In the story, Withering Heightes, by Charlotte Bronte, the characters weave together to provide a picture of the culture of 1947, as influenced by the economic system of the time. As critics before have noted, Withering Heightes is steeply infused with a dramatic sense of class and place. There's Joseph, the stable boy, who speaks in the idom of the day and curses the women of his own station for their witchery. The two Catherines, unable to inherit through legal means, and thus without real money of their own, use their sex as currency to buy positions of greater value. As Terry Eaglton has noted in his siminary work on the subject, the story ends with Catherine Earnshow and Hindley reclaiming their rightful place as masters of both lots of land haunting the moors. To fully understand sex and rank in this barren landscape, I'd like to examine the characters of Catherine Earnshaw and Nelly Sue, the narrator.
Catherine Earnshaw grows up in a wealthy family that tends the lands of the moors. As a girl, she isn't expected to do any work on the land, except to be a pretty young thing who keeps her father happy and holds the promise of marrying into a family of higher rank, thus bringing her own families star a bit higher. When the orphan Heathcliff arrives at Withering Heightes, she falls in love with him instantly. His difference from the other characters makes him unreal and almost doll-like to her. In her childish narcissism, she's the one who takes care of him by reminding him to keep clean and to keep up with his studies if he wants to make it in the cut-throat world without an inheritance. Heathcliff, the poor thing, cannot help but love Cathy and her pretty curls as she's the only one who treats him like a human being.
