Marxist Reading of Wuthering Heights

Emily Bronte’s Victorian novel, Wuthering Heights has formed four critical analysis perspectives: psychoanalytic, Marxist, feminist, and cultural studies. Despite these varying literary criticisms, I feel that the Marxist outlook is the most valid of the four. According to Marxists, literature itself, is a social establishment that has a distinct ideological function, based on the background and ideology of the author. In essence, Wuthering Heights is an ideal representation of this type of criticism.

       Bronte used her novel as a presentation of the lack of rights women had at the time, as well as a social assessment on the belittlement of the rich towards the poor. Heathcliff, was a character that served as a stimulus for both ideologies Bronte illustrated in her novel. Beyond these two ideologies, Heathcliff embodied the three main principles of Karl Marx’s theories — Economic Determinism, Dialectical Materialism and Class Struggle throughout the entity of the novel.

 

        It was evident that Heathcliff, despite being taken care of by the Earnshaws, was completely an outsider. He’s constantly being reminded of his essential qualities that are different from everyone else around him. The difference in physical features is also the cause of his class rank and social status. These elements push Heathcliff to assimilate with his encompassing culture and push him even further into learning how he can make the twisted society operate in his favor. He used all of his knowledge and experience with social class to his advantage to alter himself in such a way that brought on a large amount personal success. 

          Marx believed that Economic Determinism, Dialectical Materialism and Class Struggle were three of the most vital principles that illustrated his theories. Wuthering Heights represents these three factors to perfection. Heathcliff displays economic determinism by adapting to the social culture of his enemies for his own benefit. By accomplishing this, he eventually takes over Wuthering Heights as well as Thrushcross Grange. The way society sees the world functioning during that era is, by social classes, a crucial principle in Marx’s beliefs. Everyone determines their self worth by their social status. Heathcliff uses dialectical materialism by recognizing this, and understands the reality that he is an outsider. 

         Heathcliff here symbolizes an individual with absolutely no class at all, yet by the end of the novel he rises above the rest of the society. Marxist criticism is based on social and dialectic theories, and here we can see an illustration of how Heathcliff, an outsider, assimilated to his surroundings in order to succeed, then took his adopted culture, turned it around and sought revenge on those who treated him wrongly.