riven by this

maltreatment. The latter of those two books is kicked to the same place

by Heathcliff. Banished to the kitchen, Catherine records those happen

ings in a book she found there and at Heathcliff's suggestion they depart

to scamper about on the moor under the shelter of the dairy woman's

cloak.

Catherine begins her scribbled record of the day by impeaching Hindley

for his atrocious conduct to Heathcliff and writes, "H. and I are going to

rebel-we took our initiatory step this evening" (16; ch. 3), and their first

initiatory step was their hurling and kicking Joseph's books. The reason

for their decision to go to Thrushcross Grange is also related to the

oppression they are suffering, for they go there to see whether children

are treated so cruelly in other houses. Yet, Catherine, who declared that

they had taken their initiatory "step" of their rebellion, has her foot bitten

by the watchdog ofthe Lintons. Or, if we regard the spine of a book as

symbolic of Catherine, she harms herself by her own rebellion. The

opening of a rift between Catherine and Heathcliff does not wait until

Catherine returns five weeks later, groomed by the Lintons. As early as

the day of their rebellion, Catherine begins to forget Heathcliff, who,

spying on the Lintons attending her, waits in vain outside the window for

45


the moment when she wishes to return with him.

The very act of their rebellion brings about evils to Catherine and

Heathcliff, just as Lockwood's rebellion against Jabes Branderham trig

gers Jabes's declaration of war. In his dream, exasperated by Jabes's

interminable sermon dwelling on the four hundred and ninety sins, Lock

wood loses patience at the commencement of the four hundred and

ninety-first part of the sermon and rises to denounce Jabes, who, in turn,

orders his congregation to "execute upon him the judgment written,"

citing a part of the Psalms 149.9, and thus endowing his order with the

authority of the book. Jabes, the author of the book which Lockwood

read falling half asleep, seems to take revenge in the name of the book.

Having hurled and kicked books in their rebellion, Catherine and Heath

cliff are also forced to proceed to their separation in this world, as if by

the books' curse and the revenge. Books in Wuthering Heights seem to

be able to work magic to revenge themselves by afflicting those who have

harmed them.

Yet this outset of the separation between Catherine and Heathcliff has

another important meaning besides that of the books' revenge. The

books they hurled and kicked were not the Bible, though they were of a

religious kind. Hindley and Joseph, against whom they revolted, were,

however wrongful, only puny beings. But Catherine and Heathcliff

rebelled against the teaching for the infinite forgiveness and endurance of

any persecution. Christ taught to forgive the same sinner infinitely, not

definitely until seventy times seven, and taught not to retaliate on the

sinner even for the four hundred and ninety-first sin. Catherine and

Heathcliff rebel, disobeying this teaching of infinite forgiveness, and, as if

by way of punishment, their union is severed.

46


This suggests that, despite the impression of the flood-like permeation

of revengefulness, the supreme rule of this novel is that teaching of

Christ's which deems revenge as sin. Though that teaching of "forgive

ness" inconsistently precludes forgiveness for its disobeyers, this novel

integrates into itself as its absolute rule the teaching of infinite forgive

ness advocating acceptance of all affliction, and commanding to offer the

left cheek if slapped on the right. In the novel, that teaching does not

delight human beings. Instead the novel depicts how one is irresistively

compelled to act against that teaching and how, having once disobeyed it,

one has to live, henceforth, inevitably burdened with the punishment for

that transgression. Like Satan, whose rebellion against God precipitated

his descent into Hell, or like Eve and Adam, exiled from the Paradise on

account of their eating the forbidden fruit, Catherine and Heathcliff,

punished for their disobedience to the teaching of infinite forgiveness, lose

their paradisal unity without the third person, Edgar, and have to endure

that loss as long as they live.

II

Catherine and Heathcliff's loss of Paradise is irreversible. Much later,

just as Catherine does not choose to desert her husband Edgar for

Heathcliff, so does Heathcliff not think of taking her back from Edgar.

Both of them behave as if the marital ties between Catherine and Edgar,

once formed, are indissoluble. This attitude of theirs would be attribut

able, at least partly, to the novel's symbolic expression of the irrever

sibility of their loss of Paradise. The stream of the beck whose burble is

heard several times in the novel seems to express, by its inability to flow

47


against gravitation, an irreversibility similar to their loss of Paradise.

And, along with the downward transition of the novel's locus from the

"Heights" to the churchyard of Gimmerton near a swamp, that beck

suggests the irreversible progress of life which, like rivers flowing into the

sea, flows into the tranquility of death.

During his last meeting with Catherine before her death, Heathcliff

criticises her desertion of him for Edgar. The word "will" in it also

suggests that Adam and Eve's loss is superimposed upon the separation of

Catherine and Heathcliff:

You loved me-then what right had you to leave me? What right

-answer me-for the poor fancy you felt for Linton? Because

misery, and degradation, and death, and nothing that God or Satan

could inflict would have parted us, you, of your own will, did it. I

have not broken your heart-you have broken it-and in breaking it,

you have broken mine. (125; ch. 15)

Human beings are endowed with free will, despite the danger of its

exposing them to the possibility of committing sin. Deceived by Satan,

but of her own free will, Eve disobeys God. Likewise, Catherine chooses

to marry Edgar and, though against her will, drives Heathcliff into

running away. As Heathcliff was also in the rebellion which permitted

the introduction of the third person Edgar, he is jointly responsible for

their separation, yet it is only of her own free will, as Heathcliff accuses,

that later on she chooses to marry Edgar. The novel thus expresses how

one loses Paradise by voluntary choice, like Eve, who voluntarily sins and

is exiled from the Garden of Eden.

48


When demanded by Edgar after their marriage to choose between him

and Heathcliff, Catherine refuses, showing a peculiar insistence on retain

ing both lovers. Yet, formerly, in her confession to Nelly of her troubled

mind on the evening she accepted Edgar's proposal, she says she would

not have thought of marrying Edgar if Hindley had not brought Heath

cliff down so low, implying she might have married Heathcliff as a matter

of course. Though transcending physical union, the love between Cather

ine and Heathcliff does not seem to preclude their marriage. Neither

"degradation" in the social position nor "misery" in needy circumstances

could have prevented their marriage, but of her own free will, she chooses

to marry Edgar.

In her mind, however, despite the decision to marry Edgar, Catherine

does not choose between him and Heathcliff. She thinks optimistically

that even after her marriage with Edgar she can keep Heathcliff around

her. Her love for Heathcliff does not seek marriage, though it does not

preclude it, and she can be completely satisfied if she can only retain him

near her. In this she differs from Heathcliff whose love for her cannot

be satisfied except by marriage, and he vanishes in despair at her engage

ment. In agony over the news of his disappearance and drenched in the

ensuing thunderstorm, she gets critically ill. Delirious in her fever,

Catherine hovers between life and death, excruciated by the loss of

Heathcliff.

Even after her recovery, Catherine is never freed from the senous

threats of a fit. The doctor's remark that she would not bear much

crossing makes her feel authorised to have her own way and, ever more

arrogant, she tyrannises the household. Also in Thrushcross Grange

after marrying Edgar three years later, she continues to be a tyrant,

49


taking both Edgar and Isabella's unilateral concessions for granted. Yet

after Heathcliff's return, Edgar reveals his selfishness and urges her to

choose between him and Heathcliff. Rekindled by this mutiny of

Edgar's, Catherine's illness flares up again, and her loss of Heathcliff,

resulting from her former decision of marriage with Edgar, in the end

leads to her death.

Of importance in considering Catherine's loss of Heathcliff is Hidley's

prohibition on their habit of sharing the oak-panelled bed. That prohibi

tion was inflicted upon them soon after the death of Mr. Earnshaw when

they were about twelve. The age twelve corresponds to the period when

Catherine can no longer be sexless and is forced to have physical and

physiological features as a woman. Or, as Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan

Gubar believe, in the separation from Heathcliff, Catherine loses "the

androgynous wholeness of childhood" (284). In her delirium during the

recrudescence of her illness at Thrushcross Grange, Catherine raves

about the sense of alienation which dates back to the prohibition on her

sharing the bed with Heathcliff, and she craves a return to Wuthering

Heights. Her agony over the loss of Heathcliff is partly attributable to

her grief over her growth and loss of sexlessness. One of the meanings,

therefore, of Catherine's refusal to choose Heathcliff at the either-or

choice urged by Edgar is to be found in the symbolic expression of the

irreversibility of growth from infantile sexlessness to womanhood.

Catherine's tragic loss of Heathcliff corresponds to the enforcement of

sexual difference upon the growing individual.

Catherine's relapse into illness is, in her thoughts, directly connected

with a feeling of being wronged and her subsequent need for revenge.

Though free from jealousy, Catherine feels herself to be wronged by

50


Heathc1iff's attempt at marrying Isabella, as it baffles her hope of retain

ing him around her by antagonising Edgar, who has so far tolerated her

association with Heathc1iff.. She also feels herself to be unduly wronged

by Edgar, who, though she thinks she has strived for him to check

Heathc1iff's attempt, spoils her efforts by untimely intrusion and, more

over, proceeds to forbid her association with Heathc1iff from petty jeal

ousy. Exasperated at her wish to keep Heathc1iff as her friend thus

being threatened to be thwarted, she thinks of avenging their wrong

doings upon them by breaking her own heart, which she hopes will break

theirs.

The connection between her mental distraction and her revengefulness

can also be seen in her complaint about Edgar's indifference to her

suffering. After three days and nights of fasting, thinking that Edgar has

not been tortured as she hoped by her distraction, she says to Nelly:

Nelly, if it be not too late, as soon as I learn how he feels, I'll choose

between these two: either to starve at once-that would be no

punishment unless he had a heart-or to recover and leave the

country. Are you speaking the truth about him now? Take care.

Is he actually so utterly indifferent for my life ? (94; ch. 12)

The latter alternative "to recover and leave the country" seems to imply

with Heathdiff. In order to punish Edgar, if he does not grieve over her

death, Catherine even thinks of exiling herself with Heathdiff. On the

other hand, at the beginning of her last meeting with Heathc1iff, Catherine

accuses him of having broken her heart together with Edgar, with a wild

vindictiveness on her face, her hand seizing Heathcliff's hair, and insists

51


that she would not pity them even if they should suffer.

This vengefulness, and the feeling of being wronged make Catherine

unaware of her own unreasonableness in that she does not choose to

desert Edgar, though this choice is available if she refuses to separate

from Heathcliff. After Edgar begins to nurse her personally, Catherine

is satisfied by it and thinks no longer of leaving the country with

Heathcliff, only being conscious of the imminence of her death. As

formerly mentioned, Catherine is tyrannical over both Heathcliff and

Edgar. Her vindictiveness and feeling of being wronged at the time of

her fatal illness can be thought of as a tyrant's anger at her slaves' selfish

quarrels thwarting their ruler's will. From this point of view, her refusal

of the choice of Heathcliff or Edgar seems also to derive from her

attachment to the position of absolute ruler over both.

We have seen that the meanings of Catherine's refusal of the choice

between Heathcliff and Edgar are to be found in the symbolic expression

of the irreversibility of both her loss of Paradise and growth from infan

tile sexlessness to womanhood, and in her attachment to her position as

the absolute ruler over both. We might think that Catherine cannot

choose to marry Heathcliff, who is more herself than she is, as one cannot

marry with oneself. But this view is a little questionable, because

Catherine takes it for granted that she would marry Heathcliff if Hindley

had not degraded him. Yet the uniqueness of Catherine's love for

Heathcliff, who she thinks is more herself than she is, suggests another

meaning of her refusal of the choice between the two.

Heathcliff's and Edgar's love for Catherine seem dissimilar, yet both

loves seek to monopolise her. Being quite different from them, and

without a desire for exclusive possession, Catherine's love for Heathcliff

52


has as its perennial, rock-like basis the similarity which she feels in their

souls. But Heathcliff, though so singularly loved, does not accept that

uniqueness in her love. Unsatisfiable except by monopoly of Catherine,

he feels himself to have been betrayed over her marriage with Edgar, and

seeks compensatory revenge on others except his own tyrant. On the

other hand, Edgar gets intolerant of her associating with Heathcliff, and

tries to exclude him.

Not seeking monopoly, Catherine's love for Heathcliff can be free from

jealousy for Isabella, even when he tries to marry her, yet it is also

compatible with her marrying Edgar if Heathcliff continues to be around

her. Though Catherine's arms can hold both Heathcliff and Edgar in this

unique compatibility, both lovers tug at each of the arms from opposite

sides so as to monopolise her. If we take up again the image of Cather

ine as a bird with spread wings, the image can be of her figure when she

is thus tugged from opposite sides by Heathcliff and Edgar, or the image

can encompass the broad embrace of her wing-like arms. Underlying

Catherine's refusal of choice between Heathcliff and Edgar is her agony

over her widespread accommodation not being understood or accepted by

the two.

III

During their last meeting, when Heathcliff accuses Catherine of having

severed their tie of her own free will, she says, "If I've done wrong, I'm

dying for it. It is enough! You left me too" (125; ch 15), blaming him for

having run away from her. Undoubtedly, though Catherine chooses to

marry Edgar, if Heathcliff had been forbearing enough not to leave, their

53


separation, at least for her, would not have happened. Therefore, not

. only Catherine's inability to endure the "misery" and "degradation" which

would follow her marriage with Heathcliff, but also the overpossessive

ness of his love for her, which made her engagement with Edgar unbear

able, is responsible for her loss of him.

In the uniqueness of her love for Heathcliff, Catherine seems to eclipse

Heathcliff and Edgar. Yet Heathcliff, too, is outstanding, in the intensity

of his desire to be united with Catherine's soul. His inhumanly wild love

for her, though it is monopolistic like Edgar's love for her, also makes him

much more impressive than Edgar. For this very reason, however, it

seems anticlimatic that Heathcliff continues to live for eighteen years

after Catherine's death. Many readers have questioned this long survival

of his, though not so sarcastically as Isabella does on the night of the day

of Catherine's burial:

Heathcliff, if I were you, I'd go stretch myself over her grave and die

like a faithful dog. The world is surely not worth living in now, is

it? You had distinctly impressed on me the idea that Catherine was

the whole joy of your life. I can't imagine how you think of surviv

ing her loss. (136; ch. 17)

One of the reasons for Heathcliff's survival could be his revengefulness,

but also the visitation of Catherine's soul to him at her grave in Gimmer

ton churchyard, over which he did not die "like a faithful dog," seems to

have a deep connection with those reasons. We will see this in the

following discussion.

54


After Catherine's death, Heathcliff calls for her soul to visit him,

possessed with a wild desire to see its figure. At the dawn of the day

when Catherine dies at two o'clock in the morning, Heathcliff, enraged by

Ne1ly's report that her dead face was calm, vociferously prays that she

may not rest after death:

Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest, as long as I am living! You

said I killed you-haunt me, then! The murdered do haunt their

murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth.

Be with me always-take any form-drive me mad ! only do not

leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! it is

unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without

my soul! (129; ch. 16)

This passage, though suggestive of the difficulty of Heathcliff's life after

Catherine's death, does not directly show the reason for his survival. Yet

the vehemence of his longing for the visitation of her soul, which this

passage indicates, is a siginificant emphasis.

The above scene is on Monday, and on Tuesday evening Heathcliff has

a chance of seeing Catherine's corpse, but he mutely deserts, only replac

ing Edgar's hair in her locket with his own. Every night until her burial,

he lurks in Thrushcross Grange, spying on the house, but late Friday night

he returns to Wuthering Heights. That afternoon it happens to begin

snowing, though it has been warm until then, and Isabella mocks him for

his feeble inability to bear a shower of snow. That night, Hindley locks

all the entrances to shoot Heathcliff, but is hindered by Isabella's

betrayal. Next morning, Isabella succeeds in enraging Heathcliff to such

55


an extent as to make him forget his discreet forbearance from violence to

her, and, having a dinner knife flung at her, but, as if satisfied by her

successful retaliation, she at length flies from Wuthering Heights.

About the night of Catherine's burial and the following morning, only

the commotions brought about by Hindley and Isabella are described.

Heathcliff's unusually early return that night is not, as Isabella suggests,

due to the sudden onslaught of a cold weather. The true reason is shown

only eighteen or so years later in Heathcliff's reminiscence, told to Nelly

when he comes to Thrushcross Grange to fetch Catherine 11 to Wuthering

Heights on the evening of Edgar's funeral. He recounts to Nelly how he

felt the existence of Catherine's soul at the edge of her grave when he was

trying to open her newly buried coffin:

'If I can only get this off,' 1 muttered, 'I wish they may shovel in the

earth over us both!' and I wrenched at it more desperately still.

There was another sigh, close at my ear. I appeared to feel the

warm breath of it displacing the sleet-laden wind. 1 knew no living

thing in flesh and blood was by; but as certainly as you perceive the

approach to some substantial body in the dark, though it cannot be

discerned, so certainly 1 felt that Cathy was there, not under me, but

on the earth. (219; ch. 29)

Following this, he expresses the joy he felt at this visitation of Catherine's

soul:

A sudden sense of relief flowed from my heart through every limb.

1 relinquished my labour of agony, and turned consoled at once,

56


unspeakably consoled. Her presence was with me; it remained while

I re-filled the grave, and led me home. You may laugh, if you will,

but I was sure I should see her there. I was sure she was with me,

and I could not help talking to her. (220; ch. 29)

Returning home and eluding Hindley's attempt on his life, he hurries

upstairs to his room, formerly Catherine's. Here, he can still feel her

close existence, but, try as he might, he cannot "see" her. Henceforth for

eighteen years, he continues to be racked by these invariably false

premonitions that he will at last be able to see her. He expresses the

long-sustained agony as that of being beguiled by "the spectre of hope,"

seeing this as "a strange way of killing, not by inches, but by fractions of

hair-breadths" (220; ch. 29).

Heathcliff, however, has also been forced to live by that "spectre of

hope." If he had opened Catherine's coffin and embraced her body, his

passion would have kept him at her grave till he froze to death. Yet the

visitation of Catherine's soul deters him from opening her coffin and

makes him leave her grave. And the hope engendered by this experience

of feeling close at hand the existence of Catherine's soul halts him from

freezing suicidally to death and goads him to live on.

Heathcliff is worked upon to come to her, not through her grave, but

through other ways, to which a part of Catherine's feverish speech after

fasting for three days and nights corresponds. In her delirium, she

recollects that they tested their courage at Gimmerton churchyard, daring

each other to brave its ghosts:

But Heathcliff, if I dare you now, will you venture? If you do, I'll

57


keep you. I'll not lie there by myself; they may bury me twelve feet

deep, and throw the church down over me, but I won't rest till you are

with me. I never will !"

She paused, and resumed with a strange smile, "He's considering

-he'd rather I'd come to him! Find a way, then! not through that

Kirkyard. You are slow! Be content, you always followed me !"

(98; ch. 12)

In the first part of this passage, Catherine challenges Heathcliff to be

courageous enough to meet her ghost at the churchyard. But she seems

to think that he, lacking courage to be at the churchyard, wants her to

come to him at some place further away. As Heathcliff is courageous

enough to dig up her grave, this speech of hers is not rightly prophetic.

Yet her appeal to him to find a way other than through the churchyard is

suggestive of its deep connection with the episode of the visitation of her

soul to him which deters him from opening her coffin. In both passages,

Heathcliff is to seek the union with Catherine, not by embracing her body

at the grave and suicidally dying there, but by some other means.

The visitation of Catherine's soul to Heathcliff deters him from opening

her coffin, yet this episode allows a slightly different interpretation: her

soul appears to him, not to prevent him from suicidally dying there, but

to prevent him from not suicidally dying there after opening her coffin.

Catherine's soul, which, as we will see later, wants both her body and

Heathcliff's to begin to rot simultaneously, fears that he will not die there

after opening her coffin, and fearing this, it halts him from wrenching off

the lid. Though not through his hesitation which Catherine offers in her

feverish speech as a prediction, but being made to live on by the visitation

58


of her soul, Heathcliff has to "be content" with laggardly "following" her

for many agonising years until the longed-for union with her soul is

realised. Yet the presence of Catherine's soul to Heathcliff at her grave

requires further discussion.

Concerning Gimmerton Kirk which "lies in a hollow between two hills,"

as Lockwood recalls his dream of Jabes's sermon, the peaty moisture of

the nearby swamp "is said to answer all the purposes of embalming on the

few corpses deposited there" (18; ch. 3). Catherine's body, owing to this

peaty moisture, whose embalming effect Heathcliff's refrainment from

opening her coffin keeps active, is preserved from rot, until it begins to

decompose shortly before Heathcliff's burial beside it. Remarking on

this point, Yumiko Hirono proposes the interpretation that Catherine's

soul visits Heathcliff at her grave and halts him from opening her coffin

in order to prevent her body from beginning to rot, wishing it to share

decomposition with Heathcliff's (136-38). This interpretation also pre

supposes that Heathcliff does not freeze suicidally to death after opening

Catherine's coffin, because, if he had died there, decomposition would

have been shared by their bodies. Or we can consider that, as Edgar

might oppose Heathcliff's burial beside Catherine, her soul makes Heath

cliff survive Edgar.

Hirono also proposes (132-34) that the union motif of two two lovers in

death, realised by the decomposition of their corpses, is expressed by the

progressing "decay" (256; ch. 34) of the house of Gimmerton Kirk which

has two rooms that are "threatening speedily to determine into one" (18;

ch. 3). "Shielders" (39; ch. 6), the name of the curate, who seems to have

lived in the house of the church, may also be of some significance in this

interpretation. Although it is possible that Shielders has been succeeded

59


by others, if he is the same curate who £lees from the decaying church

near the end of this novel, there arises a meaningful correspondence

between Shielders's desertion and the collapse of the house's wall, which

has shielded its two rooms from each other. Correspondingly, having the

shielding side planks of their coffins pulled away by the sexton bribed by

Heathcliff, his corpse and Catherine's rot side by side and are gradually

united. Taking account of these elaborate expressions of the lovers'

union in decomposition, Hirono's interpretation of the visitation of

Catherine's soul, detering Heathcliff from opening her coffin in order to

keep her corpse intact until it can begin to rot simultaneouly with his, is

even more persuaSIve.

That Catharine's corpse has preserved its peaceful dead face is of much

significance in relieving Heathcliff's long-sustained agony, and he is also

pleased that the decomposition of her corpse should not start till he can

share it. Yet, the prevention of her decomposition does not seem to be

the sole purpose of the visitation of Catherine's soul to Heathcliff. The

visitation seems to have a more direct and positive purpose, that is, to

prevent Heathcliff from dying and keep him in this world. In her confes

sion to Nelly of her troubled mind on the day of her engagement to Edgar,

Catherine says:

I cannot express it; but surely you and everybody have a notion that

there is, or should be, an existence of yours beyond you. What were

the use of my creation if I were entirely contained here? My great

miseries in this world have been Heathcliff's miseries, and I watched

and felt each from the beginning; my great thought in living is

himself. If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue

60


to be; and, if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the Universe

would turn to a mighty stranger. I should not seem a part of it.

(63-64; ch. 9)

In order not to cease to be a part of the Universe, Catherine must make

Heathcliff continue to live in this world. Being more herself than she is,

Heathcliff is a kind of copy of her, a simulacrum of her existence beyond

her single, finite self. In keeping her other self alive, Catherine seeks to

continue to be a part of the Universe, just as a life, and also a book, seek

to continue to be alive in many copies for survival. She does not regard

bearing children as having anything to do with continuing to be a part of

the Universe. Yet, eighteen years later, when Heathcliff is forced to see

the figures of himself and Catherine in Hareton and his cousin, Catherine

invites Heathcliff to the posthumous union of their souls, as if she had

acquired new copies of her self.

IV

More puzzling than Heathcliff's eighteen years' survival after Cather

ine's death are the disappearance of his vindictiveness and his fatal

weakening from fast. In this section, I will discuss the significance of

resemblance of Hareton and Catherine II to Catherine I as one of the

reasons for Heathcliff's death. Yet, before entering that discussion, let

us notice the disappearance of his feeling of being wronged as a possible

reason for the departure of his sense of revenge and for his death.

In the previous section we noticed the agony of Heathcliff, who IS

repeatedly disappointed in his hope that he can at last see Catherine's

61


soul. In thinking about his vindictiveness, the feeling of being wronged

by Catherine in his agony is important. "She showed herself, as she often

was in life, a devil to me !" (220; ch. 29), he says of her refusal to appear

before him when he vainly tried to see her soul after returning from the

grave. Earlier, when upbraided by Catherine against causing a stir by

making approaches to Isabella, he also expresses his feeling of being

wronged by her, "I want you to be aware that I know you have treated me

infernally-infernally!" (87; ch. 11), thus reminding her that he would not

accept her treatment of him unrevenged. In the final meeting with her,

he vehemently insists how cruel she was when she despised and deserted

him. Likewise, he regards her refusal of showing the figure of her soul

as a hellish treatment of him.

Heathcliff's feeling of being wronged by Catherine is closely connected

with his harmful deeds to others. This characteristic of Heathcliff's

relation with her lies in his implicit submission to her, and, being maso

chistically related to her, he never rebels against her tyranny, only

seeking satisfaction by sado-masochistically harming objects other than

her. His infliction of injury upon the two generations of the Earnshaws

and the Lintons is an articulation of the feeling of being wronged which

he continues to hold even after her death, though the object of the

articulation has changed. Proportionately to the duration and the inten

sity of his longing to see Catherine's soul, his feeling of being wronged by

its refusal to show itself before him is lasting and intense. Heathcliff's

long-standing revenge upon his old enemies becomes closely related to his

agony over his ever unsatisfied hope to see Catherine's soul.

The disappearance of Heathcliff's vindictiveness near the end of the

novel, therefore, can be understood, at least partly, as related to the

62


erosion of his feeling of being wronged by Catherine. With the increas

ingly intensified confidence that he will at length be able to see her soul,

he no longer has a feeling of being treated infernally by her. Being

submerged in ecstatic expectation of union with Catherine's soul, he not

only looses his moral energy for revenge but also is disinclined to take

meals and sometimes even forgets to breathe. The expectation of seeing

Catherine's soul keeps Heathcliff alive when he might have frozen to

death suicidally after opening her coffin, but, contrarily, the proximity of

this realisation drives him away from life.

"Nelly, there is a strange change approaching-I'm in its shadow at

present" (245; ch. 33), muses Heathcliff at the heightening of his expecta

tion. Yet, about half a year earlier, when recollecting aloud before Nelly

on the evening of Edgar's burial, he recalls, not that expectation, but his

agony over his inability to see Catherine's soul -"that strange feeling"

(219; ch. 29). Confusingly, and demanding careful attention, the same

word "strange" is applied both to the expectation of seeing Catherine's

soul and to the agony over the inability to see it.

Regarding the phrase "that strange feeling," Heathcliff recounts its

partial disappearance. On the day before Edgar's burial, he makes the

sexton who has been digging up Edgar's grave beside Catherine's clean off

the earth off her coffin lid and open it. He says that it is only when he

saw her well preserved, passionless features that "that strange feeling,"

which had oddly begun eighteen years ago, was partially erased. As he

had seen Catherine's body on the day following her death, he had previous

ly known the peacefulness of her dead face. For one thing, as he had

been long agonising, he might have got into his head the idea that her soul

had been likewise agonised, and so he was calmed by seeing the tranquil-

63


ity of her body. Or, though it is only her corpse, instead of her soul's

figure that he sees, his longing to see her soul is partially satisfied by

seeing her body, which has undergone almost no change.

When Heathc1iff says, "Now since I've seen her, I'm pacified-a little,"

with his "brows not contracted, but raised next the temples, diminishing

the grim aspect of his countenance, but imparting a peculiar look of

trouble, and a painful appearance of mental tension towards one absorb

ing subject" (220; ch 29), the peculiar change of his expression, which

becomes increasingly noticeable toward the end of the novel, has already

begun. During Lockwood's visits to Wuthering Heights in November or

December of that year, Heathc1iff's expression is still grim. Lockwood,

however, is also a witness to the peculiar change in Heathc1iff's expres

sion. Before departing for London in mid-January, he sees Heathc1iff

pass Hareton by, who has darted off, being insulted by Catherine about

his reading practices, and he reports:

"It will be odd, if I thwart myself !" he muttered, unconscious that

I was behind him. "But, when I look for his father in his face, I find

her every day more! How the devil is he so like? I can hardly bear

to see him."

He bent his eyes to the ground, and walked moodily in. There

was a restless, anxious expression in his countenance I had never

remarked there before, and he looked sparer in person. (230; ch. 31)

That these peculiar changes in Heathc1iff's appearance are caused by his

perception of the resemblance between Hareton and Catherine I is also

significant, and it is this resemblance that influences Heathc1iff to swerve

64


from the long pursuit of his revenge.

It is on the evening of the day following the reconciliation between

Catherine II and Hareton that Heathcliff speaks to Nelly about the

approach of the "strange change." At breakfast, Heathcliff seizes Cather

ine by the hair to hurt her, hearing that she made Hareton pull away

Joseph's black-currant trees to make a flower bed, but as if he saw the

eyes of Catherine I in her daughter's defiant eyes, he releases her, cover

ing his own eyes. And in the evening, on seeing the young couple glance

up at him from the book they have been reading together, he is apparently

agitated by their resemblance to Catherine I. Under the influence of this

agitation, he recounts the approach of the "strange change" to Nelly.

Concerning the newly awakened love between Catherine II and Har

eton, Heathcliff says to Nelly that this would be the precise time to

revenge himself on the representatives of his old enemies, and that he

could do it. Heathcliff, indeed, has now acquired the means to torture

the two offspring of his old enemies as he himself was tortured, by driving

Hareton away without a farthing, thus severing their relation and forcing

both of them to live in penury. Yet he says that, not knowing the purpose

of his revenge now, he cannot raise his hand to strike, and that, having

"lost the faculty of enjoying their destruction," he is "too idle to destroy

for nothing" (245; ch. 33).

These words of Heathcliff's lead us to think, though somewhat mislead

ingly as we will shortly see, that the departure of his need for revenge is

the result of his loss of interest in Hareton and Catherine II. Certainly,

he says, "it is by compulsion that I do the slightest act not prompted by

one thought, and by compulsion, that I notice anything alive, or dead,

which is not associated with one universal idea" (246; ch. 33), showing his

65


total loss of interest in anything that is not related to the "one universal

idea" of the union with Catherine's soul. Yet, immediately after telling

Nelly about his being in the shadow of a "strange change," he also says:

I take so little interest in my daily life, that I hardly remember to eat,

and drink. Those two, who have left the room, are the only objects

which retain a distinct material appearance to me; and that appear

ance causes me pain, amounting to agony. About her I won't speak:

and I don't desire to think: but I earnestly wish she were invisible

-her presence invokes only maddening sensations. He moves me

differently; and yet if I could do it without seeming insane, I'd never

see him again ! (245; ch. 33)

For Heathcliff, who now cannot perceive voluntarily anything which is

not related with the idea of the union with Catherine's soul, only Cather

ine II and Hareton appeal, and even their existence agonises him. Far

from having lost interest in those two, Heathcliff is forced to focus on

them. Though he ascribes the absence of his desire to destroy them to

the loss of interest in anything besides the one idea he is possessed by,

those two of the younger generation intrude upon his awareness and rack

him, however firmly he shuts his awareness to them. Heathcliff's "uni

versal idea" of the union with Catherine's soul is bound to the figures of

the young couple by peculiarly strong ties.

The pain which the sight of Catherine II causes Heathcliff is described

as the wince that he makes when she turns her eyes to him, which

resemble those of her mother, especially when she defies or appeals to

him. I have already discussed his wince, which unfolded his clutch on her

66


hair. Or on the day when he detains her in custody at Wuthering

Heights, he winces twice, first releasing the key which she tries to snatch,

and second averting his face from her when she entreats him to let her

return to her dying father. He also shows an aversion to the sight of her,

saying that he is tired of seeing her as an explanation to Nelly for his

summoning her to Wuthering Heights within a fortnight of Lockwood's

departure to London. He orders Nelly to be with Catherine in another

room in order to lessen the necessity for him to see her.

As for Hareton, Heathcliff says to Nelly, referring to the his appear

ance while he was reading with Catherine, "Five minutes ago, Hareton

seemed a personification of my youth, not a human being. 1 felt to him

in such a variety of ways, that it would have been impossible to have

accosted him rationally"(245; ch. 33). He also states that the torture of

his seeing himself in Hareton is one of the reasons for his loss of interest

in the relationship between the two of the younger generation:

"Well, Hareton's aspect was the ghost of my immortal love, of my

wild endeavours to hold my right, my degradation, my pride, my

happiness, and my anguish-

UBut it is frenzy to repeat these thoughts to you; only it will let you

know why, with a reluctance to be always alone, his society is no

benefit, rather an aggravation of the constant torment 1 suffer; and it

partly contributes to render me regardless how he and his cousin go

on together. 1 can give them no attention, any more." (245; ch. 33)

These two passages suggest that Heathcliff is Hareton in the same

sense that Catherine 1 says, "1 am Heathcliff"(64; ch. 9). And, in appear-

67


ance, Catherine I also resembles Hareton, who is more like her than her

own daughter, whose resemblance to her mother lies only in her eyes, her

broad forehead, and a certain arch of the nostril, which gives her some

what haughty appearance. As Lockwood witnesses in the passage I

formerly quoted, Heathcliff sees Catherine I in Hareton, as well as seeing

himself in him.iI

Heathcliff, however, says to Nelly that Hareton's "startling likeness"

(245; ch. 33) to Catherine I is the least potent element which arrests his

imagination inasmuch as he sees her features in objects such as trees,

clouds and the most ordinary faces of people. Yet Catherine's features,

which are shaped in every object and every face, only make Heathcliff

realise that the "entire world is a dreadful collection of memoranda that

she did exist and that" he has "lost her" (245; ch. 33). But instead of

emphasising the absence of Catherine I, Hareton's and Catherine H's

likeness to her seems to torture Heathcliff by giving him the impression

that Catherine I, who is the one and only existence for him, exists in

others where she must not exist.

Being about thirty eight, Heathcliff is young enough to marry again.

Yet as he loves Catherine as his one and only existence, he can never

permit himself to be attracted to Catherine Il, however much likeness to

her mother he finds in her. For Heathcliff, the absolute devotion to

Catherine is life itself, and to be attracted to others would inevitably

destroy him. This would be the reason which Heathcliff cannot face up

to for his embarrassment and pain caused by the sight of Catherine H.

Having been agonised by his longing to "see" the figure of Catherine's

soul, Heathcliff is, owing to the intensity of that longing to "see," even

more agonised by seeing Catherine's eyes in the young two who are both

68


the offspring of his old enemies, and one of whom is among women whom

he must not love. Exclusively pursuing Catherine I, Heathcliff is ousted

from this world by the emergence of the young ones who are reflexions

of her. Or, as is stated earlier, Catherine I's soul invites Heathcliff out

of this world to death, having its continuous existence in the universe

ensured by that emergence of her new copies.

*As. we have seen in the prevIOUS section, resemblance is of great

importance in this novel. Though naturally each character differs from

the others, and the likeness between them is more or less limited, the

significance given to resemblance is great. Admittedly, Catherine 11

impresses us as undersized, compared with her mother, and Hareton,

though tightly bound to Heathcliff by their common inclination to the

wild, is much more humane and benevolent to others than Heathcliff.

Yet, though differentiating its characters from each other, the novel

repeatedly emphasises the strength and the significance of resemblance.

The theme of resemblance is also expressed by the common character

istics between apparently dissimilar characters. Though venomously

hated by his father, Linton Heathcliff is more like Heathcliff than his

father is in his even more beastly selfishness. Hindley's return after

three years' absence, and his grief over the death of his beloved, parody

those of Heathcliff. And the unconscious malice of Nelly Dean has some

similarity with Heathcliff's fervid hatred to others.

Pervading vindictiveness continues the theme of resemblance, exposing

the common features between the discrete characters. Hareton, in his

69


infancy, being asked by Nelly the reason for his liking Heathcliff, says

that he appreciates him because he takes vengeance on Hindley who

curses Hareton. Catherine H says, following her boast of forgiveness to

Linton, that she can "have the revenge" (218; ch. 29) of thinking that

Heathcliff's cruelty rises from his greater misery, thus exposing how we

can be vindictive at the very moment we are speaking about our own

forgiveness. Even mild-tempered Lockwood utters incoherent threats of

retaliation when he is ignobly subdued by dogs. Similarly, in the third

section, we have already referred to Catherine's feeling of being wronged

by Heathcliff and Edgar, and her vindictiveness towards them.

Catherine says that Heathcliff is more herself than she is. But like

wise, others are more or less ourselves. Depicting various degrees of

resemblance between apparently dissimilar characters, the novel seems to

express that our selves exist beyond the individual, physical limit and are

dispersed widely in the universe. And the refined expressions of that

theme of the ubiquity of our individual selves are Catherine's aspiration

to continue to exist as a part of the universe by keeping alive her copy,

Heathcliff, and her inviting him to death after the emergence of their new

copies, Hareton and Catherine H. Depicting such an aspiration in Cath

erine, Emily Bronte, too, continues to exist in the universe, by dispersing

the copies of the novel, which in turn are eternal copies of her self.

The expansion of one's self beyond the narrow limits of individuality is

also expressed by the image of emancipation of one's soul from one's

prison-like body in death, which Catherine conveys to Heathcliff in their

last meeting:

(... ) the thing that irks me most is this shattered prison, after all.

70


I'm tired, tired of being enclosed here. I'm wearying to escape into

that glorious world, and to be always there; not seeing it dimly

through tears, and yearning for it through the walls of an aching

heart; but really with it, and in it. Nelly, you think you are better

and more fortunate than I; in full health and strength. You are sorry

for m~very soon that will be altered. I shall be sorry for you. I

shall be incomparably beyond and above you all. (124; ch. 15)

The emancipation of one's soul is also a key to understanding the calm

ness of the dead face of Catherine, who said, "I won't rest" (98; ch. 12)

after death till Heathcliff is with her. Though her emancipated soul may

be forced to continue her restless wandering, seeking for the union with

Heathcliff's soul, emancipation from the body is delightful enough for her

soul, and her dead face records in its peaceful expression the delight of

her escaping soul.

Another baffling Question besides the self-contradictory calmness of

Catherine's dead face is her soul's lament over the inability to return to

Wuthering Heights shown to Lockwood by a girl's ghost. Emancipated

from the body, her soul can fly freely and even make Heathcliff feel its

presence, so its inability to return to Wuthering Heights seems incongru

ous. The Question, however, can be solved by presupposing that the soul

of the dead, though it can visit living people, cannot unite itself with the

soul of the living, and that without the union with Heathcliff's soul, the

soul of Catherine cannot achieve its symbolical return to Wuthering

Heights. Therefore, as far as her soul detains Heathcliff in this world,

waiting for the emergence of her new copies, it must continue its painful

roaming till he dies. But when the time is ripe, Catherine's soul beckons

71


Heathcliff to death.

On the day before Edgar's funeral, Heathcliff opens Catherine's coffin,

this time without being deterred by the visitation of her soul, and, seeing

the tranquil appearance of her well-preserved body, he feels relieved from

his "strange feeling," the agony of the inability to see her soul. One of

the reasons for the relief seems to be that, inspired by the calmness of her

dead face, which suggests the delight of the liberation of her soul from her

body, he begins to anticipate the possibility of the union of his soul with

Catherine's freed from his body after death. Though Heathcliff firmly

believes in the posthumous existence of one's soul, and also delights in the

possibility of sharing the dissolution of his corpse with Catherine's, he has

not thought of the emancipation of his soul from his body. Even after

this, he does not positively wish for death, but he thinks that, as he has to

remind himself to breathe-almost remind his heart to beat, he "cannot

continue in this condition" (246; ch. 33). Totally possessed by the idea of

seeing Catherine's soul, and anticipating the possibility of the union with

it, he forgets to struggle to continue to be in the state of life.

Heathcliff's longing to see Catherine's soul seems to be nearly realised

even before his death, as he is witnessed by Nelly gazing "at something

within two yards distance" (251; ch. 34), pursuing it by his eyes as it

moves. The union with Catherine's soul is achieved by his death, through

the open window, inside of which is the oak-panelled bed. His corpse,

which Nelly finds, is soaked by the rain falling through the window. The

rain suggests the moisture of the swamp near the churchyard, and the

water that invariably streams downwards. In contrast to the slight

elevation of Wuthering Heights, the novel frequently refers to swamps, as

in Hindley's dubious boast that he has "just crammed Kenneth, head-

72


downmost, in the Blackhorse marsh" (57; ch. 9), in which Zillah thinks

Nelly is sunk during her five days' detention in Wuthering Heights, or in

the location of Gimmerton Kirk near a swamp. Having lost their

Paradise, irretrievably like streaming water, Catherine and Heathcliff

finally reach the churchyard near a swamp, a sea-like destination of

water, and there, dissolving together, they regain their Paradise.

On earth, Catherine continues to be a part of the universe, In the

existence of her copies, Hareton and Catherine H. Under the ground, she

is united with Heathcliff's corpse in their coffins, the side planks of which

are pulled away, and will also be united with the corpse of Edgar some

time later. The tombs of the three, the headstone of the Catherine's

already "half buried in heath" (256; ch. 34), will be gradually united with

the surrounding moor which Catherine loved. It might be questioned

whether or not Heathcliff and Edgar will continue to be repellent to each

other even as souls after death. There are no decisive clues to the

question in the text, yet in the last part of the novel where the pervading

flood of animosity and hatred quickly subsides, and the fertile field of

forgiveness and union emerges, it is imagined that Catherine has at length

acquired her true Paradise, embracing both Heathcliff and Edgar. And

like the shape of an opened book, spreading the two wings of Heathcliff

and Edgar, the soul of Catherine ascends into eternal flight.

* I would like to express here my special thanks to Professor David Taylorof the English Department at Kyushu University for his invaluable advice,which has greatly improved the argument and analytical expression in theabove paper.

73

CatherineEarnshawastheSpineofaBook

WorksCited

Bronte,Emily.Wuthm'ngHeights.1847.Ed.WilliamM.Sale,JR andRichard∫.Dunn.London:Norton,1990.

Gilbert,SandraM.andSusanGubar. TheMadu)o桝αnintheAttic:TheWomanWriterandtheNineteenth-Centu7yLiteraryZmLqination.1979.NewHaven:YaleUP,1980.

Hirono,Yumiko.Arashigaokanonazowotoku[ToSolvetheMysten.esofWutheringHeights].Tokyo:Sogensya.2001. 鹿野由美子『｢嵐が丘｣の謎を

解く』創元社,

McKibben,RobertC."TheImageoftheBook in Wuthering Heights."Nineteenth-CentuPyFiction15.1960.159-69.

Sanger,C[harles]P[ercy]."TheStructureofWuthenlngHeights."1926. TheBronte.Sisters:Cn'ticalAssessments.Ed.EleanorMcNees.Vol.2.EastSussex:

HelmInformation,1996.7ト82.4vols.

74

densika

ノート注釈

densika : MigrationPending

densika

ノート注釈

densika : MigrationPending

densika

ノート注釈

densika : Completed

densika

ノート注釈

densika : Completed

catherine earnshaw as the spine of a book : the

Documents