Wuthering Heights

Character List

Catherine Earnshaw

Mr. Earnshaw's daughter and Hindley's sister. She is also Heathcliff's foster sister and love interest. She marries Edgar Linton and has a daughter, also named Catherine. Catherine is beautiful and charming, but she is never as civilized as she pretends to be. In her heart she is always a wild girl playing on the moors with Heathcliff. She regards it as her right to be loved by all, and has an unruly temper. Heathcliff usually calls her Cathy; Edgar usually calls her Catherine.

Cathy Linton

The daughter of the older Catherine and Edgar Linton. She has all her mother's charm without her wildness, although she is by no means submissive and spiritless. Edgar calls her Cathy. She marries Linton Heathcliff to become Catherine Heathcliff, and then marries Hareton to be Catherine Earnshaw.

Mr. Earnshaw

A plain, fairly well-off farmer with few pretensions but a kind heart. He is a stern father to Catherine. He takes in Heathcliff despite his family's protests.

Edgar Linton

Isabella's older brother, who marries Catherine Earnshaw and fathers Catherine Linton. In contrast to Heathcliff, he is a gently bred, refined man, a patient husband and a loving father. His faults are a certain effeminacy, and a tendency to be cold and unforgiving when his dignity is hurt.

Ellen Dean

One of the main narrators. She has been a servant with the Earnshaws and the Lintons for all her life, and knows them better than anyone else. She is independent and high-spirited, and retains an objective viewpoint on those she serves. She is called Nelly by those who are on the most egalitarian terms with her: Mr. Earnshaw, the older Catherine, and Heathcliff.

Frances Earnshaw

Hindley's wife, a young woman of unknown background. She seems rather flighty and giddy to Ellen, and displays an irrational fear of death, which is explained when she dies of tuberculosis.

Hareton Earnshaw

The son of Hindley and Frances; he marries the younger Catherine. For most of the novel, he is rough, rustic, and uncultured, having been carefully kept from all civilizing influences by Heathcliff. He grows up to be superficially like Heathcliff, but is really much more sweet-tempered and forgiving. He never blames Heathcliff for having disinherited him, for example, and remains his oppressor's staunchest ally.

Hindley Earnshaw

The only son of Mr. and Mrs. Earnshaw, and Catherine's older brother. He is a bullying, discontented boy who grows up to be a violent alcoholic when his beloved wife, Frances, dies. He hates Heathcliff because he felt supplanted in his father's affections by the other boy, and Heathcliff hates him even more in return.

Heathcliff

A foundling taken in by Mr. Earnshaw and raised with his children. Of unknown descent, he represents wild and natural forces which often seem amoral and dangerous for society. His almost inhuman devotion to Catherine is the moving force in his life, seconded by his vindictive hatred for all those who stand between him and his beloved. He is cruel but magnificent in his consistency, and the reader can never forget that at the heart of the grown man lies the abandoned, hungry child of the streets of Liverpool.

Isabella Linton

Edgar's younger sister, who marries Heathcliff to become Isabella Heathcliff. Her son is named Linton Heathcliff. Before she marries Heathcliff, she is a rather shallow-minded young lady, pretty and quick-witted but a little foolish (as can be seen by her choice of husbands). Her unhappy marriage brings out an element of cruelty in her character: when her husband treats her brutally, she rapidly grows to hate him with all her heart.

Joseph

A household servant at Wuthering Heights who outlives all his masters. His brand of religion is unforgiving for others and self-serving for himself. His heavy Yorkshire accent gives flavor to the novel.

Dr. Kenneth

The local doctor who appears when people are sick or dying. He is a sympathetic and intelligent man, whose main concern is the health of his patients.

 

Mr. and Mrs. Linton

Edgar and Isabella's parents. They spoil their children and turn the older Catherine into a little lady, being above all concerned about good manners and behavior. They are unsympathetic to Heathcliff when he is a child.

Linton Heathcliff

The son of Heathcliff and Isabella. He combines the worst characteristics of both parents, and is effeminate, weakly, and cruel. He uses his status as an invalid to manipulate the tender-hearted younger Catherine. His father despises him. Linton marries Catherine and dies soon after.

Lockwood

The narrator of the novel. He is a gentleman from London, in distinct contrast to the other rural characters. He is not particularly sympathetic and tends to patronize his subjects.

Zillah

The housekeeper at Wuthering Heights after Hindley's death and before Heathcliff's. She doesn't particularly understand the people she lives with, and stands in marked contrast to Ellen, who is deeply invested in them. She is an impatient but capable woman.

Juno

Heathcliff's dog.

Skulker

The Lintons' bulldog. Skulker attacks Cathy Earnshaw on her first visit to Thrushcross Grange.

Michael

The Lintons' stable boy.

Mr. Green

A lawyer in Gimmerton who briefly becomes involved with executing Edgar Linton's estate.

  

Summary

Wuthering Heightsopens with Mr. Lockwood, a new tenant at Thrushcross Grange, writing in his diary about his visit to his landlord, Mr. Heathcliff. While entering Wuthering Heights, Lockwood notices but does not comment upon the date "1500" and the name "Hareton Earnshaw" above the principal door. Lockwood, an unwelcome guest, soon meets Joseph, a servant, and a pack of dogs that have overrun the farmhouse. Although he receives no encouragement from his host, Lockwood decides to make a return visit.

Analysis

Wuthering Heights opens with a date that signifies the setting as well as the form of the narrative. The present is 1801; however, the primary story line has taken place years ago. Most of the action in the novel occurs in Wuthering Heights, Thrushcross Grange, or the moors in between the two houses. All three locations are "completely removed from the stir of society," and each house symbolizes its habitants: Those at Wuthering Heights tend to be strong, wild, and passionate whereas those at Thrushcross Grange are passive, civilized, and calm. Heathcliff is the personification of Wuthering Heights.

Readers are introduced to Lockwood, an unreliable narrator who tries to make sense of his surroundings and his landlord. In doing so, his impressions provide readers with the first glimpse of Heathcliff, the main character. Lockwood's perceptions are simultaneously significant for the reader while being wholly inaccurate for himself as a character. For example, he mentions twice that Heathcliff does not extend a hand to him, yet Lockwood still considers Heathcliff a gentleman. Lockwood also notices that "grass grows up between the flags, and cattle are the only hedgecutters" but erroneously assumes that Heathcliff has a "whole establishment of domestics." At the close of the chapter, Lockwood recognizes that Heathcliff has no desire to see him again, yet he plans to visit again nonetheless. Lockwood draws comparisons between Heathcliff and himself, and the line "I have gained the reputation of deliberate heartlessness" foreshadows the telling of past heartless actions by Heathcliff.

Lockwood is clearly blind to the reality of the situation, although the extent of his misinterpretations is not fully realized. He is the first of many narrators to tell the story from a point of view that is neither omniscient nor unbiased. In Wuthering Heights, stories are often told within stories, with much of the information being revealed second-handed. Lockwood is an outsider who serves as the impetus for Nelly first to tell the story of Heathcliff and Catherine, and then to relate the story of their respective children.

In addition to Lockwood and Heathcliff, two servants are introduced in Chapter 1. The first is Joseph, an old man with a nasty disposition who has a sense of religious fanaticism; the other is only referred to as a "lusty dame" and is later identified as Zillah.

These characters are presented realistically, and other signs of realism are the depictions of the dogs and the details of the farmhouse furnishings. Brontë provides these kinds of details throughout the novel because having a sense of realism and authenticity is an important aspect of Wuthering Heights. Another important aspect is ownership of property, and even though the name "Hareton Earnshaw" is not explained, the family name plays an important part of Wuthering Heights. Because the opening chapter raises more questions than it answers, it serves as a hook to capture the attention of readers and encourage them to continue reading.

Wuthering Heights Summary

In Wuthering Heights, Catherine falls in love with Heathcliff, a boy her father adopts. Their love is doomed, and both eventually marry other people. Catherine dies in childbirth, and Heathcliff joins her in death after enacting his revenge upon the next generation.

Race/Class/Education - Throughout the novel characters are prejudged by their race, class or education. When Heathcliff is first introduced he is described as a dark skinned boy with dark hair, and because of this people are prejudiced against him. He is called a 'gypsy' numerous times, and the Lintons treat him badly and send him away from their house because of his appearance. Heathcliff also quickly dislikes his son because of his light skin and hair.
Class is also an issue. There was a class hierarchy in Bronte's England, and this can be seen in the novel as well. The residents of Wuthering Heights seem to be of a lower class than the Lintons at Thrushcross Grange. Even though she loves him, Catherine will not marry Heathcliff after he has been degraded, and instead marries into the rich Linton family, causing all of the major conflict in the novel. The Lintons are of a higher class both because they have more money and don't seem to have to work, and because they are better educated.

Catherine tries to better her station both by marrying Edgar Linton and by her constant reading. She laughs at Hareton because of his lack of education. Heathcliff admits that Hareton is smarter than Linton, yet because of how they are raised and what they will inherit, Linton will be the more upgraded while Hareton will remain a servant. It is only when Catherine and Hareton become friends and she begins to educate him that Hareton turns into a gentleman and loses his crude behavior.
Revenge - Revenge is a major theme of the novel. Early in the novel Heathcliff is described as plotting revenge, and the second half of the novel is dominated by Heathcliff's revenge against Hindley and his descendants for his mistreatment of him and against Edgar and his descendants for Catherine's death. Heathcliff's revenge affects everyone in the novel, and he seems to think that if he can revenge Catherine's death, he can be with her. He has been looking for her since her death, as he has been sensing her near him. However, it is only at the end of the novel, when he has given up his plans for revenge, that he is able to see Catherine and that he is reunited with her.
Supernatural - Supernatural events happen in the very beginning of the novel and continue until the very end. In chapter three Lockwood is grabbed and pleaded to by Catherine's ghost through a window, and in the last chapter Ellen talks about people seeing the ghosts of Heathcliff and Catherine walking on the moors. In between Heathcliff tells Ellen about hearing Catherine sighing in the graveyard and sensing her nearby, and when he gives up his plans of revenge he even seems to sees her ghost. Ellen also once sees Heathcliff as a goblin, and wonders if he is a vampire or a ghoul, although she realizes she is being silly. These themes and instances are tied to a spirituality and life-after-death theme in the novel. Edgar and Heathcliff both want to be with Catherine after she has died. Edgar does not want her to haunt him, but he does look forward to a time when they can be together again. Heathcliff does want Catherine to haunt him, and she indeed seems to, and he also looks forward to spending eternity with her after death.

Wuthering Heights opens with Lockwood, a tenant of Heathcliff's, visiting the home of his landlord. A subsequent visit to Wuthering Heights yields an accident and a curious supernatural encounter, which pique Lockwood's curiosity. Back at Thrushcross Grange and recuperating from his illness, Lockwood begs Nelly Dean, a servant who grew up in Wuthering Heights and now cares for Thrushcross Grange, to tell him of the history of Heathcliff. Nelly narrates the main plot line of Wuthering Heights.

Mr. Earnshaw, a Yorkshire Farmer and owner of Wuthering Heights, brings home an orphan from Liverpool. The boy is named Heathcliff and is raised with the Earnshaw children, Hindley and Catherine. Catherine loves Heathcliff but Hindley hates him because Heathcliff has replaced Hindley in Mr. Earnshaw's affection. After Mr. Earnshaw's death, Hindley does what he can to destroy Heathcliff, but Catherine and Heathcliff grow up playing wildly on the moors, oblivious of anything or anyone else — until they encounter the Lintons.

Edgar and Isabella Linton live at Thrushcross Grange and are the complete opposites of Heathcliff and Catherine. The Lintons welcome Catherine into their home but shun Heathcliff. Treated as an outsider once again, Heathcliff begins to think about revenge. Catherine, at first, splits her time between Heathcliff and Edgar, but soon she spends more time with Edgar, which makes Heathcliff jealous. When Heathcliff overhears Catherine tell Nelly that she can never marry him (Heathcliff), he leaves Wuthering Heights and is gone for three years.

While he is gone, Catherine continues to court and ends up marrying Edgar. Their happiness is short-lived because they are from two different worlds, and their relationship is strained further when Heathcliff returns. Relationships are complicated even more as Heathcliff winds up living with his enemy, Hindley (and Hindley's son, Hareton), at Wuthering Heights and marries Isabella, Edgar's sister. Soon after Heathcliff's marriage, Catherine gives birth to Edgar's daughter, Cathy, and dies.

Heathcliff vows revenge and does not care who he hurts while executing it. He desires to gain control of Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange and to destroy everything Edgar Linton holds dear. In order to exact his revenge, Heathcliff must wait 17 years. Finally, he forces Cathy to marry his son, Linton. By this time he has control of the Heights and with Edgar's death, he has control of the Grange.

Through all of this, though, the ghost of Catherine haunts Heathcliff. What he truly desires more than anything else is to be reunited with his soul mate. At the end of the novel, Heathcliff and Catherine are united in death, and Hareton and Cathy are going to be united in marriage.

Wuthering Heights is Emily Brontë's only novel. Written between October 1845 and June 1846,^[1] Wuthering Heights was published in 1847 under the pseudonym "Ellis Bell"; Brontë died the following year, aged 30. Wuthering Heights and Anne Brontë's Agnes Grey were accepted by publisher Thomas Newby before the success of their sister Charlotte's novel, Jane Eyre. After Emily's death, Charlotte edited the manuscript of Wuthering Heights, and arranged for the edited version to be published as a posthumous second edition in 1850.^[2]

Although Wuthering Heights is now widely regarded as a classic of English literature, contemporary reviews for the novel were deeply polarised; it was considered controversial because its depiction of mental and physical cruelty was unusually stark, and it challenged strict Victorian ideals of the day regarding religious hypocrisy, morality, social classes and gender inequality.^[3][4][5] The English poet and painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti, although an admirer of the book, referred to it as "A fiend of a book – an incredible monster  [...] The action is laid in hell, – only it seems places and people have English names there."^[6]

The novel has inspired adaptations, including film, radio and television dramatisations, a musical by Bernard J. Taylor, a ballet, operas (by Bernard Herrmann, Carlisle Floyd, and Frédéric Chaslin), part of the "Wind and Wuthering" 1976 album by Genesis, and a 1978 song by Kate Bush.

In 1801, Lockwood, a wealthy young man from the South of England who is seeking peace and recuperation, rents Thrushcross Grange in Yorkshire. He visits his landlord, Heathcliff, who lives in a remote moorland farmhouse, Wuthering Heights. There Lockwood finds an odd assemblage: Heathcliff who seems to be a gentleman, but his manners are uncouth; the reserved mistress of the house who is in her mid-teens; and a young man who seems to be a member of the family, yet dresses and speaks as if he is a servant.

Snowed in, Lockwood is grudgingly allowed to stay and is shown to a bedchamber where he notices books and graffiti left by a former inhabitant named Catherine. He falls asleep and has a nightmare in which he sees the ghostly Catherine trying to enter through the window. He cries out in fear, rousing Heathcliff, who rushes into the room. Lockwood is convinced that what he saw was real. Heathcliff, believing Lockwood to be right, examines the window and opens it, hoping to allow Catherine's spirit to enter. When nothing happens, Heathcliff shows Lockwood to his own bedroom and returns to keep watch at the window.

At sunrise, Heathcliff escorts Lockwood back to Thrushcross Grange. Lockwood asks the housekeeper, Nelly Dean, about the family at Wuthering Heights, and she tells him the truth.

Heathcliff's childhood (Chapters 4 to 17)[edit]

Thirty years earlier, the owner of Wuthering Heights is Mr. Earnshaw, who lives with his son Hindley and younger daughter Catherine. On a trip to Liverpool, Earnshaw encounters a homeless boy, described as a "dark-skinned gypsy in aspect." He adopts the boy and names him Heathcliff. Hindley feels that Heathcliff has supplanted him in his father's affections and becomes bitterly jealous. Catherine and Heathcliff become friends and spend hours each day playing on the moors. They grow close.

Hindley is sent to college. Three years later Earnshaw dies, and Hindley becomes the landowner; he is now master of Wuthering Heights. He returns to live there with his new wife, Frances. He allows Heathcliff to stay but only as a servant, and regularly mistreats him.

The climb to Top Withens, thought to have inspired the Earnshaws' home in Wuthering Heights

A few months after Hindley's return, Heathcliff and Catherine walk to Thrushcross Grange to spy on Edgar and Isabella Linton, who live there. After being discovered, they try to run away but are caught. Catherine is injured by the Lintons' dog and taken into the house to recuperate, while Heathcliff is sent home. Catherine stays with the Lintons. The Lintons are landed gentry and Catherine is influenced by their elegant appearance and genteel manners. When she returns to Wuthering Heights, her appearance and manners are more ladylike, and she laughs at Heathcliff's unkempt appearance. The next day, knowing that the Lintons are to visit, Heathcliff, upon Nelly's advice, tries to dress up, in an effort to impress Catherine, but he and Edgar get into an argument and Hindley humiliates Heathcliff by locking him in the attic. Catherine tries to comfort Heathcliff, but he vows revenge on Hindley.

The following year, Frances Earnshaw gives birth to a son, named Hareton, but she dies a few months later. Hindley descends into drunkenness. Two more years pass, and Catherine and Edgar Linton become friends, while she becomes more distant from Heathcliff. Edgar visits Catherine while Hindley is away and they declare themselves lovers soon afterwards.

Catherine confesses to Nelly that Edgar has proposed marriage and she has accepted, although her love for Edgar is not comparable to her love for Heathcliff, whom she cannot marry because of his low social status and lack of education. She hopes to use her position as Edgar's wife to raise Heathcliff's standing. Heathcliff overhears her say that it would "degrade" her to marry him (but not how much she loves him), and he runs away and disappears without a trace. Distraught over Heathcliff's departure, Catherine makes herself ill. Nelly and Edgar begin to pander to her every whim to prevent her from becoming ill again.

Three years pass. Edgar and Catherine marry and go to live together at Thrushcross Grange, where Catherine enjoys being "lady of the manor". Six months later, Heathcliff returns, now a wealthy gentleman. Catherine is delighted, but Edgar is not. Edgar's sister, Isabella, soon falls in love with Heathcliff, who despises her, but encourages the infatuation as a means of revenge. This leads to an argument with Catherine at Thrushcross Grange, which Edgar overhears. Finally, enraged by Heathcliff's constant appearance and foul parlance, he forbids Heathcliff from visiting Catherine altogether. Upset, Catherine locks herself in her room and begins to make herself ill again.

Heathcliff takes up residence at Wuthering Heights and spends his time gambling with Hindley and teaching Hareton bad habits. Hindley dissipates his wealth and mortgages the farmhouse to Heathcliff to pay his debts. Heathcliff elopes with Isabella Linton. Two months after their elopement, Heathcliff and Isabella return to Wuthering Heights, where Heathcliff discovers that Catherine is dying. With Nelly's help, he visits Catherine secretly. However, Catherine is pregnant. The following day, she gives birth to a daughter, Cathy, shortly before dying. During Catherine's wake, Nelly discovers that Heathcliff secretly attended Catherine's wake and replaced a lock of Edgar's hair in Catherine's necklace with a lock of his own.

Immediately following Catherine's funeral, Isabella leaves Heathcliff and asks Edgar if she may live with him at the Grange. Edgar banishes her from his home. Before leaving, Isabella confides in Nelly, laughing as she tells Nelly how glad she is that Catherine died. She also demands that Nelly quiet Catherine's whimpering infant, Cathy, exclaiming, "I don't like to see it!...Listen to that child! It maintains a constant wail - send it out of my hearing, for an hour..." Isabella eventually finds refuge in the South of England and gives birth to a son, Linton. Hindley dies six months after Catherine, and Heathcliff thus finds himself master of Wuthering Heights.

Twelve years pass. Catherine's daughter Cathy has become a beautiful, high-spirited girl. Edgar learns that his sister Isabella is dying, so he leaves to retrieve her son Linton in order to adopt and educate him. Cathy, who has rarely left home, takes advantage of her father's absence to venture further afield. She rides over the moors to Wuthering Heights and discovers that she has not one but two cousins: Hareton, in addition to Linton. She also lets it be known that her father has gone to fetch Linton. When Edgar returns with Linton, a weak and sickly boy, Heathcliff insists that he live at Wuthering Heights.

Three years pass. Walking on the moors, Nelly and Cathy encounter Heathcliff, who takes them to Wuthering Heights to see Linton and Hareton. Heathcliff hopes that Linton and Cathy will marry, so that Linton will become the heir to Thrushcross Grange. Linton and Cathy begin a secret friendship, echoing the childhood friendship between their respective parents, Heathcliff and Catherine. Nelly finds out about the letters.

The following year, Edgar becomes very ill and takes a turn for the worse while Nelly and Cathy are out on the moors, where Heathcliff and Linton trick them into entering Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff keeps them captive to enable the marriage of Cathy and Linton to take place. After five days, Nelly is released and later, with Linton's help, Cathy escapes. She returns to the Grange to see her father shortly before he dies.

Now master of both Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange, Cathy's father-in-law, Heathcliff, insists on her returning to live at Wuthering Heights. Soon after she arrives Linton dies. Hareton tries to be kind to Cathy, but she withdraws from the world.

At this point, Nelly's tale catches up to the present day (1801). Time passes and, after being ill for a period, Lockwood grows tired of the moors and informs Heathcliff that he will be leaving Thrushcross Grange.

Eight months later, Lockwood returns to the area by chance. Given that his tenancy at Thrushcross Grange is still valid, he decides to stay there again. He finds Nelly living at Wuthering Heights and enquires what has happened since he left. She explains that she moved to Wuthering Heights to replace the housekeeper, Zillah, who had left.

Hareton has an accident and is confined to the farmhouse. During his convalescence, he and Cathy overcome their mutual antipathy and become close. While their friendship develops, Heathcliff begins to act strangely and has visions of Catherine. He stops eating and, after four days, is found dead in Catherine's old room. He is buried next to Catherine.

Lockwood learns that Hareton and Cathy plan to marry on New Year's Day. As he gets ready to leave, he passes the graves of Catherine, Edgar, and Heathcliff and pauses to contemplate the quiet of the moors.

Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?

Although William Shakespeare is best known as a playwright, he is also the poet behind 154 sonnets, which were collected for the first time in a collection in 1609. Based on the Petrarchan (or Italian) sonnet, Shakespeare’s sonnets differ from the norm by addressing not only a young woman – which was the norm in Italy – but also a young man, known throughout as the Fair Youth. Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day? is one of the Fair Youth poems, addressed to a mysterious male figure that scholars have been unable to pin down. A total of 126 of the 154 sonnets are largely taken to be addressed to the Fair Youth, which some scholars have also taken as proof of William Shakespeare’s homosexuality.

Summary

Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day? attempts to justify the speaker’s beloved’s beauty by comparing it to a summer’s day, and comes to the conclusion that his beloved is better after listing some of the summer’s negative qualities. While summer is short and occasionally too hot, his beloved has a beauty that is everlasting, and that will never be uncomfortable to gaze upon. This also riffs – as Sonnet 130 does – on the romantic poetry of the age, the attempt to compare a beloved to something greater than them. Although in Sonnet 130, Shakespeare is mocking the over-flowery language, in Sonnet 18, Shakespeare’s simplicity of imagery shows that that is not the case. The beloved’s beauty can coexist with summer, and indeed be more pleasant, but it is not a replacement for it.

  Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day? Analysis

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

The poem opens with the speaker putting forward a simple question: can he compare his lover to a summer’s day? Historically, the theme of summertime has always been used to evoke a certain amount of beauty, particularly in poetry. Summer has always been seen as the respite from the long, bitter winter, a growing period where the earth flourishes itself with flowers and with animals once more. Thus, to compare his lover to a summer’s day, the speaker considers their beloved to be tantamount to a rebirth, and even better than summer itself.

As summer is occasionally short, too hot, and rough, summer is, in fact, not the height of beauty for this particular speaker. Instead, he attributes that quality to his beloved, whose beauty will never fade, even when ‘death brag thou waander’stin his shade‘, as he will immortalize his lover’s beauty in his verse.

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

The immortality of love and beauty through poetry provides the speaker with his beloved’s eternal summer. Though they might die and be lost to time, the poem will survive, will be spoken of, will live on when they do not. Thus, through the words, his beloved’s beauty will also live on.

In terms of imagery, there is not much that one can say about it. William Shakespeare’s sonnets thrive on a simplicity of imagery, at a polar opposite to his plays, whose imagery can sometimes be packed with meaning. Here, in this particular sonnet, the feeling of summer is evoked through references to the ‘darling buds‘ of May, and through the description of the sun as golden-complexioned. It is almost ironic that we are not given a description of the lover in particular. In fact, scholars have argued that, as a love poem, the vagueness of the beloved’s description leads them to believe that it is not a love poem written to a person, but a love poem about itself; a love poem about love poetry, which shall live on with the excuse of being a love poem. The final two lines seem to corroborate this view, as it moves away from the description of the lover to point out the longevity of his own poem. As long as men can read and breathe, his poem shall live on, and his lover, too, will live on, because he is the subject of this poem.

However, opinions are divided on this topic.

Shakespeare’s sonnets are all written in iambic pentameter – an unstressed syllable, followed by a stressed syllable, with five of these in each line – with a rhyming couplet at the end.

 Historical Background

William Shakespeare was born in 1564 in Stratford-Upon-Avon to an alderman and glover. He is widely regarded as the greatest English writer of all time, and wrote 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and 38 plays, though recently another play has been found and attributed to William Shakespeare. Although much is known about his life, scholars are still uncertain as to whether or not Shakespeare actually authored his works, and convincing arguments exist on both sides.

He died on his 52nd birthday, after signing a will which declared that he was in ‘perfect health’. Theories about his death include that he drank too much at a meeting with Ben Jonson, and Drayton, contemporaries of his, contracted a fever, and died.

His work remains a lasting source of wonder to many filmmakers, writers, and scholars, and has been recreated in other media – most noticeably Baz Luhrmann’ 2004 Romeo + Juliet. William Shakespeare’s work also has worldwide appeal, and has been recreated for Japanese audiences in films such as Throne of Blood, which is based on Macbeth, though Throne of Blood eschews all the poetry and focuses simply on the story.

Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day: William Shakespeare - Summary and Critical Analysis

The poet William Shakespeare thinks that his love is incomparable. He can’t compare her to the summer’s days because; she is lovelier and milder than it. In summer the stormy winds weaken the charming rosebuds and the prospect of renewed health or happiness lasts for a very short time. The sun is occasionally very hot and its golden rays are often dim.

The beauty of every beautiful thing decreases and is spoiled accidentally or naturally. But the eternal summer or the charm of the poet’s love will never be proud of taking the poet’s friend to its dark kingdom. In fact, death will never enjoy its victory over his friend because the poet’s verse will remain eternal all through the time. His friend may die physically, but her beauty will remain in the poem. As long as the human race remains alive and as long as men can read, this sonnet will live as it is eternal, and thus the poet’s friend will be immortal.

This sonnet claims that the Dark Lady is more beautiful than the summer’s day and is also as immortal as Shakespeare’s sonnet. Thoughts of a literary immortality through the poet's verse inspire this sonnet. Her eternal summer would outlast all summer’s lease in the future. The beauty of the summer’s day with the darling buds of May is not lovelier than her. Eternal lines of verse would make an eternal summer of her beauty denying Death and Time and their power of destruction.

Shakespeare takes heart, expects immortality for his verse, and so immortality for his friend as surviving in it. He will fearlessly express ‘a poet’s rage’. Immortalizing beauty through verse was a commonplace among the Elizabethan sonnet writers. This sonnet is magnificent throughout-from the perfect beauty of the opening quatrain to the sweet and the rush of the triumphant final couplet. The rhythms are varied with the subtlest skill and the majestic line-“But thy eternal summer shall not fade” reverberates like a stroke on a gong.

This sonnet has three quatrains and a couplet. It follows the rhyme scheme abba cdcd efefef and gg. The ideas are developed in the three quatrains and the conclusion is embedded in the couplet. The conclusion is that as long as the human race remains alive and as long as men can read, this sonnet will live, and thus immortalize the woman the poet loves. Shakespeare’s conclusion holds true because art can really immortalize people. Time and death may destroy the persona and her beauty physically, but they can’t destroy her completely. Whenever people read this verse, they certainly remember the poet’s beloved and she is brought to life in the mind of the readers. Time and death can’t wipe out her existence for ever. The rose metaphor is deftly humanized in the phrase ‘darling bud of May’ in this sonnet.

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

• The speaker starts by asking or wondering out loud whether he ought to compare whomever he’s speaking to with a summer’s day.
• Instead of musing on that further, he jumps right in, and gives us a thesis of sorts. The object of his description is more "lovely" and more "temperate" than a summer’s day.
• "Lovely" is easy enough, but how about that "temperate"? The meaning that comes to mind first is just "even-keeled" or "restrained," but "temperate" also introduces, by way of a double meaning, the theme of internal and external "weather." "Temperate," as you might have heard on the Weather Channel, refers to an area with mild temperatures, but also, in Shakespeare’s time, would have referred to a balance of the "humours."
• No need to explain this in great detail, but basically doctors since Ancient Greece had believed that human behavior was dictated by the relative amount of particular kinds of fluids in the body (if you must know, they were blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm. Yummy, no?).
• By the early 1600s, this theory was being strongly challenged, but people in Shakespeare’s audience would have known that "temperate" meant that someone had the right amount of those different fluids.
• The other important (and less disgusting) issue these lines bring up is the question of "thee." Normally, we’d just assume that the object of the poem is his lover, and leave it at that. But with Shakespeare, these things are always complicated.
• What can we tell about the relationship between the speaker and his addressee from the way he addresses "thee"?
• For the moment, all we can really tell is this: the speaker doesn’t seem to care much what "thee" thinks. He does ask whether he ought to make this comparison, but he certainly doesn’t wait long (or at all) for an answer.
• So is he just wondering out loud here, pretending "thee" is present?
• Even better, and this is important, could "thee" also be us readers? Is it just us, or does some small part of you imagine that Shakespeare might be asking you, the reader, whether you want him to compare you to a summer’s day? Keep that on the back burner as you go through the poem.
• Finally, just a note on the meter here:
• Go ahead and read those first two lines out loud. Notice how they’re kind of bouncy? That’s the iambic pentameter: "compare thee to a summer’s day."
• So do you want to see a cool bit of foreshadowing? The pronoun "I" is a stressed syllable in the first line, but the pronoun "Thou" is unstressed in the second line. Guess who’s going to be the real subject of this poem.

Lines 3-4

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:

• Here the speaker begins to personify nature. In other words, some of the smack talking he’s doing about summer sounds like he’s talking about a person.
• Basically, strong summer winds threaten those new flower buds that popped up in May, and summer just doesn’t last very long.
• The way he describes the short summer, though, is what’s interesting. Summer has a "lease" on the weather, just as your family might have a lease on your car; like a person, summer can enter into, and must abide by, agreements.
• The point here is clear enough: the summer is fated to end.
• But check this out: isn’t summer also fated to begin every year once again? Can the summer possibly have "too short a date," if it happens an infinite number of times? Isn’t it, in a meaningful sense, immortal?
• Keep this in mind as you read on.

Lines 5-6

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;

• Here comes the major personification of nature. Put simply, the speaker’s saying sometimes the sun is too hot, and other times you can’t even see it at all (hidden, we assume, by clouds).
• But instead of being boring, he calls the sun the "eye of heaven," refers to it using the word "his," and gives it a "complexion," which generally means refers to the skin of the face.
• Check out how much more information about the summer we’re getting than we are about the beloved. Indeed, the speaker is carefully describing the summer individually, and even in human terms, while he only describes "thee" in one line and only relative to the summer.
• "Complexion," in particular, is especially interesting, as it brings back the whole "humours" theme we saw in "temperate."
• "Complexion" used to be used to describe someone’s health, specifically with regard to their balance of humours. Thus, we see here again that the speaker is combining descriptions of external weather phenomena with internal balance.

Lines 7-8

And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;

• With these lines, the speaker gets even broader in his philosophy, declaring that everything beautiful must eventually fade away and lose its charm, either by chance or by the natural flow of time. Kind of like teen pop stars.
• Now what exactly does "untrimm’d" refer to?
• We might read it as what happens to "fair" or beautiful things. By that reading, things that are beautiful eventually lose their trimmings, or their decorations, and thus fade from beauty.
• On the other hand, "untrimm’d" is also a term from sailing, as you "trim," or adjust, the sails to take advantage of the wind. This gives "untrimm’d" a completely opposite meaning; instead of "made ugly and plain by natural changes," it means "unchanged in the face of nature’s natural changes."

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening BY ROBERT FROST

Whose woods these are I think I know.   

His house is in the village though;   

He will not see me stopping here   

To watch his woods fill up with snow.   

My little horse must think it queer   

To stop without a farmhouse near   

Between the woods and frozen lake   

The darkest evening of the year.   

He gives his harness bells a shake   

To ask, if there is some mistake.   

The only other sound’s the sweep   

Of ,,easy wind and downy flake.   

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   

But I have promises to keep,   

And miles to go before I sleep,   

And, miles to go before I sleep.

Our speaker is in the woods, but (gasp) he's trespassing. He first wonders who owns these woods. In the same breath, he tells us that he thinks he does know who owns them. The lucky landowner lives in a house in the village. Phew. So, our speaker won't get into trouble for trespassing, because there's no one to catch him trespassing. 

Surprise! Our speaker has a horse (neigh), and this horse is little. Our speaker psycho-analyzes his little horse and supposes that said little horse must think it's pretty strange for them to be stopping in the middle of nowhere, with no one in sight, with not even a farmhouse close by, and absolutely no sign of hay. Newsflash: the speaker and his little horse are chilling (pun intended) between the woods and a frozen lake. Ice skating? Nope. Also, it happens to be the darkest evening of the year.

Little Horse is starting to really lose it. Fortunately, he has some harness bells on his back, and he gives them a little shake in order to get his master's attention. The only other sounds are of a slight wind and of falling snow. Shhhhhh. It's quiet. 
Our speaker admits to having a hankering for the dark woods, but he tells us he's got things to do, people to see and places to go. He's got a long way to go before he can rest his head on his little pillow, so he had better get going.

Maybe you've seen this little poem elegantly scrawled on a gift card. Perhaps your favorite teacher recited it to you and your classmates with a chilling, gravelly voice. Or perchance you simply came across it once upon a time and can't seem to get it out of your head. No matter what, we're willing to bet big money that you and this poem are already friends.

Robert Frost wrote "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" in 1922, two years before winning the first of his four Pulitzer Prizes. The poem tells the story of a man traveling through some snowy woods on the darkest evening of the year, and he's pretty much in love with what he sees around him. He's on his way back to town, but he can't quite tear himself away from the lovely and dark woods.

People love to talk about what this poem means. Some argue that it is simply a description of a man appreciating nature. Others would tell you that there is some heavy metaphor action going down, and that the poem is about death. And there are those who take it a step further and say that this poem addresses suicide. Nature-lovers see it as a piece that trumpets nature and that scorns civilization (take that, civilization!). You probably have your own idea of what this poem means. We at Shmoop have an inkling that the heart of this poem's awesomeness lies in how it soundsrather than in what it means, and so we're going to take some time to look at and listen to the sounds in this poem (see "Sound Check").

Robert Frost is a beloved American poet, and many people associate him with nature and with the New England landscape, because, well, he liked to write about nature and the New England landscape. He was born in San Francisco (land of the sourdough), but spent most of his years in snowy places like Massachusetts and New Hampshire (land of the maple syrup). 

Frost is known for creating simple poems that can be interpreted on many different levels. He also loved to inject every day, colloquial speech into his poems. He was big on sounds, often talking about how the sounds of words carry more meaning than the words themselves. Check it:

"What we do get in life and miss so often in literature is the sentence
sounds that underlie the words. Words themselves do not convey meaning,
and to [. . . prove] this, . . . let us take the example of two people who
are talking on the other side of a closed door, whose voices can be heard
but whose words cannot be distinguished. Even though the words do not
carry, the sound of them does, and the listener can catch the meaning of
the conversation. . . . [T]o me a sentence is not interesting merely in
conveying a meaning of words. It must do something more; it must convey a
meaning by sound." (Source)

So, if we follow Mr. Frost's advice, we shouldn't be so concerned with what this poem means as concerned with how it means. Let's warm up our vocal chords and perk up our ears, because something tells us we're going to be reciting and listening to "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" until the wee hours of the night.

 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening' is one of Robert Frost's most famous poems, filled with the theme of nature and vivid imagery that readers of his work have come to love. In this lesson, we'll summarize the poem, discuss its major theme and several interpretations, and finish with a quiz to test your knowledge.

The Poem

If you've ever seen or experienced snow, you've probably taken a few minutes to marvel at its beauty. Possibly you were drawn to this element of nature that is at once soothing to look at and dark in its association with cold, winter, and the silence of nature. In literature, the seasons of nature are often used to explore the relationship between life and death, and one of Robert Frost's most famous poems, 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,' written in 1922, captures this pull between life and death, man, and nature.

Theme & Analysis

Like many of Frost's poems, 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening' deals with the contemplation of nature. Many readers debate about whether or not the tone of the poem is calm and serene or dark and depressing.

Serene Interpretation

On the one hand, the speaker wants to take a moment to pause in a quiet spot to watch the snow falling, perhaps to soothe his mind and contemplate nature. The pull of the woods could just be the solitude of being alone and the lure of being free of responsibilities.

It might also suggest a sense of adventure and attraction to danger - the 'darkness' and 'depth' of the woods. Perhaps the speaker wants to experience new things and places, but his responsibilities - his work, his family, his community - keep him from going off on dark and dangerous adventures.

The Village in the Jungle By Leonard Woolf

Sexuality/Brutality/Lust

The Village in the Jungle tells the story of twin sisters, Punchi Menika and Hinnihami, each of whom has a "strangeness and wildness" associated with the jungle.

Each is brought under the thumb of a dominant man.

Leonard's description of the near rape through which a young man, Babun, claims Punchi Menika as his mate: "She allowed him to take her into the thick jungle, but she struggled with him, and her whole body shook with fear and desire as she felt his hands upon her breasts. A cry broke from her, in which, joy and desire mingled with the fear and the pain”. However, frightening Babun's lust, Punchi Menika's married life may be more chilling, for soon her "wildness" becomes "dimmer and vaguer": "She became the man's woman, the cook of his food, the cleaner of his house, and bearer of his children".

Hinnihami fares worse. A hideously scarred old shaman, Punchirala, begins to hanker for her, and despite her elaborate efforts to resist him, Hinnihami finds that the old man's magic is potent enough to endanger her father's life. Reluctantly, Hinnihami agrees to be given to Punchirala.

But, she defiantly interprets the agreement to mean that she will be his sexual partner for only one night.

Nevertheless, she becomes pregnant, and soon after giving birth, she begins to suckle an orphaned fawn alongside her daughter, Punchi Nona. The girl dies, and Hinnihami comes to think of the deer, which she continues to nurse, as her son. When drought and other ills descend on the village, its superstitious inhabitants, blaming Hinnihami's aberrant behavior, surround the deer to stone it. Hinnihami tries to intervene, but they throw her to the ground, tearing her jacket to shreds, and beat her. The deer dies later that day; Hinnihami is dead by the next morning. The narrative then turns back to Punchi Menika. She is soon pursued by a powerful older man, Fernando, who has her husband sent off to prison, where he dies; Fernando himself is shot dead by Punchi Menika's father, who is then imprisoned for life. The novel ends with Punchi Menika alone in the deserted village, waiting for death, which comes in the ambiguously metaphoric form of a wild boar gliding into her hut with gleaming white tusks.

He felt that The Village in the Jungle expressed his growing anti-imperialism after leaving the civil service, and the respect he shows the native people of Ceylon in the novel.

Plot

The novel describes the lives of a poor family in a small village called Beddagama (literally, "The village in the jungle") as they struggle to survive the challenges presented by poverty, disease, superstition, the unsympathetic colonial system, and the jungle itself. The head of the family is a hunter named Silindu, who has two daughters named Punchi Menika and Hinnihami. After being manipulated by the village authorities and a debt collector, Silindu is put on trial for murder.

The story of Village in the Jungle is full of acrimony. It is disgusting to see that human beings are subjected to such levels of torture and misery by their own neighbors and the administrators. Unfortunately the story of the novel is not unique only to Baddegama. It is the story of the rural Sri Lanka during colonial times. The story of the rural villages is not that different even today with all the advancement of technology and democracy we are supposed to enjoy.

Leonard Woolf selects a few characters of the village Baddegama in the deep down south of Sri Lanka and tells us a story about how the dreams of a young couple, Babun and Punchimenika shatter away due to the lewdness of a trader who comes to the village and subsequent troubles created to separate Babun from Punchimenika.

In the backdrop of the main story, there is another story about Punchimenika’s younger sister, Hinnihamy being forced to marry an old and vicious indigenous medical practitioner and her subsequent death by the villagers due to the suspicions inculcated against her in the villagers’ mind by the medical practitioner as she refuses to be his wife.

Silindu, the protagonist of the novel leads a miserable life squeezed in to the jungle and the bureaucracy. He is as silent as a deer and becomes violent as a provoked water buffalo when it is too much for him to tolerate the wickedness of the world.

There is a Sinhala language movie with the same name based on the novel with lead roles played by Wijaya Kumarathunga, Malani Fonseka, Joe Abeywickrama, Tony Ranasinghe, D. R. Nanayakkara and Nadeeka Gunasekara. Dr. Arthur C. Clarke makes a cameo appearance. The film is directed by none other than Lester James Pieris. (Wanninayake)

The Village in the Jungle (1913) was his first novel, based on his administrative and personal experiences when working as an Assistant Government Agent in the Hambantota District of Ceylon. Mirroring Woolf’s own disillusionment with the imperial project, the novel traces its protagonist Silindu’s struggle against the slow but steady bureaucratization of life that comes with the account books, gun licenses and courthouses of colonial rule, which ultimately leads him to murder. The novel is a strange counterpoint to Woolf’s other writing from his time in Ceylon. While his official administrative diaries show meticulous records of legal proceedings, pearl fishing and harvesting, The Village in the Jungle finds facts difficult to grapple with. Dominated by a narrative voice from within Silindu’s community, the novel nevertheless refuses to put forward definite opinions. Using the master-trope of the modernist colonial novel, disorientation, all the characters and events that Woolf writes about are, like the jungle, shrouded in a sense of unknowability.

The novel is an exceptional contribution to the modernist period, largely because of its unusual treatment of racially other characters.

The Village in the Jungle has a single white character (a magistrate, possibly based on Woolf himself), and escapes resorting to stereotypes of the “native” as uncivilised, immature and dangerous. Instead, a more complex portrait of Sinhalese colonial society is created. Rather than simply representing the colonial encounter in terms of binaries of us/them, the novel demonstrates that communities are built not just on race, but also on affect and fellow- feeling. Woolf’s fellow colonisers, as the volume of his autobiography dealing with Ceylon, Growing, shows us, had little in common with him; he in turn was disgusted by their artificiality and stylised behaviour. Similarly, while Silindu’s oppressors, headmen and petty moneylenders, are definitely instruments of the colonial state, they are Sinhalese like him, and yet see nothing but bestiality in him that they at once exploit and are afraid of. The magistrate, on the other hand, not only recognizes the suffering he sees in Silindu’s face when he is brought before him on charges of murder, but identifies with his pain in a manner that renders barriers of race and colour irrelevant.

The aftermath of The Village in the Jungle spurred Woolf on to write a series of tracts that argued against the British Empire, both as an economic as well as a moral-political construct. He also went on to actively propound these views through his associations with the Labour Party and Fabian Society. He was only to visit Ceylon again in 1960, nine years before his death. The novel, in its centenary year of publication, remains today a central text in the Sri Lankan colonial literary canon.

Leonard Woolf`s village in the jungle is a fascinating novel written about the life of the peasants in Sri Lanka during the British rule. The story takes place in a remote jungle village called Baddegama . The writer recalls the strange happenings not only within Baddegama but also in its surroundings. The story is between a high cast family and a low cast family and how a foreign man who comes to the village influences these two families. The story goes on describing how the low cast family is suffered by the high cast family and their friends in the village. 

In 1980, Sir Lester James Peries released a superb film based on this well known novel, naming it Baddegama . The film helped the novel to be as real as it was in the reader`s imagination as it gave faces to the main characters such as Silindu , and his two daughters, Punchi Manika and Hinnihamy , Babun , also not forgetting the cruel native doctor Punchirala , the village headman Bebehamy and Fernando the man