“Bronte’s Bible of Hell” Reflection
In “Looking Oppositely: Emily Bronte’s Bible of Hell,” Sandra Gilbert explains that family and upbringing significantly impacted The Bronte sisters’ literary work, explaining that “...the four young inhabitants of Haworth Parsonage began producing extended narratives at an early age.” She supports this by comparing Mary Shelley to the Bronte sisters, stating that like Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, they all lost their mother at a young age and lived their lives as women in a patriarchal society, leading to their creation of Gothic novels that uncover various societal flaws. As Gilbert points out, both Wuthering Heights and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein possesses “forces and beings” and supernatural elements The Creature in Frankenstein and the ghost of Catherine both torment their creators, or, in Catherine’s case, her ‘other half,’ Heathcliff. However, she fails to draw beyond the parallels. Wuthering Heights ends on a seemingly less tragic note. Cathy and Hareton, the reincarnations of Heathcliff and Catherine, end up marrying each other and ending the tragic cycle of love, heartbreak, and revenge.…show more content… Heathcliff represents the devil, and Catherine plays the role of the outcast, much like “Adam, Eve, and Satan” while trying to find her own identity as a woman fascinated with “the state of being patriarchal Christianity calls “hell: is eternally, energetically delightful.” Further interpretation of Gilbert’s analysis of the novel’s biblical references prompts the idea that a woman’s lack of obedience to the class structure and to her feminine roles made her sinful and that her value as a Christian woman depended on the men whom she had ties with, both in the overworld and underworld. Her role obligated her to marry the righteous Edgar instead of the devilish Heathcliff, and live a proper life as a respectable, well-to-do
