Literary Devices in Wuthering Heights
Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory
This piece of furniture is the symbolic center of Wuthering Heights – both the novel and the house – and provides the setting for two of the novel's most dramatic events. Residing in Catherine...
Setting
More, More, MoorSet in the harsh and isolated Yorkshire moors in Northern England, Wuthering Heights practically makes a character out of its geography. And—like other characters in this book—...
Narrator Point of View
Wuthering Heights has two main narrators: Lockwood and Ellen "Nelly" Dean. The primary narrator is Lockwood, who begins and ends the narrative and is recording the story that he hears from Nelly....
Genre
Gothic FictionWuthering Heights has just about all the elements of a Gothic novel, but the characters are a lot more complex than your average Gothic protagonists/antagonists. Heathcliff's motiv...
Tone
You know how Charlie Brown's Snoopy, sitting atop his dog house with a typewriter, always starts his stories "It was a dark and stormy night"? Well, he may as well be Emily Brontë, because that s...
Writing Style
Before she wrote Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë composed quite a bit of poetry, and the urge to write in a lyrical manner really shows in her prose style. Her poems are full of flowers, mountain...
What's Up With the Title?
Contrary to what autocorrect may believe, wuthering is a real word. Our good buddies at Merriam-Webster define "wuther" as "to blow with a dull roaring sound."Oh, well, that's cheery.But, if you'v...
What's Up With the Ending?
The book is a real page-turner, making you really want to know how it ends. Death? Marriage? Trick question: we get both. The last page of the book has Lockwood leaving Wuthering Heights for Thrus...
Tough-o-Meter
With her violently romantic plot line and passionate characters, Emily Brontë has no problem drawing the reader into the book. And once you get through the first two chapters, you are definitely...
Plot Analysis
Lockwood meets Heathcliff at Wuthering Heights and, forced to spend the night, describes mysterious happenings in the house.Lockwood arrives at Wuthering Heights to become a tenant at Thrushcross...
Booker's Seven Basic Plots Analysis
Though he has a roof over his head, Heathcliff has no sense of home.Wuthering Heights is a variation on the Rags to Riches plot line. Heathcliff is (supposedly) an orphan who is brought into the...
Three Act Plot Analysis
Lockwood arrives and Nelly Dean begins to tell the story of the Earnshaws and the Lintons. Flashback time: Mr. Earnshaw brings Heathcliff into the family. Everyone treats him terribly, but then He...
Trivia
Some people just can't get enough Brontë, in which case they become members of the Brontë Society, one of the most important literary societies in the English-speaking world. Formed in 1893, the...
Steaminess Rating
There isn't any sex in this novel, and the only steamy parts are the love scenes between Catherine and Heathcliff, which tend to be a little maudlin. The reason this novel gets a PG-13 is that the...
Allusions
William Shakespeare, King Lear (3.104)The Slough of Despond: a bog in John Bunyan's allegorical story Pilgrim's Progress. The protagonist, Christian, sinks into the Slough of Despond, weighed down...