Republic of Iraq

University of Anbar
College of Arts-English Dept.

Gender Discrimination in Wuthering Heights

by

Hiba yaseen

July2020

Introduction

I. Emily Bronte’s Biography

Emily Brontë is best known as for authoring the “Wuthering Heights”. She was the
sister of Charlotte and Anne Brontë, also famous authors. She was born in 1818; she
lives most of her short life in the Yorkshire moors that she immortalized in Wuthering
Heights. In 1820 the family moved to Haworth in Yorkshire, eighteen months later
Mrs. Bronte died and her husband turned to a maiden aunt, Miss Elizabeth Branwell
who came from Plymouth to bring up his children in a strict and authoritarian way.
The three eldest sisters - Maria, Elizabeth, and Charlotte - were sent to the Clergy
Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge, a school for the daughters of impoverished
clergy. Emily joined her sisters in 1824, upon reaching the age of six. The daughter of
writer Hannah Moore was also in attendance. The harsh conditions of the school were
later reflected in Charlotte Brontë's novel, Jane Eyre. Emily’s experience of the
school, as the youngest of the four, was better than that of her sisters, but the
conditions were still harsh and abusive. (Usein. 116)

From an early age, Emily began writing displaying a vivid imagination. Her early
writings were in collaboration with her sisters and brothers about an imaginary world
(Gondal saga). Only small fragments remain from this period. She continued writing
throughout her life, though it became an increasingly private affair; initially she
disliked the idea of her poems being published though she was persuaded on finding
her sisters had been writing similar poems.

In 1846, the three Bronte sisters published a collection of poems under the
pseudonyms Currer Bell (Charlotte), Ellis Bell (Emily) and Acton Bell (Anne). The
fact they chose masculine names suggests they wanted to avoid the prejudgment of
female writers. In nineteenth-century England, women were assumed to be unable to
write great literature, primarily because they were believed to be unable to think great
thoughts and a woman’s social world was considered uninteresting. Women in
general were expected to be meek, gentle, and submissive; author Coventry Patmore
would later sum up this stereotype by calling it “the angel in the house.” In Wuthering
Heights, Emily Bronte turns the “angel in the house” image on its head, not only by
writing the book but by including female characters that are far more complex than
the one-dimensional stereotype. Of these, Cathy is the prime example. Isabella Linton
starts out as an “angel in the house” type, but then demonstrates a level of
assertiveness that was frowned upon in women at the time, when she runs away from
Heathcliff and takes their son, Linton, with her. In 1847, she published her only novel
Wuthering Heights. Based on the windswept moors of Haworth, it is a powerful tale
of love, hate, sorrow and death; it later became a classic of English literature. Though
at the time, its innovative structure and complexity led to mixed reviews. In 1850, her
sister Charlotte republished the book under Emily’s real name. The novel, as an
effective medium for the criticism and interpretation of life, comes into existence
through the creativity of the writer. A literary text is an artifice; a work of art. The
readers come in contact with the fictional world of the novels through its language.
(Varghese, 46)

II. Gender Discrimination

The rigid definition of gender role in Victorian society, whichendorsed oppression of 
females at all ages, has led Emily Brontë to develop an overactive superego to suppres
s all the desires prohibited by society; this is really a rigorous and oppressive milieu.
According to Freud, andthese repressed urges can be linked toneurotic symptoms such 
as paranoia, phobia and hysteria. (Mehrvand, 2013, 68)
As seen by ASL, the oppressive father of Emily Brontë, the harsh regime ofClergy Da
ughter's School and the rigid gender definition of the Victorian society's created a sev
erely oppressive environment that eventually led Emily Brontë to develope an overact
ive superego in  order to suppress society's forbidden wishes. The Freudian read from
Wuthering Heights also confirms that the novel's core of Emily Brontë is father-
hatred and the rejection of authority. (ASL, 2014, 3)

Throughout Wuthering Heights, she argues at the unequal, crueldisparities of a societ
y that discriminates against women, brutalizes women, abusesthem and abuses kids.S
he seems to be haunted bythe vision of a societywhere men's predominance is replace
d by
female dominance.He also proposes a future in which the character of the father is eve
ntually slain, with a strange sensation of liberation and satisfaction in realizing his dea
th. Her contrary approach to society is somewhat unconscious. (ASL, 2014, 30)
Many days ago, today's feminists have dealt with such varied subjects as women,
autobiography and literature in the development of female sex in post-colonial
societies.However, a few years ago, feminist ideas tended to be classified not by
theme, but by country of origin. Female literary criticism must be seen as a part of the
women's freedom movement that in the 1960s erupted in Europe and America to
rekindle women's political and social problems. (Mahapatra, 2014, 1)

III. Wuthering Heights

Most people, especially those who never read the book, see Wuthering Heights as a
simple, if intense love story — Romeo and Juliet on the Moors of Yorkshire. That's an
error. The story is actually one of revenge It follows Heathcliff's life from childhood
(about seven years old) to his death in his late thirties, a mysterious gypsy-like
individual Heathcliff rises up in his adopted family and is then relegated to a servant's
status, running away when Catherine decides to marry another man. He reappears,
rich and educated, and sets out to take revenge on the two families he felt his life was
destroyed by them. Wuthering Heights also explores perceptions of masculinity and
femininity as gender roles were much more rigid and established than they are now.
Brontë is a constant contrast of masculine and feminine, but not all similarities are
simple, for example, Edgar Linton and Linton Heathcliff are men, but they are often
portrayed by Brontë as having women's looks and attributes. She also seems to favor
masculinity over femininity, even in her women. In general, she portrays weak,
delicate characters with contempt, while she treats strong and rugged characters like
Heathcliff, both Catherine, and Hareton, with compassion and admiration, despite
their flaws. (https://www.litcharts.com)

The distinction between genders roles is fundamental to the literature; women's

autonomy before the dominance of men begins to appear in the Romantic era when a
new spirit appears creating spaces in which men no longer take full control; areas
such as regulation of the creation of the complot and its powerful presence in the
domestic domain. Such characteristics can be seen in Wuthering Heights, where the
women are portrayed as spies and submissive characters at the same time.
Nonetheless some critics like Rousseau claimed that ‘woman was the natural
complement to man’ in the eighteenth century.

This research explores the portrayal of men and women in the novel, particularly in
their isolated positions. The following articles will deal primarily with the power of
women over men in the novel and their figurines with regard to narrative and
exchange of letters, "The Female Narrator in the British Novel" (1992), "The Female
Consciousness in Wuthering Height" (1992), and "the In reliable Narrator in
Wuthering Heights." Their power within the story produces a prototypical woman
who defies the weapons of the period with respect to the main protagonists. Desire
and domestic fiction: the historical history of this novel (1887).

Emily Brontë created Heathcliff, a man driven by his desires, his need for revenge, his
use of violence, a man who is ready to do anything to reach his goal. Obviously he
was a very shocking character for the strict Victorian morality. Many attributed this
novel to a male author ‘Its coarse and vulgar language, its display of fierce passion
and physical violence, could only have been constructed by a man (...)’. So we can see
that Wuthering Heights stands out in the Victorian period. How could Emily Brontë
create such a man? Why did she make him so different from all the other heroes? In
the following extract, Sherry explains her creation of Heathcliff:

‘She was not irked by the restrictions placed on women in society,

and presumably viewed Barnwell's self-destruction as the action of
a free soul going its own way - as did Heathcliff (...).

She was able to see such events, she observed the reasons for certain actions, but she
was so removed from the influence of everyday morality that she did not need to
judge, or to point a warning lesson. This attitude is responsible for lifting the universe
of Wuthering Height beyond the limitations of the contemporary moral world to a
wider belief in the basic qualities of human nature. While her heart is for Heathcliff,
Catherine knows that only if she marries someone with rank and fortune can be
ensured her place in society, and Heathcliff doesn't have either of these. Brontë
reminds us that a woman was just as popular socially as her husband when she wrote.
Therefore a "healthy" marriage was necessary to honor and win influence in society.
The treatment of his wife, Isabella, who Heathcliff had married solely for avenge is
barbaric in the extreme: "He grabbed, and pulled her out of the house ....' I have no
sympathy! 'I've no sympathy”.

Gender discrimination in Wuthering Heights:

As we mentioned earlier, this novel illustrates many problems related to Victorian

society, such as society's view of women as a weak being who has no right to share
her thoughts and actions even inside the home so that she cannot even decide how and
with whom her future will live due to male domination at the time .

That is why the man was the one who chooses and decides in her stead and the
woman cannot oppose or demand her rights. Therefore, the author published her novel
for the first time in the name of males because she knows that if she publishes her in
her name, she will not receive it and will not succeed or until her message reaches the
community in order to investigate gender justice.

Since Earnshaw entered the house with Heathcliff, a storm of discrimination,

hatred, and hatred began to transform between family members, foremost among
them was their mother, who was not satisfied to remain with them because of his
black color and being anonymous, so everyone was private, Hindley opposed to his
existence except Earnshaw and Catherine. Many obstacles came across him, but he
overcame them because of his love for Catherine, who helped him and adapted to him
and they harmonized in their world, but Hindley was not satisfied and told Catherine
to leave Heathcliff more than once and he became in control of her, especially after
the death of their father, yet she did not leave him and risked staying with him until he
went home Mr. Linton then realized herself as an educated lady and not just a vagrant
wandering around the lands with Heathcliff.
Add section for conclusion !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

References

-Varghese, L. M. (2012). Stylistic Analysis of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights.

IOSR Journal of Humanities And Social Science, 46-50.

- Usein, Arafat, (2016). The Life of Emily Bronte and critical Analysis of her
Masterpiece “Wuthering Heights”. International Refereed Scientific Journal Vision,
Volume 1, Issue 1, (116-124).

-https://www.litcharts.com/lit/wuthering-heights/themes/masculinity-and-femininity.
Accessed on 2020.

Add other refrences !!!