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浅析《呼啸山庄》主要人物的创作模型(1)学毕

2013-09-07 01:05

[Abstract] Wuthering Heights is the unique remarkable novel written by Emily Brontë, who is one of the most famous novelists of the 19th century in English Literature. It is considered as a powerful and strange book. The author seizes primary images and enters into the savage field of spirits by her poetic imagination, showing us the conflicts between the keen heart-storm and the savage wilderness. Compared with other works, the heroes and heroines in the book are different in their stubborn and rebellious personalities. This paper has analyzed the creation models of Catherine, Heathcliff and Hindley, the protagonists in Wuthering Heights. It concentrates on two aspects: one is from the author’s personality, life experience and living environment to analyze Catherine and Hindley. It points out that the creation of Catherine Earnshaw comes from the author Emily Brontë herself, and her brother Branwell is the creation model of Hindley. The other one is through the approach of Archetypal Criticism, concentrating on a comparative analysis between Heathcliff and Medea in Greek myth Medea. Based on detailed analysis, it draws the conclusion that both Heathcliff’s and Medea’s revenge is the result of hatred and the loss of love and that Heathcliff is a “displacement” of Medea. This paper aims at digging out some hidden implications in the novel from a new and different perspective to provide the reader with more enlightenment and speculation and at the same time helping the reader get a deeper understanding of Emily Brontë.
[Key words] Emily Brontë; Catherine; Heathcliff; Hindley; archetype; creation models of main characters

【摘 要】 《呼啸山庄》是英国十九世纪著名小说家艾米莉·勃朗特的唯一一部长篇小说，被西方评论家视为维多利亚时代最伟大的作品之一,同时奠定了作者在英国文学史以及世界文学史上的地位。《呼啸山庄》弥漫着一种既暴烈又多变，既真实又荒诞，既狂热又冷酷的奇特氛围。本文一方面从艾米莉·勃朗特的生活环境、个性特征和生活经历方面出发，指出《呼啸山庄》中凯瑟琳·恩肖的人物形象的创作灵感来源于作者艾米莉·勃朗特本人，辛德雷·恩肖这个人物形象的创作模型则是其兄布兰威尔，以此试图从一个新的角度挖掘出《呼啸山庄》中尚未被挖掘的一些新的意蕴和内涵，使读者对艾米莉·勃朗特更深刻、更透彻的了解；另一方面，用希腊神话中描述的爱的原形对比研究，展示了希刺克利夫桀骜不驯的性格，异乎寻常的爱、恨和复仇意识，提出了希刺克利夫就是希腊神话《美狄亚》中美狄亚的“移用”。艾米莉·勃朗特以诗人敏锐独特的想象，紧扣住大自然中的原始意象，把笔触伸入到了人物灵魂层面中的野性空间，向人们展示了那足以席卷一切的心灵风暴。

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【关键词】 艾米莉·勃朗特；凯瑟琳；希刺克利夫；辛德雷；原型；人物创作模型

1. ccIntroduction
1.1 Emily Brontë’s life experience
Emily Brontë (1818--1848), novelist and poet, is one of the most famous representatives of the 19th century in English literature. Brontë sisters, Emily Brontë, Charlotte Brontë and Anne Brontë are the exotic flowers in literary field of 19th century England. Emily is born in Thornton of Yorkshire and grows up in Haworth, a village in north of England. Emily Brontë is first a poet. Her character and genius are shaped by the influence of her father. Patrick Brontë, the father, is of Irish stock and is known for his picturesque, free flowing speech, poetry and imagination. She is born a quiet girl, unsociable and uncommunicative, yet her inner heart is filled with passion, which can be seen in her poetry and novel. The English poet and critic, Matthew Arnold, says: “Her (Emily) extraordinary passion, feverish feelings, gloominess and boldness are incomparable after Byron.”[1] And Virginia Woolf writes in her book Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights: “When Charlotte composes, she declares with eloquence, brilliance and passion that ‘I love’, ‘I hate’ and ‘I suffer’. But in Wuthering Heights, Emily looks forward to the world, by the hero’s mouth, she says not only ‘I love’ or ‘I hate’, but also ‘we, all the human beings’ and ‘you, the eternal power…’”[2] Emily is chiefly remembered as the author of the powerful novel, Wuthering Heights. The novel describes the characters and environment of her native countryside, on the moors of north England. She enters her living conditions and her experiences as well as her individuality such as melancholy, passionate and eloquent into the works. Emily Brontë is good at seizing primary images and entering into the savagery field of spirits by her poetic imagination. She shows us the conflicts between the keen heart-storm and the factitious wilderness. Virginia Woolf also remarks: “Wuthering Heights is more different to understand than Jane Eyre, because Emily is a greater novelist than Charlotte.”[3] 大学排名
1.2 The publication of Wuthering Heights
Emily Brontë’s unique remarkable novel Wuthering Heights establishes her literary position. It is remarked as “the most peculiar novel”, [4] and some of critics think of it as “Sphinx of literary history”, [5] which is full of vigor and fierceness, leading readers into a world brimming with hatred and love, evil and kindness, weakness and stubbornness. However, at the beginning of its publication, it was not well received by the reading public, many of whom condemned it as sordid, vulgar, and unnatural—and author Emily Brontë went to her grave in 1848 believing that her novel was a failure. It was not until 1850, when Wuthering Heights received a second printing with an introduction by Emily’s sister Charlotte, that it attracted a wide readership. And now it is widely recognized as one of the greatest novels of English literature. Ralph Fox, the revolutionary critic of England writes: “Wuthering Heights is beyond all doubt one of the most extraordinary books which human genius has ever produced.” [6] He regards it as the three greatest books of that age, “and the writer of the future will acknowledge them as his inspiration when he attempts the task of conquering reality”. [7]
Today, the novel is still heatedly discussed, some on the main characters’ destiny, some on the theme of Heathcliff’s revenge and some on the tragedy of Heathcliff and Catherine. This article deals with the creation models of main characters in Wuthering Heights. According to Jung, the contents of human psychology are essentially experienced, which can be displayed both by personal behaviors and psychological activities and by superstition, myth, religion and philosophy. [8] On one hand, the author’s personal experience plays an important part to help create the typical characters; on the other hand, the Greek myth provides the archetype to portray the characters. This paper divides five parts: introduction, an analysis of the creation of three main characters, Catherine, Heathcliff and Hindley, and the last part conclusion. 

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2.Catherine Earnshaw and Emily Brontë
The novel written by Emily is portrayed true to Victoria life which she is familiar with, it can be regarded as the real life of her own. “Wuthering Heights probably contains some factor of satisfying a long-cherished wish and imaginary life activities.” [9] Catherine molded by her is extremely the same as herself. Both of they experience the same living conditions which influence the shape of their personalities: stubborn and rebellious and their weak side of personalities brings about the tragic fate.
2.1 Living conditions
Emily and Catherine have shaped the same personality by the influence of living conditions. Emily lives in Haworth, which is a village of small, gray house on the side of a hill in the worth of England. To the west it is the boundless and uninhabited moors, not living plants but heather growing disorderly. Such living environment can be seen in Wuthering Heights. The environment plays an important role in creating the uniqueness of Emily Brontë and Catherine she creates. “She describes life according to the severe land she grows up and the more severe people of this land.”[10] Charlotte Brontë explained it in the book The Republication of Wuthering Heights: “It is imbued with local color. It enriches in wild nature, like the roots of heather. It adapts the nature because Emily Brontë was born and grew up on the moor, and she was nurtured by the moor.”[11] She experiences the bondless swamp and wilderness of Yorkshire and writes them in the imaginaries of her novel, where she grasps the primitive images of the nature with her sharp eyes to create the lifelike, feverish and amazing atmosphere. Undoubtedly, Wuthering Heights features the wilderness and windstorm. “The greatness and profoundness of Emily can only be built up by the cruel, lofty, gloomy and desolate land and sky of Yorkshire.” [12] At the beginning of the novel, Emily Brontë purposefully dates the story at the time so close to her, arranges the setting in the North, where she lives and which she is familiar with. “Wuthering” is a “significant provincial adjective, descriptive of the atmosphere tumult to which its station is expressed in stormy weather.” [13] Both are the moors, which have the same weather conditions, “The power of the north wind blowing over the edge, by the excessive slant of a few stunted firs at the end of the house; and by a range of gaunt thorns all stretching their limbs one way, as if craving alms of the sun.” [14] Such environment of the wilderness in the story reminds us of Harworth moor. The remote and gloomy atmosphere influences Emily Brontë. She is a desolate and lonely girl, always walking on the moors to spend time. Self-abased, introverted and melancholy as she is, she is not good at communicating with others, unwilling to live with others and keeping pretty much to herself. However, Emily Brontë longs for love and she pays more enthusiasm to social movement and is strongly opposed to formal religion. The features of moors shape her a willful, savage and stubborn individuality. She puts all the personalities into Catherine.

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Catherine comes from a high-society family, who, as a child, could ride any horse in the stable, and in later years “rides roughshod” over everyone who tries to stand in her way. [15] “Her spirits were always at high-water mark, her tongue always going-singing, laughing and plaguing everybody who would not do the same. A wild, wick ship she was.” [16] She loves freedom, not constrained by the oppressive forces. She is a strong-minded, domineering girl. Just before his death, old Earnshaw’s only worry is, “Cathy, why can’t you be a good girl?” What kind of girl does her father want to be? He wants her to be an angelic girl—a gentle, obedient daughter. At this the rebellious Catherine mocks, “Why can’t you be a good father?” Emily here implies it is not “I” that “am not a good girl”, but “you”, Mr. Earnshaw, the authority of Wuthering Heights that is not a good father. “you”, the father should not confine “me” to the household and try to shape “me” more freedom, allow “me” to show “my” true nature, to do “singing and going”.[17] After the death of Mr. Earnshaw, she is ill-treated by her brother, Hindley, without getting a little warmth of the family. She is often punished standing at the cover of wall and is not allowed to eat. She is not allowed to be with Heathcliff. Yet the more he oppresses, the more eagerly she would rebel. Her nature calls her to grow up as rude as savage in order to live a free life. For Catherine and Heathcliff, it is one of the chief amusement to run away in the moors in the morning and remain her all day”.
Emily Brontë lives in the village of Haworth; she is influenced by the people there, who are blunt, stubborn, vigorous, rude, harsh and brutal. “Hear all, see all and say nothing. Eat all, drink all and play nothing.”[18] This is the Yorkshire creed that embodies deeply in its people’s soul. It is these moors that exalt the spirit of Emily Brontë and shapes her stubborn character. She looks motionless in her appearance but her inner world is sensitive and unyielding. She is a girl of few words, and she is apt to be gloomy, depressed, inwardly angry and stubborn because of her introverted personality. Mrs. Elizabeth Cleghorn Caskell writes in Life of Charlotte Brontë: “Once her favourite dog broke the pastor housing rules and slept on the bed, and she was angry and bit the dog with naked fists.” [19] Just as Charlotte says in her letters: “ The unyielding charm and plain personality join together in Emily. Her innocent feelings and openhearted attitude hide the determined character and ranging flames, which is enough to encourage heroes and boil their blood.”[20] Emily Brontë transfers her true nature to Catherine, especially her extraordinarily rebellious personality.
2.2 Personalities
 From Emily Brontë, we can see the shadow of Catherine who is brave, strongwilled and more important, rebellious.
Although Catherine was born in a noble family, yet she falls in love with Heathcliff without any fear. Heathcliff is a waif picked up by Mr. Earnshaw. He is a dark-skinned gipsy, “as dark almost as if came from the devil”. [21] He is not welcome in Wuthering Heights even the maid Helly hates him. But Catherine shows happiness and sympathy with him and they played innocently together. “She was much too fond of Heathcliff. The greatest punishment we could invent for her was to keep her separate from him: yet she got childed more than any of us on his account.” [22] Says Nelly. She loves Heathcliff heartily, to her, Heathcliff is innermost herself. When we talk about Catherine’s love betrayal to Heathcliff, we can’t condemn her any way. She knows it is false to marry Edgar: “ In whichever place the soul lives. In my soul and in my heart, I’m convinced I’m wrong!” [23] She devotes all her painstaking efforts into her love to Heathcliff. It is not Edgar is “handsome, pleasant to be with”, “young and cheerful” [24] that she marries him, but she says if she marries Linton, she can aid Heathcliff to rise, and place him out of her brother’s power. She knows her love for Edgar will change, while her love for Heathcliff will remain firm, which she acknowledges from her heart:
“ My great miseries in this world have been Heathcliff’s miseries, and I watched and felt each from the beginning; my great thought in living is himself. If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be, and if all else remained and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stronger. I should not seem a part of it. My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods. Time will change it, I’m well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath—a source of little visible delight, but necessary. Nelly, I am Heathcliff!” [25] Heathcliff is part of her, representing her innermost self, yearning for freedom. By choosing Edgar for her husband and rushing into the arms of the Grange, Catherine sacrifices her true love. In Grange she suffers a lot, she “has been concerted, at a stroke, into Mrs. Linton, the lady of the Grange, and the wife of a stranger; an exile, an outcast, therefore, from what had been my world. You may fancy a glimpse of the abyss where I groveled.” [26] She considers her whole life—the seven years under oppressed patriarchal society as a blank and she loses her freedom. Though Catherine dies, but what she remains to the reader is admiration and veneration. One shows admiration and veneration to her because her willful nature sounds stranger than ever. She dares to love whom she loves and she dares to seek for freedom that she yearns for. Like Catherine, Emily Brontë has the same rebellious personality and indomitable spirit. Her poem shows her these qualities: （科教作文网http://zw.ΝsΕAc.Com编辑整理）
“No coward soul is mine,
No tremble in the world’s storm-troubled sphere;
I see Heaven’s glories shine,
And faith shine equal, arming me from fear.”[27]
“Stronger than a man, simpler than a child, her nature stood alone.” [28] Her sister Charlotte Brontë uses this word to describe her. Her strong will and acting of her own way would never shrinks from being opposed and difficulties. She is favor of the heathers on the moors and venerates the precipice. The heathers and cliffs are the symbols of her real personality. Mrs. Caskell writes another occasion in Life of Charlotte Brontë: “Emily was bit by the wild dog which she took in. Realizing that she may suffer from the insidious danger of hydrophobia, she ran to the kitchen, using the heated soldering iron to burn the wound.” [29]
2.3 Tragedy destiny
The weak side of their characters brings about the tragedy destiny. At Victorian times, marriage is well-matched in social and economic status. Catherine cannot get rid of the old traditional trammels, though she loves Heathcliff deeply. She is seduced by the refined and tranquil Thrushcross Grange. Her visit to the Grange preludes the tragedy of their love. Looking through the window of the Grange, Catherine sees a world completely different from the bleak and deckling Heights. It is an attractive place, possessing everything that Heathcliff doesn’t have—social position, wealth and comfortable life. She decides to marry Edgar Linton, because she wants “to be the greatest woman of the neighborhood.’’ [30] In fact, choosing Edgar, she is deliberately false to her own world, just as what Heathcliff comments: an oak is planted in a flowerpot. So when Heathcliff returns, she is eager to feel the value of her existence in him. She tries to reconcile her feeling with what Linton represents, but the two sides can’t be reconciled at all. She can’t bear such suffering, falls in ill and never recovers.
Catherine dies at the birth of her daughter Cathy and Emily Brontë, the creator of Catherine, dies at the age of thirty. Emily Brontë is born an introverted girl, just as Charlotte Brontë says: “My sister (Emily) was born unsociable, and the environment made her tend to be desolate and aloof. She almost stayed at home all day long unless she went to the church or walked on the moors.” [31] Meanwhile, she suffers from the death of her aunt and brother, and she herself is on a bad health condition, all of which leave the dark side of her heart and bring her tragedy fate as Catherine: dies in her youthful years. 内容来自www.nseac.com
In a word, Catherine is a vivid and lifelike Emily. Catherine’s marriage reflects that Emily’s inner world: she can’t avoid the tragedy of losing freedom. The grief that Catherine feels after she becomes Mrs. Linton is just like Emily’s grief of losing freedom. Emily puts her true self into Catherine, to whom she devotes all her vehement passions, fanatical love and unyielding rebellion. It may say Catherine is Emily’s true self and the external image of her mental sense.

 

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