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Values And Morality In Catherine Earnshaw's Wuthering Heights

1540 Words7 Pages

These values and morals of Victorian age was showed in Great Exhibition and they also included conservatism, hard labor, prohibitions of mentioning about sex, hypocrisy and patriarchal values. There was a competition with these values to upgrade a class and maintain life prosperiously since being respected and having inheritance that also brings reputation were extremely important for the Victorians. Therefore, arranged marriages and social class mobility are frequently seen as a phenomenon in nineteenth century England. In novel, Catherine Earnshaw’s marriage is one of these to change her class that can also be called as upward class mobility. She married up with Edgar Linton even though she loves Heathcliff inwardly. She admits this situation to Nelly, their servant, and nurse in Wuthering Heights like this: “I’ve no more business to marry Edgar Linton than I have to be in heaven; and if the wicked man in there had not brought Heathcliff so low, I shouldn’t have thought of it. It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now” (Brontë 71). When Heathcliff hears this conversation he leaves Wuthering Heights and does not come back for three years. After he comes back, he is a wealthy. He also upgrades his class to get marry with Catherine. He wants to be as rich as Edgar Linton is and destroys the class distinction between them. Furthermore, this class distinction that Heathcliff tries to destroy is quite visible. Even the names of their homes reveals this. Wuthering Heights

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