The Sublimation and Repression

Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights is a tale in which “two households, both alike in dignity” have conflicts which cause “civil blood” to make “civil hands unclean.” In her one novel she encapsulates both the harshness and the beauty of the Yorkshire moors, using it, not only as a background, but also as a central image of the passions and thwarted longings of the characters in Wuthering Heights. The human patterns, which reoccur in Wuthering …

…often portrays the more civilized characters as despicably weak and silly. This method of characterization prevents the novel from flattening out into a simple privileging of culture over nature, or vice versa. The setting is significant to the novel as it represents all the themes and juxtapositions of characters that are dealt with in Wuthering Heights. The elemental atmosphere that is created using the background of the moors enhances the novel's wild and savage nature.