Nelly, I Am Heathcliff
Essay Preview: Nelly, I Am Heathcliff
Report this essay
“Nelly, I am Heathcliff” – With this unusually leading statement, Catherine Earnshaw is able to profess her love for Heathcliff, the outcast and rugged villain of the novel Wuthering Heights. However, not only is this just a declaration of love, this statement also allows Emily Brontл to open a door to a world of much wider and deeper issues. She raises the idea of how there can be no place for ones true and authentic self in this over-civilised, bourgeois nineteenth century world, and depicts both Cathy and Heathcliff as being outside society to demonstrate this concept. The statement also implies that Cathy is more than just in love with Heathcliff, they are in fact so close that their very souls have become entwined allowing them to become part of each other. This notion is carefully charted by Brontл during the course of the novel.
From the very beginning of the novel there is an ecstatic chemistry between Cathy and Heathcliff that fails to waver throughout the story. During their numerous, playful adventures and ramblings on the moors surrounding Wuthering Heights, they are at ease with their natural personalities and over a short period of time develop a unique and steady bond. Nelly Dean illustrates them as being “very thick” , so much so that the mischievous duo have to be parted by Mr. Earnshaw to keep them from becoming a nuisance.
It becomes evident that the pair is somehow outside this plush, clichйd nineteenth century society when they both express their disdain for the Linton children while watching them in violent dispute over a puppy through a window at Thrushcross Grange. Viewing their argument as being petty and stupid they “laughed at the petted things” , suggesting that they would not wish to be a part of their civilised world.
We get an indication that Cathy and Heathcliff are one in the same when Hindley punishes Heathcliff for retaliating to and insult aimed at him by young Edgar Linton by tossing a dish of hot apple sauce at him. Hindley smuggles him upstairs out of sight and subsequently administers him with a sound beating. Cathy is distraught at this action exclaiming, “I hate him to be flogged! I cant eat my dinner” . Evidently, she shares his feelings and it is almost as if she can feel his physical pain.
However, we observe her to betray this personality when she is with Edgar Linton. When in his presence “she was full of ambition”, and adopted “a double character without exactly intending to deceive anyone”. She takes care not to act like Heathcliff around him and gives in to civilisation in the conventional sense. Eventually, she turns her back on her true, authentic self and announces her intent to wed Edgar Linton. She implies that her love for Heathcliff is timeless and exists on a different plane than her more conventional feelings of love for Linton. If this is so, then she is free to act as she sees fit in this material, social plane and believes that marrying Linton will not affect her relationship with Heathcliff.
She tells Nelly that it would be impossible for her to abandon Heathcliff as “hes more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same, and Lintons is as different as a moonbeam from lightning”. She makes the point that her very existence depends on Heathcliff and that she is more than just a part of him – “Nelly, I am Heathcliff”. Cathys betrayal of her own true, undeniable nature ultimately destroys not only her but also Heathcliff, the other half