Wuthering Heights is narrated by Lockwood for approximately seven chapters and the narrating is then taken over by Nelly Dean, she is one of the servants working at Wuthering Heights and she can be considered as being directly involved in the characters actions. When Lockwood arrives at Wuthering Heights, he turns up half way through the dramatic story of the Earnshaws and the Lintons. This provides the readers a way in to an otherwise closed and secret place. Lockwood also exaggerates how nice Heathcliff is. To the reader, Heathcliff is stubborn and impatient but because they readers are reading it through Lockwood, it’s easier to get influenced by Lockwood’s ideas. Even though, first person could be more reliable, the readers are not sure whether Lockwood is a trustworthy narrator. Therefore the reader begins to pose questions like ‘Why is Heathcliff like he is?’ or ‘Is it factually correct?’ Nearer the middle of the novel, Nelly tells the story up to date and you begin to see the interesting structure that is starting to unwind. Overall in the novel, there are two first person narrators. Using two narrators is effective as it grabs the attention of the reader and makes the reader ask questions which answers are obviously further on in the novel. Not only does it pose questions and grab your attention, it makes you think about how trustworthy it all is. This links the trust to the questions. When you are unsure about trusting something, then you often ask questions.
The readers already get the impression that Heathcliff is a scary and tense man and the message is put across in another way. Heathcliff’s mysterious presence dominates Wuthering Heights from start to finish. On page 2, Lockwood starts describing Wuthering Heights as being ‘scary’ and isolated. He uses words like ‘grotesque’ to portray the carvings on the wall and uses ‘villainous’ to describe the ornaments that are scattered around the living room. By describing the décor of Wuthering Heights as scary and suspicious, it makes the reader tense and unsettled. It makes them wonder what will happen to the character and makes them venture more into what type of man Heathcliff is. In 1914, when people read novels, they would find it easier to keep on reading because stories such as Wuthering Heights were new and exciting for them. The first impressions about the house are that the setting was quite gothic and spooky. The imagery is very clever and really gets the reader creating a mental image in their heads of an intimidating house surrounded by boggy fields and marshes. It is situated in a rural location with one neighbour which is Thrushcross Grange, where Lockwood is leaving. The ghostly side of the house comes from the ghost of Catherine haunting the house. Knowing that the house is haunted, surrounded by fields and has ghastly carvings on the wall, it builds up a good image of which the reader can base the story.
Another character that is introduced in the first chapter in Joseph. Because Lockwood is narrating it, the reader only gets to know his thoughts on Joseph. Lockwood portrays Joseph to be the old servant in the house who is desperate for the job he has. Lockwood notices that Heathcliff treats him unfairly but the only reason Joseph stays is for the job. Lockwood doesn’t understand Joseph and the way he speaks so the reader fills Lockwood’s shoes. The reader has to try and be aware of what Joseph is talking about, it might be relevant for when you get deeper into the novel. As soon as the reader becomes aware of Joseph and how he talks, it becomes easier to understand the plot. Joseph’s language is very biblical which gives the reader a clear understanding that he is religious and believes in his religion very strongly. By introducing a nervous servant character early on in the novel, the reader can then relate to it and try and find out why Joseph is like he is : did something in particular happen to him? The novel begins to fire out all these questions for the reader to answer. Lockwood also gets introduced it Zillah, who is the house-wife. Zillah tells Lockwood that she finds the house ‘curious’ and she discovers ‘quiet goings on’ every now and then. This relates back to the point of Wuthering Heights being a spooky novel.
Brontë uses techniques in her novel that are still used today; binary opposition, similes, imagery and metaphors. The first binary opposition that is used in the novel is the opposition between the two houses, Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange. The two houses are different in every way. Thrushcross is a smaller house with pleasant views and it is closer to civilisation. Whereas Wuthering Heights is four miles away from Thrushcross Grange which means further away from the local village. It is surrounded by farming land and is intimidating on the outside and the inside. When Lockwood goes on further to describe Heathcliff, he uses small phrases which involve binary opposition, like ‘He’ll love and hate’. Brontë uses animals to portray Heathcliff and the house. Lockwood is waiting in Wuthering Heights when he gets approached by ‘savage dogs’. Although, Lockwood portrays the dogs to be ‘hairy monsters’ and ‘beasts’, the dogs are nice to Heathcliff which gives the reader the impression that Heathcliff is quite obnoxious or evil. While Lockwood is in the kitchen, he sees a pile of dead rabbits but at first he believes they are a pile of cushions. By using animals for imagery, it creates a better picture in the readers head about the atmosphere. The reader can also link the dead rabbits and savage dogs with hunting.
Wuthering Heights stands out from many of the novels that were written in the late nineteenth century. Most novelists of the time wrote with the aim of expressing an idea or proclaiming a message about some aspect of the society of their time. They did this by presenting a picture of injustice or by criticising institutions such as schools or the legal system in their stories. Their novels often presented a range of characters, involved several plots and sub-plots and a variety of settings and situations. These things are not true of Wuthering Heights. It stands alone, as a story about a small number of people in a very restricted setting. It does not openly carry a moral message or Brontë’s views on social or political issues of the time. Its themes are confined to emotions and affairs which involve a small number of characters, but which are to some extent present in all human life: love, grief, betrayal, rejection, jealousy and revenge. And where other writers of the time created plots which came to make sense and characters whose actions became understand during the course of the novel, Brontë plunges the readers into a world where events are not predictable and where characters behave in ways which go far beyond what seems natural or rational. It is this quality of being somehow beyond reason which may make Wuthering Heights a ‘nightmare’, but which also makes it compelling and ‘brilliant‘. All of this is put across to the reader in the opening pages. The reader can discover that the characters are not what we call rational because of how they act and how Lockwood portrays them. The ‘nightmare’ image is put across in the descriptive part, and helps us create a mental image of Wuthering Heights.
The beginning of this novel sets us up for the ending in a numerous amount of ways. Firstly, the beginning sets the scene and introduces the characters, their personalities, looks and etc. The characters all come together at the beginning and when it gets to the middle of the book, they all begin to feud. But by the end of the novel, they all come back together like they were at the beginning. Therefore, this means that there is a link between the characters and the plot. There is a large contrast in the setting and scenery between the beginning and the end. The beginning describes Wuthering Heights as a dark, gloomy and suspicious building but at the end, the scenery is flowery and colourful because of Catherine creating her garden. This also means that the language changes. The language which describes the gloomy side of Wuthering Heights is disheartening and depressing, and the language describing the colourful side of Wuthering Heights is light hearted and cheerful. There is binary opposition found between the relationships between the characters as well. At the start, relationships are quite dysfunctional but at the end, the characters are building good relationships with one another.
In my opinion, the first three chapters of this novel are effective in a number of different ways. Brontë uses a series of techniques (which are still used today) in a very successful way. The contrast between the start and the end surprises the reader and it makes them try and explore the meaning of the novel. The scenery, characters and plot all link together all the way through the novel. This makes it simpler for the reader to get into the plot. By using the characters as narrators, it poses questions for the reader to try and answer which Is a good way of getting the reader to read on. The imagery is very successful and Brontë uses animals to portray the image of what the setting is like. By having one character who is quite mysterious, this also poses questions and gets the reader thinking about what he is truly like. When this novel was wrote, the majority of them were based on aspects of the 1914 life and expresses an idea, although Wuthering Heights is very different as it is based on neither. Therefore, this would make readers back then get more interested in the novel and how it is laid out. The beginning is a very important part of the novel, as it sets the reader up for the rest of the novel. I believe Wuthering Heights does this very well because of it’s techniques and characters.