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Here I sit on my 25th birthday, writing a critique of Wuthering Heights. One of the regular readers of my blog asked me to review it because she noticed some elements of humor in the story. I tried my best, but I could not see this humor. All I saw was despair, disbelief, and lots of confusion. Dear authors: please do not create several characters with the same name and then only refer to them by one name. It does not help the reader to follow your plot, when they can't tell which character you're talking about. (Read: Earnshaw and Catherine in this case.)
Many people argue that this is a hopeless romantic story, where Heathcliff is willing to go to whatever means necessary to gain the love of a woman. But the only word in that sentence that applies to this book is hopeless. Heathcliff is as neurotic as every other character in the book, if not moreso. We can look at individual characters (though I despair at doing so), and see just how "sane" they are. We have Heathcliff, who is set out on vengeance but ultimately gives up on it (and life) because of a single stroll in the wilderness after seeing a likeness in the eyes of the children. We have all of the female characters, who are completely whimsical (not funny, but following any whimsy that hits them). In particular, we follow young Cathy, who is only happy when she has a man to love her. It's not that she actually seeks enjoyment from them; she just wants someone to like her (and clearly, servants don't count). Several of the men are so weak that they can't even pursue a walk through the park without taking to bed for days. Joseph is a religious fanatic who, like Heathcliff, strives to make everyone's life miserable. That leaves the narrator and Nelly Dean (the pseudo-narrator). Even these two are unlikeable! Nelly is the biggest gossip in the entire story, willing to give up the families' stories at a minor suggestion by the narrator, who then gobbles up the entire story. This story he uses to taint his views of the permanent residents, hiding from Hareton and Cathy when he returns to visit. Not to mention his unwillingness to accept a reproach, when Heathcliff attempts to make him leave for the night at the beginning of the book. All-in-all, every single character has something at least unlikeable about them, but most character are completely despicable. I struggled through the entire book, seeking the humor that my friend asked me to seek, and unable to find anything but complete disdain for every character in the book. If Emily Brontë was trying to create a book in which you could like no one, she clearly succeeded; but I have a feeling that was not her intention at all.
As a parting thought, the entire time I was reading the book, I had a single thought in mind: This book is terrible. No wonder it is Bella's favorite book in Twilight. It is only slightly less morbid than she herself is (although I can see why she would relate to a completely co-dependent character like Cathy). Maybe I'll write more on that subject later, but it's my birthday and I'm done thinking about such horrible people.
