Results 1 to 6 of 6

Thread: Wuthering Heights & Heathcliff as the inversion of a colonial master

  1. #1
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Apr 2008
    Posts
    3

    Wuthering Heights & Heathcliff as the inversion of a colonial master

    I teach AP history, and my students are simply riveted in looking at Heathcliff -- not as as a Byronic hero -- but rather as an inversion of a colonial master.

    Any thoughts on his origins? Gypsy? African?

  2. #2
    Registered User rachel_bookworm's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2008
    Location
    England
    Posts
    75
    I studied wuthering heights as part of my english literature degree, and wrote an essay on Heathcliff. I read an article on his Irish origins
    : Terry Eagleton's Heathcliff and the Great Hunger: Studies in Irish Culture

  3. #3
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Dec 2018
    Posts
    2

    Does it matter?

    Quote Originally Posted by AP Teacher View Post
    I teach AP history, and my students are simply riveted in looking at Heathcliff -- not as as a Byronic hero -- but rather as an inversion of a colonial master.

    Any thoughts on his origins? Gypsy? African?
    #


    Although critics like Eagleton have suggested Irish heritage, others African, others gypsy etc etc, I think it's best to take Heathcliff's heritage as ambiguously as it is offered to us. More importantly he is denied the status of being white, which plays a more important role in the novel than his actual ethinicity. Reading WH through critics like bell hooks/fanon make a firm case for this.

    Interestingly Charlotte attaches the same ambiguity to Bertha Mason, albeit her heritage is more detailed, she is again denied the status of being white.

    Hope this helps.

  4. #4
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Dec 2018
    Posts
    2
    Great quote on this by Bratlinger along the lines of colonised subjects like Heathcliff could not be civilized because they can only ‘mimic’ the white man’s behaviour. Also a really nice linking between 'control of the black gaze' and allusions to "black eyes" in WH

  5. #5
    On the road, but not! Danik 2016's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2016
    Location
    Beyond nowhere
    Posts
    11,108
    Blog Entries
    2
    I donīt see anything colonial about Heathcliff.
    Thatīs how Heathcliff comes to Wuthering Heights, a homeless boy found in the streets of Liverpool:
    "We crowded round, and over Miss Cathy's head I had a peep at a dirty, ragged, black-haired child; big enough
    both to walk and talk: indeed, its face looked older than Catherine's; yet when it was set on its feet, it only
    stared round, and repeated over and over again some gibberish that nobody could understand. I was
    frightened, and Mrs. Earnshaw was ready to fling it out of doors: she did fly up, asking how he could fashion
    to bring that gipsy brat into the house, when they had their own bairns to feed and fend for? What he meant to
    do with it, and whether he were mad? The master tried to explain the matter; but he was really half dead with
    fatigue, and all that I could make out, amongst her scolding, was a tale of his seeing it starving, and houseless,
    and as good as dumb, in the streets of Liverpool, where he picked it up and inquired for its owner. Not a soul
    knew to whom it belonged, he said; and his money and time being both limited, he thought it better to take it
    home with him at once, than run into vain expenses there: because he was determined he would not leave it as
    he found it."
    http://www.online-literature.com/for...56#post1359556
    "I seemed to have sensed also from an early age that some of my experiences as a reader would change me more as a person than would many an event in the world where I sat and read. "
    Gerald Murnane, Tamarisk Row

  6. #6
    On the road, but not! Danik 2016's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2016
    Location
    Beyond nowhere
    Posts
    11,108
    Blog Entries
    2
    Bertha Mason is another matter:
    “‘I affirm and can prove that on the 20th of October A.D. --- (a date of fifteen years back), Edward Fairfax Rochester, of Thornfield Hall, in the county of ---, and of Ferndean Manor, in ---shire, England, was married to my sister, Bertha Antoinetta Mason, daughter of Jonas Mason, merchant, and of Antoinetta his wife, a Creole, at --- church, Spanish Town, Jamaica. The record of the marriage will be found in the register of that church—a copy of it is now in my possession. Signed, Richard Mason.’”
    https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1260/1260-h/1260-h.htm
    "I seemed to have sensed also from an early age that some of my experiences as a reader would change me more as a person than would many an event in the world where I sat and read. "
    Gerald Murnane, Tamarisk Row

Similar Threads

  1. Wuthering Heights
    By James Zemboy in forum Wuthering Heights
    Replies: 8
    Last Post: 08-16-2010, 10:13 PM
  2. Wuthering Heights Discssion
    By Mr_Moh in forum Wuthering Heights
    Replies: 3
    Last Post: 01-13-2008, 12:17 PM
  3. power of choice determines fate
    By nicole in forum Wuthering Heights
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 02-27-2007, 09:39 PM
  4. Wuthering Heights: Heathcliff vs Edgar
    By sdr4jc in forum Wuthering Heights
    Replies: 8
    Last Post: 09-07-2006, 04:33 PM
  5. A review..
    By ja in forum Wuthering Heights
    Replies: 4
    Last Post: 05-24-2005, 06:07 PM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •