“marriage compounds the problems of Catherine’s life” (469)
I believe this partial quote explains much of the feminist viewpoint of Wuthering Heights. It is interesting that it Catherine is able to choose who she “wants” to marry and at the same time, she is unable to choose. She loves Heathcliff, but due to pressures of society, she marries Edgar because of his higher social class. This makes her decisions and actions the center and the basis for Wuthering Heights. The way she is so commonly influenced by society – in her maturation as well as her marriage to Edgar – makes Catherine an example to the question “’what is a woman’” (470)? Pykett explains that because of this, femininity is a by-product of society – “reinforce, rather than derived from woman’s ‘nature’” (470). Pykett also offers that Catherine’s “double-self” directly proves the latter theory. In childhood, Catherine’s wildness with Heathcliff is seemingly her nature. Then when she stays at Thrushcross Grange, she is suddenly changed into a “proper young lady.” Hindley’s wife even insists that they must not let Catherine stray back to her old ways, implying how she has once been was all along natural. In this way, society has imposed it’s beliefs on Catherine and changed her indefinitely – so much so that she chooses a man she does not love over one she is madly in love with. The fact that society has this much influence over her is a reflection of oppression. Catherine is not truly in control of her choice for marriage, yet society is. Catherine does not truly pick Edgar, society does. And Catherine is certainly and negatively affected by this as she physically loses herself and her decisions in the end.
It is strange to me that society still has a stigma attached to "independent" women who make choices society deems unfit for women.
ReplyDeleteIf a women chooses to marry out of class, out of race or engage in a same sex relationship she can be ostracized and outcast. Catherine is no different from millions of women and men for that matter who make the choice to be with someone or without someone based on how her family or friends might perceive her.
Wuthering Heights was written almost 200 years ago and is still relevant today.
I find it very interesting that Catherine allows society to have such a strong hold over her. She is shown to be such a fiercly independent woman in her early years, and the fact that she lets society choose her husband, her lifelong partner, seems completly uncharacteristic of her. I think Bronte is making a social commentary on this subject by showing how strong social influences can be on a female of the time if she lets them.
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