Childhood In Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

Although Wuthering Heights is not a novel about childhood, it narrates the evolution of two generations of children. During the 19th century childhood became a recurrent theme, because during that period arose an awareness about infancy, in many cases denouncing the terrible situation of children, especially in the cities. But living in Romanticism, Emily Bronte was also conscious about children´s situation, as the few poems she left reflect. Thus, in Wuthering Heights, childhood has also a strong presence; however there are two important differences in respect to other approaches during the 19th century: on one hand, it is located in the country – far from the satanic mills of the cities. And on the other hand, children in Wuthering Heights

From presenting them as innocent children, Emily Bronte uses nature to depict wild characters trapped into their infancy by savage passions. Thus, the first appearance of a child in the novel, Catherine Earnshaw, in the form of a ghost who wants to come into the house. (20) is surrounded by a snow storm with a gelid wind. This introduction of the character reveals the connection between her and Nature, the same as Heathcliff, in a similar manner, as Nelly tells, they were only happy in the moors, (40.) and both of them are connected with the extreme weather and the wildness of the landscape (…). Furthermore, the lack of adult references, since the premature death of the mother and the distant figure of a strict father (36), makes it possible that far from being educated, the children in Wuthering Heights grow up surrounding by wilderness and as a result their characters are as reflection of those wild elements. Therefore, passionate characters connected with natural elements such as the wild love between Catherine and Heathcliff (….) and even on her death bed Catherine asks return to the moors, in a desperately searching for her lost child-identity. Consequently, children are presented as savage beings abandoned to their nature and far to be tamed. Only the second generation (Cathy and Hareton) will be tamed and overpass the savage of the childhood by the influence of instruction so, although Cathy reveals to be a second version of her mother (Seichepine 213), she can be tamed by the books since books bring civilization and domestication and give them the opportunity to grow up and to be rescued from wildness. In other words, Emily Bronte in Wuthering Heights depicts childhood in a romantic way, as they are trapped in a savage state and in their raw behaviour which far from producing rejection, catches the reader creating a deep