The source of all of Catherine's emotional problems is
clearly set forth by Catherine herself in Ch.9 when she tells Nelly
Dean,
My great miseries in
this world have been Heathcliff's miseries, and I watched and felt each from the
beginning: my great thought in living is himself. If all else
perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and
he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a
part of it. - My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it,
I'm well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the
eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary.
Nelly, I AM Heathcliff! He's always,
always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself,
but as my own being.
The
elder Catherine is deeply and passionately attached to Heathcliff her brother by
adoption, so there is no question of her ever getting married to
him.
Her marriage to Edgar only makes her yearn for him all
the more. So, it was only inevitable that soon there should be a climactic showdown in
Ch.11 between Edgar and Heathcliff. The consequence of this confrontation was that
Catherine decides to exasperate both Heathcliff and Linton by locking herself up in her
room:
Well,
if I cannot keep Heathcliff for my friend - if Edgar will be mean and jealous,
I'll try to break their hearts by breaking my own.
That will be a prompt way of finishing all, when I am pushed
to extremity! [Ch.11]
In
Ch.12 we learn that she's been in the room for almost five
days:
How
long is it since I shut myself in here?' she asked, suddenly
reviving.'It was Monday evening,' I [Nelly Dean] replied, 'and this
is Thursday night, or rather Friday morning, at
present.'
A little later, in
the same chapter Nelly Dean informs Dr.Kenneth the family physician of Catherine's
illness:
it
commenced in a quarrel. She was struck during a tempest of passion with a kind of fit.
That's her account, at least: for she flew off in the height of it, and locked herself
up. Afterwards, she refused to eat, and now she alternately
raves and remains in a half dream; knowing those about her, but having her mind filled
with all sorts of strange ideas and
illusions.'
Both
Catherine's body and mind are in a state of limbo. She is unhappily trapped between
Edgar and Heathcliff and doesn't know how to escape. To top it all, there's no one to
whom she can can turn to for help or sympathy. Even in her delirious state her only
thought is to be united with Heathcliff, and overcoming all attempts by Nelly Dean to
prevent her from opening the window she opens it and leaning out into the frosty night
she cries out:
But, Heathcliff, if I dare you now, will you
venture? If you do, I'll keep you. I'll not lie there by myself: they may bury me twelve
feet deep, and throw the church down over me, but I won't rest
till you are with me. I never
will!'
From
being a normal, cheerful young lady Catherine has been transformed into a manic
depressive because of her magnificent incestuous obsession -
Heahtcliff.
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