Wuthering Heights: VISUAL.

Essay Question:

“Explore how Bronte establishes a number of Gothic elements in chapter1 “

Ann B. Tracey – ‘The Gothic novel 1790-1830 Plot Summaries and Index Motifs’

“The Gothic novel could be seen as a description of a fallen world. We experience this fallen world
through all aspects of the novel: plot, setting, characterization and theme.”

 The decaying ruined scenery implies that at one time there was a thriving world. At one time
the abbey, castle or landscape was something treasured and appreciated but now all that
lasts is the decaying shell of a once thriving dwelling.
 Darkness- Architecture- Past tense- Adjectives  LOOK FOR
 Emily uses Thrushcross Grange and Wuthering Heights to depict isolation and separation.
The dark and foreboding environment described at the beginning of the novel foreshadows
the gloomy atmosphere found in the remainder of the book is an ancient mansion perched
on a high ridge, overlooking a bled, windy, sparsely inhabited wasteland. The harsh, gloomy
characteristics of the land are consequently reflected in the human characters, hence
enhancing the deeper, darker feeling evident in her text.
 The dreams and the sheer fascination with the spiritual enrich a sense of the supernatural
and the extraordinary. 
 The presence of the supernatural throughout the novel, hallucinations and visions of
Catherine and Heathcliff occur at moments of heightened emotion and passion. They have
both endured illness and starvation prior to these psychological disturbances. Their
emotional states are realised in shadowy figures by the consciousness of the character
themselves. The highly passionate relationship between Catherine and Heathcliff, forged in
their embittered and savage childhood, has been variously interpreted: it is a doomed
"Gothic" romance, whose depth of feeling makes the inane Lockwood and his narrative-
mate Mrs. Dean appear all the more shallow.  These supernatural events happen in the
beginning of the novel and continue until the very end. 
 The house: The construction itself is forbidding and unwelcoming: “the narrow windows are
deeply set in the wall, and the corners defended with large jutting stones”, and the
stonework is covered with “grotesque carving” (chapter one). The house is also very old –
the date “1500” appears over the door, suggesting to the reader that it may have a long and
dark history.
 Lockwood, the first narrator in the novel, also discovers that the house may be haunted
when he sleeps in what used to be Catherine’s bed. His sleep is disturbed by a troubling
dream in which a child – Catherine – scratches at the window and pleads to be allowed in
after roaming the moors for twenty years. Heathcliff’s reaction to this, flinging open the
window and begging her to come back again, suggests that the experience was not a dream
at all but a visitation from a ghost, although the novel never makes this clear