The way Emily Bronte uses the characters actions to reveal there personality’s is by writing about them. One example is Heathcliff he often gets angry with people and this is because he has a violent, cruel, spiteful, rude, arrogant nature. Some of this is caused by the way he was treated by Hindley. “ Off dog” and Isabella tells us in her letter of Heathcliff’s treatment towards her. “ Nor describe his habitual conduct”
Being able to read letters and diaries in the book helps us get inside the characters heads. We find out some of the deepest feeling which would have not been told to anyone but revealed in a diary. One of the examples of this is Catherine’s diary where it told us how she missed her father and Hindley was a poor replacement. “I wish my father were back again. Hindley is a detestable substitute.” The diary also said in it “H. and I are going to rebel-we took our initiatory step this evening.” This means that even though Heathcliff has been told to stay away from Catherine that they are doing as they are supposed to, this also tells us that they are free spirits and cannot be told what to do. Extract from Issabella’s letter. “ Nor describe his habitual conduct; he is ingenious and unresting in seeing to gain my apporance.”
By sharing the characers dreams the eader gets to know the characters fears and in their own way interpret them how they wish one example of this is when Lockwood is talking to Nelly about his dream. “Nelly do you ever dream queer dreams?”
The way that Emily Bronte reveals the characters innermost thoughts and feelings is through the narrators that she uses such as Nelly the servant. We find out catherines thoughts towards heathcliff and Edgar when she confides in nelly at Wuthering heights. Two examples of this are: “ I’ve no more business to marry Edgar Linton as I have to be in heaven” “It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now” another example of when this happens is when nely is telling the new owner of thrusscross grange all the feelings that heathcliff and Catherine had when they were young these however were only her interpretations of the feelings they were having but as we only have her word to believe that has to our interpretation of it aswell.
We can find out certain aspects of a characters personality in the way that they speak such as Nelly has rather a common accent showing us that she is a working class person. “Yon lad gets war ‘un’ war gets worse and worse” Another time Emily Bronte does this is the way that Hethcliff often speaks he is sometimes clearly spiteful in what he says such as at the end of the book when Catherine is dying he still blames her. “I have not one word of comfort” “you deserve this you have killed yourself”. We can also see Hindley’s resentment for Heathcliff as he wa th preferred son and not even a biological one at that in the things he says to Heathcliff such as forcing him to stay away from catherinewhen he finds out his feelings for her. “He shal have his share of my hand if I catch him downstairs again till dark”
The way Emily Bronte describes the characters tells us a lot about them such as there social class and even sometimes personality such as the way that Heathcliff had dark hair and dark skin it was coincidental that he had a dark character aswell. “He is a dark-skinned gypsy” We can tell from the description of Joseph that he is not middle or a high class person and that she is working class. “Vinegar-faced Joseph projected his head from a round window of the barn.”
Having one character give an opinion on another was used in the form of a narrator. Such as Mrs dean giving opinions on Cathy “She grew like a larch” “She could be as soft and mild as a dove” Also how Heathcliff gave his opinion about Edgar hen Catherine was ill “Dsamn the fool” Isabella also tells of how Heathcliff treats her in the letter she sends Nelly. “Nor describe his habitual conduct; he is ingenious and unresting in seeing to gain my apporance.”
There is a lot of figurative language used throughout the book. Examples of these are when Emily Bronte describes Heathcliff as a gypsy “He is a dark skinned gypsy.” Also when she describes Joseph “inegar-faced Joseph projected his head from a round window of the barn.”
