childhood and innocence

8/13/2019 Childhood and Innocence

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Bronte' Studies, Vol. Z9, November 2.004

CHILDHOOD AND INNOCENCE IN

WUTH RING HEIGHTSB Y M A R I E L L E S E I C H E P I N E

In the mid-eighteenth century writers began to deal with the theme of childhood. Thisinterest increased with the rise of the middle class, which considered children as heirs.In Wuthering Heights, childhood plays a large part and pervades the novel with itspresence. Many critics, for example, have commented on Catherine s childish love forHeathcliff. When the novel was published in 1847, childhood was still associated withinexperience, intellectual unawareness, and moral purity, in short with prelapsarian,before the Fall-of-Man innocence the heritage of the Romantic Movement. Such avision still prevailed two years later in David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, and eventhirteen years later in his Great Expectations and in The Mill on the Floss by GeorgeEliot.

However, Emily Bronte s vision of childhood has been claimed to stand in sharpcontrast with the vision which then prevailed in literature, for its perversion andnarcissism, and even has something pathological about it. Recent critics have generallyfocused on Catherine, who is said to embody such narcissism and perversion. Thisstudy, which relies on the theories of the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, actually focuseson the two main female characters, Catherine and her daughter Cathy, and considerswhether the latter generation embodies the same kind of relation between childhood andinnocence as the former generation and looks at the extent to which lost innocence andnarcissism in particular can be considered to be redeemed at the end of the novel.

Childhood is generally considered to be central to Wuthering Heights: 'The theme ofchildhood, voiced by the elder Cathy on her deathbed, is continued in the main action ofthe second half of the book [.. .] in one way or another childhood is in fact the centraltheme of Emily Bronte's writing'.' This time in Catherine's life, which is unquestionably

associated with Heathcliff's appearance in her house and the strong feelings the boy thenarouses in her, is, indeed, described at length by the narrator Nelly, as it will determinethe following events in the novel. Catherine's dreams of happiness are associated withchildhood all through her life, and even on her death-bed she still looks like a child inNelly's eyes: 'She drew a sigh, and stretched herself, like a child reviving, and sinkingagain to sleep and five minutes after I felt one little pulse at her heart, and nothingmore '' Einally it is the ghost of a child that visits Lockwood, the newcomer and secondnarrator in the novel.

Until she dies at the age of nineteen, Catherine clings in a passionate way to herchildhood memories. The most revealing passage is the scene which takes place after

Address correspondence to Stephen Whitehead, Bronte Parsonage Museum, Haworth, Keighley, West Yorkshire


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210 MA RIELLE SEICHEPINE

Heathcliff has returned from a long absence and has just quarrelled with Catherinhusband, Edgar Linton. This scene, in which she raves, is significant as it echoes childhood scenes in which she suffered from being separated from Heathcliff. Her

memories have actually never stopped cropping up in an insistent way and she ncannot help lamenting about 'what has kept recurring and recurring till I feared for reason.'^ The past years even end up overlapping the present situation and the adultCatherine totally identifies with the child. The year she has spent with Edgar then seeto vanish at once. Her physical sensations as she lies in her bed at Thrushcross Crarelease images from the past and she sees herself lying in her bed years earlierWuthering Heights. She yearned to transcend death and to recover the freedom she uto share with Heathcliff when she was a child: 'Their mutual destruction by tooth anail in an effort, through death, to get back to the lost state of gypsy freedom childhood'."

However, childhood in Catherine's case is certainly not synonymous with innocenLockwood's reaction when the little girl sobs in her melancholy voice to be let insignificant as he does not soften at all and even turns out to be totally impervious to child's plea. He then shows himself to be cruel to Catherine, even if he tries to accofor his cruelty by claiming that the ghost arouses a feeling of terror in him:

1 discerned, obscurely, a child's face looking throug h the wind ow T erro r m ade me cruel; and fiit useless to attempt shaking the creature off, 1 pulled its wrist on to the broken pane, and rubbed itand fro till the blood ran down and soaked the bedclothes . . . '

Nevertheless, Nelly's description of her little mistress is not devoid of ambiguand this makes the reader feel somewhat puzzled. The housekeeper lays emphasis Catherine's angel-like sweetness: 'she had the bonniest eye, and sweetest smile [. ..] aall, I believe she meant no harm'.* But the girl's conception of good and evil has nothcanonical about it, as is shown by the dream which she relates to Nelly: '"If I wereheaven, Nelly, I should be extremely miserable"', she confesses.'' Thus she expresses utter rebellion against convention as she inverts good and evil as well as heaven and hHeaven to her is certainly not synonymous with peace and bliss: "'heaven did not seto be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth"'.* OWuthering H eights can actually fulfill this function. Only at Wuthering Heights doesfeel really comfortable, '"the angels were so angry that they flung me out, into

middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights where I woke, sobbing for joyThe aspects of childhood which are associated with Catherine when she has becoan adult are mainly negative. In the raving scene, her childish behaviour obviouirritates Nelly who is, however, generally prone to accept her little mistress's attitu'she seemed to find childish diversion in pulling the feathers from the rents she had made [...] "Cive over with that baby-w ork " I interrupted, dragging the pillow a wayCatherine's childish feelings and, more particularly, her narcissism and perversion, hbeen repeatedly pointed out by critics. She pays much attention to herself and wonders or she rather pretends to wonder at the love she arouses in all the peothat surround her: "'H ow strange I thought, though everybody hated and despised e

other, they could not avoid loving me".''^Catherine proves to be unable to choose between her love for Heathcliff and her l

f h d h f h h


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CHILDHOOD AND INNOCENCE IN WUTHERING HEIGHTS Z I I

wishes to keep both of them. She thus shows what Freud calls the perversity of theinfant, '[Catherine] wants to have it all, an impulse that recalls what Freud hascharacterised as the polymorphous perversity of the infant'." She cannot imagine that

this situation may arouse a feeling of jealousy in either of her su itors or make him suffer.In marrying Fdgar Linton, she thus tries to persuade herself that she will be able to helpHeathcliff.

On the one hand, she longs for the high social position that only Linton can provideher with: ' " . . . he will be rich, and I shall like to be the greatest woman of theneighbourhood, and I shall be proud of having such a husband"'.^^ On the other hand,she confesses to N elly th at her deep love for Heathcliff is actually due to the perfectsimilarity of their souls, '". .. he shall never know how I love him; and that, not becausehe's handsome, Nelly, but because he's more myself than I am"'.''* Later in her life, whenshe is married to Linton, she cannot bear having a rival in Isabella and she takes herrevenge in abasing the girl and revealing her secret feelings for Heathcliff. The imageCatherine then gives of herself is in keeping w ith the image of ideal self as defined by thepsychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. The idealization of self related with narcissism isassociated with masterful and confident bearing, and also with rivalry."

The wish for symbiosis that Catherine thus expresses appears to be very close tothe infant's state of 'non-differentiation'. Pauline Nestor points out 'she [Catherine]is in fact expressing the desire for an impossible symbiosis, for a state of non-differentiation between the self and o ther which Lacan contends belongs to the realm ofthe psychological "Imaginary"'.** Not only does Catherine behave hke a child but sheseems to be in such a state of regression tha t she eventually moves back to the early stageof infancy. Just as in the infant's imaginary a condition of total unity with the motherprevails, Catherine cannot imagine herself as a being distinct from Heathcliff.

In what Lacan defines as 'the mirror-phase', either the reflection of the mirror, or thereflection given back by the perception of others, helps the child to distinguish betweenthe 'I' and the 'not-I'; between self and other. The infant then perceives itself for the firsttime as a being separate from its mother and, consequently, as subject. The mirror-phasethus provides a link with reality, a link between the 'Innenwelt' and the 'Umwelt'.*^ Asfor Catherine, she indeed proves unable to cope with the mirror-phase. During theraving scene she is quite horrified by the image of herself which is given back by themirror: '"And I dying I on the brink of the grave My God Does he know how I'maltered?" continued she, staring at her reflection in a mirror, hanging against theopposite wall. "Is that Catherine Linton?"'.'* Later she goes still further as she no longerrecognizes herself in the mirror at all; she even comes to think that someone else's face,and not her face, is reflected in it:

'It [the black press] does appear odd I see a faee in it ''There is no press in the room and never was' said I, resuming my seat, and looping up the curtain

that 1 might watch her.'Don't yo u see that face?' she enquired, gazing earnestly at the mirror.And say what I could, I was incapable of making her comprehend it to be her own; so I rose and

covered it with a shawl. "

Moreover, when she claims that she is Heathcliff, that she and Heathcliff are but oneperson, and that Heathcliff's soul and her own soul are but one soul, she shows to what


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'Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same, Nelly, am Heathcliff he's alwayalways in my mind not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself but, as myown being,'^"

Thus, they find themselves in a situation of non-differentiation, a situation in which 'I ' is the 'not-F, and self and other merge. For the heroine of the novel, therefore, chihood is synonymous with the loss of innocence (or the absence of innocence) in so farperversion and narcissism are opposed to purity and openness to others. This statemshould, however, be qualified as regards the scene which has just been mentioned.we take innocence in the sense of unawareness, we can then argue that Catherinenevertheless innocent since she is unconscious, or she is no longer conscious, of surrounding world.

Let us now consider the younger generation in the novel. To what extent does Camanage to put an end to this infernal cycle which has repeatedly brought her motback to the perversity of childhood? At the end of the first book Lockwood warns reader that he might well find in the daughter the very image of her mother whenconfesses: 'I should be in a curious taking if I surrendered my heart to that young persoand the daughter turned out a second edition of the mother'.^^ And he later goes furtwhen he expresses his total disagreement with the housekeeper and doubts that Cathyan angel as Nelly claims: '"She does not seem so amiable", I thought, "as Mrs. Dwould persuade me to believe. She's a beauty, it is true; but not an angel"'.^'^ As Nelly's description of Cathy, it is unquestionably as paradoxical as her previous descrtion of Catherine. She first says that the daughter's personality differs from her mothand that their deep feelings are actually expressed in totally opposed ways:

That capacity for intense attachments reminded me of her mother; still she did not resemble her; for could be soft and mild as a dove, and she had a gentle voice, and pensive expression: her anger never furious; her love never fierce; it was deep and tender,^

But she then claims that Cathy has features in common with Catherine. For instanwhen she escapes from the house while her father is absent, thus obliging Nelly to seafor her for several hours, and then tries to escape again, the housekeeper reproaches with her childish behaviour, just as she reproached the mother in the past: '"Ythirteen years old, and such a baby '".^'' Nelly also lays emphasis on Cathy's saucinand perversity: 'a perverse will that indulged children invariably acquire [...] her pet

will ' ."As for Cathy's relationship with Linton, it is described by Richard Chase: 'Noth

could be more Victorian than the marriage of the child lovers, Linton and the younCathy, both aged 17, under the baleful influence of Heathcliff. They are sweet, innocentchildren' (my italics).^* Cathy, indeed, often shows tenderness and patience to her couLinton, but she also sometimes openly and cruelly expresses the contempt she feels him: '"You needn't bespeak contempt, Linton; anybody will have it spontaneously,your service'"'^^, she tells him because he has shown himself somewhat whimsical .. . mainly sick.

Cathy thus reveals, in her turn, what Lacan calls a masterful and confident bearishowing her superiority over Hareton, refusing to recognize him as her cousin becauin her eyes, he looks like a mere servant: '"A nd he never said. M iss; he should have do


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C H I L D H O O D A N D I N N O C E N C E I N WUTHERING HEIGHTS 213

the stable-boys at the Grange, '"How dare he speak so to me? He my cousin "'.'^* Nellythen reports the hyperbolical language which her little mistress is used to hearingwhenever she is talked about and which actually has no other effect than to make herst i l l more proud and haughty: 'she who was always "love", and "darl ing", and "queen",and "angel", with everybody at the Grange'.^' Being thus worshipped by all those thatlive with her, and mainly by her father, actually reinforces her self-centredness.

Moreover, she feels utter disdain for Hareton because he is innocent and uncultured inher eyes. The boy, who would like his efforts and his progress in reading to be valued,arouses only mockery and rebuff in his cousin. The way in which Cathy relates to herhousekeeper one of her meetings with Hareton and the contemptuous behaviour shethen openly showed to him is quite significant:

The fool stared, with a grin hovering about his lips, and a scowl gathering over his eyes, as if uncertainwhether he might not join in my mirth; whether it were not pleasant familiarity, or what it really was,contempt.^"

A noth er exam ple can be found later in the novel when C athy is detained by Heathcliff atWuthering Heights. She then cannot stand being ignored by Zillah, the servant, and shereacts in the same way as previously: 'Catherine [Cathy] evinced a child's annoyance atthis neglect; repaid it with contempt'.^' She thus spurns Hareton, but she sometimes goeseven further in suiting the action to the word and reacting in an aggressive way. Lacanargues that aggression is precisely connected with narcissism.^'^ As a matter of fact, thegirl 's attitude has even something pathological about it in so far as she cannot bearHareton's touching her or touching the book which she is reading.

So far, Cathy does not prove to be more able than Catherine to overcome hernarcissism. She also embodies the idealization of self, obviously privileging self overother, and even rejecting other. She suffers like her mother from a kind of psychologicalimprisonment. But her relationship with Hareton eventually develops in a positive wayand she gradually becomes able to move from narcissism, pride, and contempt towardsgenerosity and interest in other. She will no longer live in the world which she hascreated just as her mother did before her in order to impose her own will. Rather,she will accept to conform to social rules and to adapt to others' needs. Her love willtherefore be able to grow at last:

Cathy Heathcliff is able to accomplish what the first Catherine could not; she places her love not withina self-created environment, the glorification of the will, but within human society, the modification ofthe will; and Hareton in his turn endows her existence with a purpose.'^

So, at the end of the novel, the relationship which is established be tween Ca thy andHareton can no longer be defined as a relationship in which the T merges with the'not-I ' , or a relationship in which self subdues other. It is, on the contrary, a relationshipbetween self and reality with self turning to others. Cathy, indeed, acknowledgesHareton as he really is. She accepts, for the first time, someone who is different from her,someone who in some respects is even inferior to her and shows weaknesses and faults.She resorts to her own ingeniousness to try and pick up the thread which has beenrepeatedly broken between Hareton and herself, adopting a cunning stratagem to do so.

She reads an extract from her book in a loud voice so as to attract her cousin's attentionand arouse his intellectual eagerness and interest in reading: 'But her ingenuity was at

k t d th i j [ ] h ld b i l t l d d it


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aloud to me'.^'' She eventually fulfils her aim if we refer to Nelly's description of the twcharacters bending their beaming faces over the same page, which is symbolical of themutual acceptance.

Cathy now no longer despises her cousin's 'simpleness'. Conversely, she shows hreadiness to convey her own intellectual knowledge to him and she thus helps him progress. Their common readings, as well as the discoveries and intellectual enjoymenwhich they derive from reading and which they share with each other, unquestionabinduce Cathy and Hareton to overcome their self-centredness and aggressivenesTogether they are then led to build up a new world which will enable them to evolve anto fulfill themselves.

Cathy and Hareton's relationship may still have something childish about it: 'There a childishness too about the love relationship of Hareton and the younger Cathy',^^ bit has nothing to do with the confident bearing and rivalry which used to characterize Cathy has managed, at last, to put an end to her psychological imprisonment and noproves able to give her cousin a helping hand. The only two characters that remain wiNelly at the end of the diegesis thus seem, conversely, to complete each other 'both theminds tending to the same point one loving and desiring to esteem and the othloving and desiring to be esteemed they contrived in the end to reach it'.^* In shothey are eventually endowed with qualities which will enable them to reach a commoaim.

The situation is thus somewhat paradoxical. As Cathy comes out of childhood anbecomes an adult, she does not lose innocence, as is usually the case when one becoman adult. Rather, she gains a certain innocence as she eventually succeeds in overcominrhe wicked tendencies which she has inherited from her mother and which havcharacterized her all through the first years in her life. For the first time she showqualities which are generally associated with childhood. At the end of the novel Cathand Hareton show a maturity which does not mean that they are disillusioned. Thematurity, on the contrary, is endowed with innocence in several ways. First of all theembody purity and the absence of guilt in so far as they manage to remove evil and help each other. Besides, they are really eager to learn and they marvel at having much to discover together:

The red firelight glowed on their two bonny heads, and revealed their faces, animated with the eaginterest of children; for, though he was twenty-three, and she eighteen, each had so much of novelty

feel, and learn , tha t neither exp erience d, nor evinced the sentimen ts of sober disen chan ted maturityCathy and Hareton come out of the mirror-phase and they are now ready to enter a nephase in which self is related with society, even though social relationships do not plaa very large part at Wuthering Heights.^^ In conclusion, it is significant that in the velast scene in rhe novel, which is undeniably related with benevolence by Nelly, the warlight falling on the two young people's faces undeniably symbolizes the positivevolution which from now on will characterize both their hearts and their minds.

References

' Richard Chase, 'The Brontes: A Centennial Observ ance', in The Brontes: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. byI G (E l dCliff P i H ll 1970 1986) 19 33 (P 3^)


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C H I L D H O O D A N D I N N O C E N C E I N WUTHERING HEIGHTS 215

^ Wuthering Heights, book ii, chapter ii, p. \66. Page numbers refer to tbe Penguin edition of zooo edited by PaulineNestor.^ Wuthering Heights, i, xii, 1Z4.* Do rotby Van G ben t, The English Novel: Form and Function (New York, 1958), p. 158.^ Wuthering Heights, \, ill, 25.' Wuthering Heights, 1, v, 41 .' Wuthering Heights, 1, ix, 80.* Wuthering Heights, I, IX, 80.' Wuthering Heights, 1, ix, 80.

'" Wuthering Heights, i , x i i , iz i -zz ." Wuthering Heights, 1, xii, i zo .'^ Pauline Nestor, 'Introduction' to Wuthering Heights, p. xvii" Wuthering Heights, 1, ix, 78." Wuthering Heights, 1, ix, 80." Lacan defines tbe idealization of self tbus: 'C 'est cette image qui se fixe, moi ideal, du point oil le sujet s'arretecomnie ideal du moi. Le moi est des lors fonction de mattrise, jeu de prestance, rivalite constituce', Jacques Lacan,Ecrits I-ll (Paris : Seuil, T966\ 1971; 1999) , 11, p. 289'* Nestor, p. xvii. Lacan, 1, p. 95." Wuthering Heights, i, xii, izo." Wuthering Heights, i, xii , izz.^ Wuthering Heights, i, ix, 8o-8z.^' Wuthering Heights, 1, XIV,15Z." Wuthering Heights, 11, xvii, z


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childhood and innocence

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