How does Emily Bront Portray Catherine Earnshaw's character? Why do you think Cathy is presented in this way?

Then Heathcliff and Cathy went to Thrushcross Grange and had a peep through the window, and saw pure white ceilings lined with gold boarders and beautiful shining chandeliers hanging from the ceiling: 'Pure white ceilings boarded with gold'. Trushcross Grange is a lot richer than Wuthering Heights because Wuthering Heights is an old farmhouse. Edgar and Isabella saw them looking around the house through the window and send out a bulldog called Skullker. Skullker then attacked Cathy and grabbed her around the ankle; she didn't scream she just took the pain. She passed out and the Lintons took her in and kept her until she was well again: 'The man took Cathy up; she was sick; not from fear, I'm certain, but from pain'. Cathy was cut badly on the ankle.

When Cathy returned to Wuthering Heights she is really posh and a lot different. While Cathy was at Thrushcross Grange she met Edgar, Edgar loved Cathy. Cathy returned to Wuthering Heights and as she descended from her horse she was wearing a beautiful white dress: 'Why Cathy, you are quite a beautiful'. Cathy looked like a proper woman. To Heathcliff's surprise Cathy was making fun of his clothes. This shows Cathy's other character, her posh side.

Cathy had a conversation with Nelly and says that she loves Edgar for his money and everything around him but she loves Heathcliff for who he is: 'My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods, time will change it... My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rock beneath: a source of little visible delight but necessary. Cathy's love for Heathcliff is forever but her love for Edgar will change over time. This shows that Cathy loves Heathcliff.

When Cathy is in the same room with both men she is deeply affected, Emily Brontë shows this on two occasions. On the first, the Lintons came around for tea. Then Heathcliff gets dressed up to impress Cathy, when Heathcliff enters the room everyone laughed at him because nobody has seen Heathcliff in this way before. Heathcliff got dressed up because he thought Cathy liked men in nice rich clothes. When everyone laughed at him he became very angry and threw applesauce over Edgar: 'Cathy slipped her fork to the floor, and hastily dived under the cloth to conceal her emotion. Cathy did this because she loved both Edgar and Heathcliff and she gets a fever afterwards.

Heathcliff ran away and returned many years later. While he was away Edgar and Cathy got married. Heathcliff bought Wuthering Heights off Hindley. He visited Thrushcross Grange. Cathy opens the door to him and gives him a hug. Then they both go inside and Heathcliff tells Cathy and Edgar about his travels, on the second occasion she dies, after Heathcliff and Edgar quarrel in the kitchen. This puts pressure on Cathy, as she loves both men. 'I began to defend myself, thinking it too bad to be blamed for another's wicked waywardness'. This was before the first punch was thrown.

When Cathy was on her deathbed and Heathcliff came to visit her they had an argument and she blamed Heathcliff for her death: 'If you loved me then why did you leave me?'

My conclusion is that Emily Brontë showed Cathy having two personalities because women in 1845 had to marry for money, not for love and that she could not stand the pressure of trying to be both characters; a rebel and a lady.

Peter Hannan 10AD

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