Lockwood is the first narrator of Wuthering Heights, so the reader relies upon his perception of surrounding characters setting and events that take place early in the novel to get a footing into the story. In many ways Lockwood's attitudes and the way in which he understands these events settings and characters of the novel are greatly affected by his personality and social class. The way in which he is very quick to make poor judgements of characters (including himself), his cultured, polite and civil social class and his violent flipside are all elements that affect his attitudes. .
In the opening scenes prior to his meeting with Heathcliff Lockwood comes across as quite a cultured, polite gentleman and makes a connection between him and Heathcliff by stating he is a "capital fellow" and claims that both he and Heathcliff are both misanthropes. As the reader learns not too long afterwards, Lockwood couldn't have painted a more wrong picture, almost everything he said can be discarded and it is from this point on that Lockwood's account of everything that he has seen and the judgements he has consequently made are unreliable even though he is a main narrator. Lockwood comes across as a vain and somewhat shallow man and his reliability as a conveyer of facts can be immediately questioned. Lockwood makes the assumption that Heathcliff is a gentleman in a house full of servants for instance, whereas it is made apparent to the reader that he is a rough and cruel man in a house full of dogs, he is even described as being "rough as a saw edge, and as hard as whinstone!" Not only does Lockwood make a poor judgement of Heathcliff, he also makes poor judgement of himself saying that he is a misanthrope and alleges that he is a romantic hero. If Lockwood were a misanthrope he wouldn't have gone out of his way to go and see Heathcliff and he certainly wouldn't have taken it upon himself to return to Wuthering Heights the following day, especially after such an unwelcoming visit.
