Wuthering Heights Reaction

The novel, Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, centers on a very binary mood in both its structure and characters, such as the repetition of Hindley’s behavior through Heathcliff. The novel is essentially split in two halves, the first being where Hindley is in control of the manor, and the second when Heathcliff is in control. They both exhibit the same terrorizing behavior on the children around at the time. Hindley’s constant scaring of Catherine and Heathcliff is so traumatizing that Heathcliff grows up only to repeat the same behavior toward Hareton, Cathy, and Linton. 

            Hindley was always disliked by his family, especially when baby Heathcliff came to fill his father’s idea of a son, and his mother died. He grew up with a constant hatred toward Heathcliff, and he could never be truly happy at home. After he returned from college to take over Wuthering Heights, Hindley expressed his deep-rooted anger by treating Heathcliff as a servant, even though he had grown up as gentleman’s son in the manor. No matter what Heathcliff did to try to be respected as a child of the house, Hindley still treated him with disgust, “Hindley opened it on the other; they met, and the master, irritated at seeing him clean and cheerful…shoved him back out with a sudden thrust, and angrily bade Joseph ‘keep the fellow out of the room-send him into the garret until dinner is over,”(Bronte 42). Hindley had no reason at all to exclude Heathcliff from the dinner, the young boy had even washed up for it, yet Hindley hated him so much that he forbid him from joining the rest of the company for dinner. Because Hareton and Catherine were friends, Hindley treated Catherine badly too; he forbid her from playing with Heathcliff, always talked angrily, and did not even treat her like his sister. Hindley was never able to recover from his cranky, negative attitude and wasted his life away drinking, and yelling at Heathcliff, Catherine, and other servants in the house.  

            Heathcliff grows up treated horrible by Hindley, betrayed by Catherine, and left with nobody, therefore takes out his anger on others. Like Hindley, Heathcliff acts out on the children because of a deep-rooted sense of revenge. For Hindley, the revenge was on Heathcliff for making him feel worthless to his family; for Heathcliff, the revenge is for Hindley’s mistreatment along with Catherine breaking his heart. Heathcliff treats Linton as a pathetic child, whom he is embarrassed to be the father of. He constantly bosses him around and makes him feel even more insecure than he already does. Heathcliff learns this behavior from Hindley, who treated Heathcliff this way when he was younger. When Cathy comes to talk to Linton, and possibly marry him, Heathcliff locks her and Nelly in the house. He treats them horribly as he keeps them prisoners and even hits Cathy, “He seized her with the liberated hand, and, pulling her on his knee, administered with the other, a shower of terrific slaps on both side of the head,”(Bronte 199). Just before the incident, Heathcliff had seen in young Cathy an image of her mother, the woman he once knew loved, and broke his heart; it was then that Heathcliff’s anger maximized and he seized the small girl. Over time, he lost most of his love and passion he used to have as a child and was as harsh and Hindley toward Hareton, Linton, and Catherine. The rash personality of Hindley was directly inherited in Heathcliff’s character and he turned into an almost exact duplication of Hindley.

Works Cited:

Brontë, Emily. Wuthering Heights.  New York: Scholastic, 1961. Print.