PART 2

教师进入正文讲解:

Q1: Historical background

A1: One thing to note about the Victorian period is that quite a few women writers made theirs voices well heard. But in Victorian times women did not have any status. The Victorian moral code for women was that they should remain ignorant and uneducated. So some of the Victorian women writers used male names as their pseudonyms. When the Brontes had their books published, they had to use pseudonyms, pretending they were male writers, Currer Bell for Charlotte, Ellis Bell for Emily, and Acton Bell for Ann.

At the very beginning, when the novel was just published, Victorian readers found the book full of morbid psychologies and it made them feel terrible. Therefore, they thought that the book should be renamed as Withering Heights. From this, the readers can draw conclusion that the book was criticized and deserted at that time.

Q2: Gothic Novel

A2: Gothic novel is one of the most fabulous types of novels in western literature which is prevalent from the end of eighteenth century to the beginning of the nineteenth century, especially in England. Gothic novel has following features. First, there are deserted castles on a lonely bleak mountain, either top or deep in an isolated valley or on an island. Second, in gothic novels, there is always an unconventional secret in the castle. Third, super-natural things become natural in gothic novels. Forth, the main character is usually a woman and she is always saved through a reunion with a loved one in the end. Fifth, the male character is usually dark and gloomy. The last, the atmosphere in gothic novels is depressing.

To speak in a general way, a ghthic novel usually contains a grotesque plot, which can be learned from the following three points. First, human being has some kind of relationship with ghost. Second, reality and super-natural things are usually mixed together. Third, those who are dead may become alive again. And last, a gothic novel usually contains characters who act as tyranny, innocent young lady and apparition.

Q3: Emily Bronte (1818-1848)

A3: Emily was actually the fourth of five daughters born to the Irish curate of Haworth in 1818. the girls’ mother died in 1821 leaving the children in the care of their aunt. Emily, with her three elder sisters were educated at the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge. The two eldest sisters died in 1825 and Charlotte, Emily and Anne were from then on educated at home. Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell was published at the sisters’ expense in 1846. Wuthering Heights was published by Thomas Newby in December, 1847. Emily died of consumption on 19th December, 1848.

Q4: Themes

A4: Wuthering Heights is, ultimately, a novel about desire, not fulfilment. Its structure suggests Emily Bronte’s own impetus to transcend the socialised boundaries of the woman’s novel at this period, with its habitual, if not inevitable stress on engagement or marriage being the most desirable of conclusions. The impossibility of attempting to live rigorously by such social orthodoxy has been exposed in the novel.

Emily Bronte choose a broader theme than her sister does in Jane Eyre which mainly deals with feminism. In Wuthering Heights, she discusses the problem of human nature, a struggle between rationality and irrationality. She takes the example of a woman, Catherine’s choice in love and marriage to express modern human’s contradiction. Under her pen, human beings in modern civilization are miserable because they have lost their true self. The longing for the true self and nature is so earnest that the female writer invents such a place as Wuthering Heights to vent. At the end of the novel, little Cathy taught her tough cousin Hareton to read, who is another Heathcliff indeed. Yet reading is the process of receiving of civilization. The reunion of the couple has brought hope to the story. However, at the end of the novel, the shepherd boy cried and said that he had seen the ghosts of Heathcliff and Catherine. This maybe hints that the struggle between rationality and irrationality will be everlasting.

Q5: Narrative features

A5: It is noticeable that the narration of the story is unconventional. Different from the first person singular or the third person omniscient, the story is told chiefly by two characters in the story: Mr. Lockwood, one of the tenants of Heathcliff, and Nelly Dean, a Housekeeper in the service of Catherine, in addition some supplementary aids, like Catherine’s diary. The unusual way of narration adds much to the truthfulness of the story and the complexity of its plot.

The action of the story is chaotic and unremittingly violent, but the accomplished handling of a complex structure, the evocative descriptions of the lonely moorland setting and the poetic grandeur of vision combine to make this unique novel a masterpiece of English literature.

Q6: Plot

A6: Wuthering Heights tells a story of tragic love. Wuthering Heights is the name of grange in a mountainous area. One day, its old owner Mr. Earnshaw brings home a gipsy foundling to meet his surprised family. Mr. Earnshaw treats the child, Heathcliff, as his son, his daughter changes her initial attitude of ridicule and befriends the “brother”, but his son Hindley makes a point of seeing the intruder as one of the servant of the house. Nelly the nurse is not happy but feels kindly toward the poor boy. Years pass, the old Earnshaw die, Catherine falls in love with Heathcliff, but agrees eventually to marry young Edgar Linton of another farm, Thorncross Grange. Heathcliff suddenly disappears. A few years later, he resurfaces, goes to see Catherine, and revives her old flame for him but torments her ruthlessly, taking advantage of Edgar’s sister Isabella’s innocent love for him, eloping with her and eventually deserting her. In the meantime, he stays with Hindley at Wuthering Heights, tricks his “brother” into gambling, and encourages him to slide to alcoholism. Soon Hindley loses his farm out to Heathcliff and dies miserably, leaving his son, young Hareton, behind. The emotional upheaval that Catherine is put through proves too much for her weak nerves. It causes the immature birth of her daughter, Cathy, and sends her to her early grave. Isabella ends up giving birth to a weakling son, Linton, sends him back to her brother, and dies. Heathcliff sends his man over to claim his son, Little Linton, and take him back to Wuthering Heights. Over ten years pass, and the younger generation grows up. Heathcliff then lures young Cathy over and forces her to marry his invalid son. Her father Edgar dies in misery, then Linton dies, and Heathcliff now owns the two properties. He brutalizes the little ones, Hareton and Cathy. But he suffers from his psychic wound immensely. He often cries out at night for his long dead Catherine, has visions of Catherine clutching at his windows, and one windy rainy night he decides that it is time to give up and die. Young Cathy and Hareton unite in the end.

Q7: Introduction

A7: The excerpt is a part of Chapter IX of the book. The events of this chapter took place in the summer of 1780. It is part of diary of Mr Lockwood, a stranger who came to stay at Thrushcross Grange at the end of 1801 and the beginning of 1802. He paid visits to Wuthering Heights on several occasions. There he met Ellen Dean, who told him about the story of the two families two decades earlier.

The excerpt describes how Catherine tells Mrs. Ellen Dean, the house keeper at Wuthering Heights, her decision to marry Edgar Linton, but in the depth of her heart she loves Heathcliff. On that stormy night Heathcliff, haveing eavesdropped on the conversation, leaves Wuthering Heights.