Thoughts on "Wuthering Heights"

[salienne]

(Hey, that almost rhymed! :D)

Okay, so, yes, I am a geek and read this book for pleasure. And being the geek I am, I really really liked it. So. Freaking. Creepy. And really good... I went to bed an hour late (and since I had to get up early, that hour made a difference @_@) 'cos I couldn't stop reading.

So then...

Heathcliff=rather worse than Snape, although I maintain that there are fundamental similarities between the two. Both characters are fascinating, though.

Hell, I love all the characters in "Wuthering Heights", 'cos they seem to have so much more to them than the "one truth" we talked about in English when analyzing "Pride and Prejudice". That, however, is most likely a result of the 1st person POV--very good move. Beyond the fact that the speakers cannot possibly remember everything they relate, it works perfectly.

My one real complaint is that Lockwood is pretty much useless. I know that, if I were reading this book for English, we'd make this big deal about how it's a 1st p. POV within a 1st p. POV (sometimes within yet another 1st p. POV) but, honestly, all Lockwood does is give us another perspective and provide a conduit for Mrs. Dean's tale. And while the out-of-verse perspective is important (and, again, a good move that I like), in terms of purposefully constructing a novel, I don't think Lockwood's role was thought out enough for him to provide anything more than that. Hence I would fail English because I think the writer just went with it when she thought, "I want Nelly to tell Heathcliff's story. But someone has to listen. I know!"... Least that's how I work. And then I give it meaning after. ^.^

Oh, and the last paragraph? So. Absolutely. Gorgeous. Just, read this and tell me if you don't agree (no real spoilers, in case, by some chance, I'm not the only one who reads Emily Bronte for fun):

I lingered round them, under that benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath, and hare-bells, listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass, and wondered how any one could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth.

So... all hail Emily Bronte! I really wish she'd gotten a chance to write more novels before her death. It be sad.

Okay, and now I'm off. To write or play video games or shower, perhaps all of the above. :D

Ta mates.

EDIT: And now for something completely different...

I didn't feel this necessary deserved an entry of itself, but I needed to complain about how UNFAIR it is that PotC 1 and LotR 2 are now showing at the exact same time. That's just cruel... 'cos I can't possibly watch both. T-T

Comments

[hippiebanana132.livejournal.com]

I love this book, but it makes me incredibly depressed because basically everyone spends the entire thing waiting for Heathcliff to die and then he does and no-one is happy. Well, thanks for that, I feel a whole lot better now.

The way everyone seems to so badly misinterpret it baffles me, too. Heathcliff is not someone you would invite round to tea and marry, girlies. He was a horrible, horrible man, even if he did have his reasons and his few redeeming qualities. I don't understand why so many women think he's this great, romantic, adorable, lovable hero with no faults. He's amazing, yes, no denying it, but I sit listening to people like that and think, "We were even reading the same book?"

All the same, parts of this book are just exquisitely beautiful. I last read it when I was thirteen, around four years ago, so I couldn't quote at you but certain moments with Catherine and Linton stick in my mind, especially when they were out walking. From what I remember, she was incredibly ill at the time and certain she was going to die. He said such lovely things to her, annoying as he could be, and she had the most wonderful, painfully beautiful attitude to death and the afterlife.

And I may have just spazzed about an entirely different book there, but you'll have to forgive me. *grins* Four years is a very long time.