Wuthering Heights; the Superego and the Crashout

Marriage – a socially and legally accepted union between two people. 

Many in our day would agree that by nature marriage should involve a deep emotional connection - 'love'

However, in the Victorian era, marriage was seen as little more than a means by which people would earn a higher social standing and/or families would become allies or settle disputes – more of a political tool than anything else. 

Wuthering Heights, published in 1847 by Emily Brontë, one of the famed Brontë sisters, under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, addresses some of the issues with the Victorian understanding of love and marriage and the way society made people internalise it, utilising aspects of psychoanalysis as well as depictions of problematic dynamics and character traits that arise from Victorian society. 

The Plot

Wuthering heights regards the often dark and disturbing history of two households in the English countryside and the relationships between the people living in them, recounted by people like Nelly Dean, a maid under employment at Thrushcross Grange, to the current tenant, one Mr. Lockwood. Given particular focus is the love triangle between Heathcliff, Edgar Linton and Catherine Earnshaw - a dynamic which has consequences for even the following generation.

One way to read the story according to many literary critics focusing on a psychological perspective, is to see the three focal characters Heathcliff, Edgar and Catherine, as different aspects of a human psyche according to Sigmund Freud – the id, superego and ego respectively. Freud's theories came about after the book's publication, but the opposition between one's desire to conform to society or behave instinctually and impulsively would have been felt by many at the time.

The Superego and Edgar Linton

The superego refers to the part of the psyche which influences the person to adhere to social expectations internalised in early development. 

Edgar is the son of a wealthy family, and was raised from a young age to follow social convention, developing into what one would expect of a Victorian gentleman. 

Hence, Catherine and Edgar’s romance symbolically represents Catherine’s superego pulling her to find fulfilment in societal conventions.

The Id

The id represents one’s unfiltered instinct – all of a person’s natural impulses given name. In other words, the antithesis of the superego.

 It is important to note that the id would drive a person to pursue marriage for love, and the superego for social status and with regard to social conventions. 

Heathcliff was found on the streets of Liverpool by Catherine’s father, a Mr. Earnshaw. 

Mr. Earnshaw’s son and Catherine’s elder brother Hindley during their childhood was jealous of Mr. Earnshaw’s affections towards Heathcliff  (when recounting the Earnshaw family history, Ellen Dean describes Heathcliff as Mr. Earnshaw’s ‘favourite child’). Hindley, feeling that Heathcliff had ‘usurped him’ of his position as his father’s son, became the next authority figure in the family, and treated Heathcliff more as a lowly servant rather than a son of the Earnshaws, leaving him dirty and making him sleep with the servants, denying him an education, etc. 

Perhaps symbolically this repression of Heathcliff represents society’s repression of the id. 

As a result, Heathcliff developed into one who was less concerned with societal norms and conventions – uncivilised and so unrepressed, a perfect foil for Edgar. 

In his childhood, he was often depicted cursing and running about, generally disregarding his manners and behaving impulsively. Later on in the story, after the death of Catherine Earnshaw, he crashes out so hard that his wife and Edgar’s sister Isabella questions whether he is actually a human or a devil.

The Ego and Catherine Earnshaw 

The ego is the aspect which balances the influences of the superego and the id, deciding the person’s actions according to every situation. 

Catherine’s narrative revolves around her relationships with Edgar and Heathcliff, the superego and id. When she is with Edgar, she becomes socially aware and is prideful of her social status, but during her time with Heathcliff, she disregards all that stuff and does what she wants.

so, her inclination toward one of them over another as the ego represents her ego quelling the influence of one in favour of another, e.g. repressing her impulses to follow convention, and vice versa.

Catherine, Heathcliff, and the influence of the Id

Catherine and Heathcliff quickly became friends following Heathcliff’s adoption. The two would often be seen together, rebelling against the adults and scampering around the moors; behaviours which can be attributed to the influence of the id – acts chasing fun rather than necessarily fulfilling social convention.

Catherine, Frances and the Lintons (possible band name? Ok maybe not) and influence of Superego

Catherine ends up staying at her neighbours, the Lintons' residence to recover from an injury. Frances, Catherine’s sister-in-law and Hindley’s wife, disapproved of Catherine’s wild behaviour and friendship with Heathcliff, but realised she would never be able to control her through force. So instead, she and the Lintons use flattery to raise her desire to be part of high society. 

It is here that Catherine is manipulated to  internalise the mannerisms and behaviours that society expects her to conform to.

Heathcliff vs Edgar

The height of the conflict between Catherine’s feelings for Edgar and Heathcliff are displayed through her conversation with Ellen Dean, a servant who once worked at Wuthering Heights, and is during the time she is telling this history as the narrator, employed at Thrushcross Grange. 

Nelly asks her why she loves Edgar, to which Catherine replies only with superficial reasons such as his wealth and his youth – superficial factors, which, as she says herself, is such ‘like the foliage in the woods; time will change it, as winter changes the trees’.

She admits that her love for Edgar is not as great as her love for Heathcliff – and yet she claims, it would ‘degrade’ her to marry him. 

She now sees herself as in a higher class, and  believes it would be inappropriate for her to be with Heathcliff, for whom she is out of his league in society.

Although if disregarding social status she would have chosen Heathcliff, her adherence to social expectations and pride in being accepted by high society denies her relationship with the person she truly loves. 

It is shown clearly that her marriage with Edgar is the culmination of her superego’s influence – the prideful belief that she is of high social standing that Frances and the Lintons so carefully cultivated in her leads her to marry for social status and forget Heathcliff.

Her choosing of Linton both symbolically and functionally is her forsaking her id and instead pursuing happiness through the pride she was made to enjoy which comes with social convention and the status which follows it.

This imbalance between the influence of the id and the superego, pursuing social standing and letting go of gratification and fun – this is how marriage often was in the Victorian period. 

Brontë, in her portrayal of Catherine’s life after her marriage to Edgar Linton, shows us the reality of such a dynamic in an unflattering light. 

Catherine moves into Thrushcross Grange. Despite her previous eagerness to marry Edgar, she expostulates about her life there, and speaks longingly about dreams where she is back in her chambers at Wuthering Heights. 

Albeit at a time of great disagreement with her husband, she calls herself ‘the wife of a stranger’. She laments how she feels trapped, and wants to go back to how she was before the Lintons – ‘half savage, and hardy and free’, forsaking the superego and embracing her id.

What is Brontë trying to say? (Hey that rhymes!) 

This isn’t to say that Brontë completely romanticises every aspect of the concept of the id. Heathcliff’s crashout following Catherine’s death and his general disregard for the people around him is evidence enough. However, she does seem to be criticising the way social expectations regarding class and marriage were internalised in Victorian children during their development. Social status is sought after by one’s desire to conform to societal norms, and passion and love are controlled by the pure and natural mind. Victorian society repressed the latter and consequently in many cases marriage for love, which was in the end the cause for the tragedy of Wuthering Heights.

WC: 1364