Heathcliff the Outsider
Wuthering Heights and Human Dignity
By Dafne Adıgüzel, Belce Bilgici, Fatma Pulat
Written by Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights revolves around Heathcliff, an orphan boy whose place in the family is later reduced to the status of a servant. After fleeing away when the domestic conditions get tougher and the woman he loves marries another, he returns to seek vengeance on those he holds responsible. Victorian England had a convenient setting for writing on discrimination based on social class and race. Bronte masterfully characterized Heathcliff to invoke discrimination: he is an orphaned lost boy with no knowledge of his origins, deplored by all members of the house including the housekeeper. He is also discriminated against because of his complexion. Although Bronte does not provide adequate information to determine Heathcliff’s race accurately, it is clear from many passages that he belongs to a different race than the other characters. It is possible to claim that Heathcliff even desires to be “more” white in order to be accepted by the rest and hence respected. The typical stigmatizations in the 19th century were based on differences regarding people’s social class, race and gender, and many did not believe in the equality among humans. The lack of equality highly impacts and shapes Heathcliff’s vengeful lifestyle and his hatred towards life in general. The adverse treatment Heathcliff receives at his house indicates that he was not properly respected: he was brutalized by Hindley and degraded by almost everyone around him. Wuthering Heights depicts a society where people may be humiliated because of the things they cannot change such as their skin color, race, or ethnicity. Through Heathcliff, we are reminded that discrimination creates a chaotic social structure where individual peace and mental health is hard to maintain. At the end of the novel, Heathcliff, the outsider, “dark” skinned boy, goes against social norms and prejudices, becoming wealthy and carving out his own place as an equal. However, he becomes successful only through repeating the same immoral attitudes he learnedand received throughout his life, which should come as no surprise. He climbs up the social-class ladder and becomes a “respectable” man without respecting human dignity. The sole reason he is recognized as a respectable man is his wealth. But can a man be still perceived as respectable if he holds no respect for humans? One can only hope that in our present time, having discriminatory attitudes towards others and not holding human dignity dear would make it very hard for anyone to be considered a respectable member of society.
