th halves of Wuthering Heights and he interacted with both Catherine and Cathy. However, they had very different relationships with him. Catherine and Heathcliff were deeply in love with each other and had been soul mates ever since childhood. Heathcliff often evoked powerful emotions from Catherine, and their encounters often left Catherine in emotional chaos. Cathy did not like Heathcliff and he did not like her. Edgar and Nelly informed Cathy of Heathcliff’s terrible history and negative impact on her family. Once she moved into Wuthering Heights and lived with Heathcliff, Cathy was transformed from a bright, cheerful young girl into the sullen, foul-tempered person Lockwood meets during his first visit to the Heights. Heathcliff saw Cathy as the cause of her mother’s death and she represented Catherine’s betrayal of their love. Cathy inspired many feelings of rage from Heathcliff. For instance, when she accused him of stealing her property he burst out, “[D]amnable witch! Off with her! Do you hear? Fling her into the kitchen! I’ll kill her, Ellen Dean, if you let her come into my sight again” (292). The mother and her daughter had contrasting views and experiences when it came to love and marriage. Catherine was desperately in attached to Heathcliff, and the love they shared was the most powerful force in the novel. She did not want to marry Heathcliff, though, because she felt it would degrade her. This displays her pride and ego, which led to her choice of Edgar for a husband. This union was not built on true love, but on Catherine’s desire to have money, power and respect. In comparison, Cathy was forced into marrying Linton, with whom she would have rather had a brother-sister bond. Heathcliff forced this marriage because he wanted the property and assets that she was heir to. Cathy eventually fell in love with Hareton, despite the fact that he was a dirty, illiterate ...
