Narrative Technique In Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights

Păun Ana-Iulia

Seria 2 Grupa 8

Lecture Aline Bottez

Seminar Alina Bottez

Story-Telling (Narrative Technique) in Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights”

Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights” employs a peculiar narrative technique. The story is not told to the reader by the omniscient third person narrator but by one of the characters to another one. In this essay I will present Bronte’s narrative techniques and the way they appear in the novel.

The main character, who is our primary narrator is Lockwood, Heathcliff’s tenant. He lives in Thrushcross Grange and vitis his landlord at Wuthering Heights in the beginning of the book. He is shocked by Heathcliff’s apathetic attitude and by the desolated state of his residence and of the other’s inhabitants.

After the end of the first part of the story, he takes the decision to leave Wuthering Heights and returns to the role of the narrator for a short while, in order to talk about his discussion with Heathcliff and his return to Wuthering Heights after a few months. This is when Nelly resumes her story (also informing the read about what has happened during the time Lockwood was missing) and takes the novel to an end. She presents to the reader Heathcliff’s death and the newly-developed relationship of Cathy and

The fact that all the characters which act as narrators throughout the novel are actual participants to the action of the book provides emotional twists for the reader. While the more outward frames (like Lockwood’s and Mrs. Dean’s) provide us with a more objective point of view, the inward short narratives are subjective and thus likely to affectively influence the reader’s opinion. Bronte’s narrative is dramatic and dynamic. She presents us with character interactions at a fast pace and allows little time for the reader’s introspection and analysis between