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Wuthering Heights, Review One: Bats in Heathcliff’s Belfry

January 17, 2009 by Vic

cathy-and-heathcliffInquiring Readers: This tongue in cheek review of Wuthering Heights, showing on PBS January 18th & 25th, has been written in the spirit of fun (and illumination!). In it Dr. Phyl, Oprey’s favorite tele-psychobabbler, analyzes Heathcliff and Cathy. My more serious analysis of Heathcliff (Review Two) sits on Remotely Connected, a PBS blogger site. Enjoy.

Dear Dr. Phyl,

Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff have had a long and stormy relationship. After Cathy’s death, Heathcliff dealt badly with her loss, seeking revenge. One might say he handled himself in a most ungentlemanlike manner. Miss Emily Brontë, an interested bystander, wrote a book about this unique tale, which I am sending on to you. After you have read Wuthering Heights, would you mind answering a few questions? Wouldn’t you agree that loving someone too much is a bad thing? And aren’t women more prone to going crazy over a lost love than men? In other words, how realistic is this story?

Thanking you in advance, Ms. Place

Dear Ms. Place,

To answer your second point first, let me state categorically that in this day and age men have as much right to go crazy as women. Males might exhibit this character trait differently, but crazy is as crazy does.

In my long career as a tele-psychobabbler, I must say that I encounter an assortment of juvenile behaviors among my featured guests, but few possess even 1/10th of Heathcliff’s charged and emotionally unhealthy obsessions. He is as nuts as they come and I write these words with awe and respect. Seldom has a man with so many problems been able to keep up a normal façade for very long, and Heathcliff managed to fool enough people and hold them in his thrall until he could destroy them.

cathy-at-the-lintonsLet’s get my assessment of Cathy Linton née Earnshaw’s character out of the way. She was merely guilty of acting like a self-centered, spoiled, and willful brat. Tighter lacings and a rigid schedule pursuing ladylike endeavors would have tamed her unruly nature. Had I been her personal psychobabbler, I would have prescribed vigorous exercises in the form of housework and mucking horse stalls to tone down her narcissistic tendencies. That girl was seriously willful and needed to get an inner life. Unfortunately she died before self-actualization became possible.

As for Heathcliff, he suffers from a rare condition called Continuous Revenge Seeker Disorder, or CRSD. Every human suffering from this persistent unvegetative state has died tragically. A childhood trauma precipitates this disease, leaving all CRSD sufferers with an acute sense of insecurity and low self-esteem. Heathcliff’s traumas were manifold. He had to scrounge for a living on the street when he was a mere child.  Then his stepbrother’s jealousy tainted his burgeoning relationship with Mr. Earnshaw, his protector. After that good man’s death, Heathcliff’s life at Wuthering Heights became a nightmare. He had gone from Gypsy child to cherished stepson to servant in the space of a few years and his fragile ego just couldn’t take this constant see-sawing of emotions.  And then Cathy, his soulmate, goes all squirrelly on him and starts coming on to another man. Some people weep and give up; but Heathcliff vowed revenge and felt stronger as a result, a classic trait of the CRSD sufferer.

checking-on-cathyCathy’s obsessively close relationship with Heathcliff sealed the CRSD deal. That poor motherless and loveless boy could no more fight off Cathy’s charms than a hog can resist a nice puddle of mud. It would have been better if he had hooked up with Tess of the D’urbervilles. Now there’s a woman whose miserable experiences and continual bad luck could have coaxed him out of his self-pity, but fate had Cathy in store for this man and that was his downfall. As for his relationship with Cathy, when people start saying things like “you torment me” to each other, that’s just not healthy! Normal couples don’t spend all their time stressing, testing, and obsessing. They keep their neediness to themselves! They GROW UP!

You didn’t mention the Linton siblings in your letter. These two mealy-mouthed milque toasties chose mates that were entirely wrong for them. Hadn’t anyone bothered to teach them the warning signs of an unhealthy relationship? One minute kind, next minute cruel. Gets jealous for no reason. And angry, sulky, or withdrawing. The Lintons began changing their own behavior to keep the peace, and Isabella went so far as to think that her love for Heathcliff would be strong enough to CHANGE him. Talk about unrealistic expectations! Well she got her comeuppance, so you can’t help but feel sorry for her, because for him she was just a means to revenge. What amazes me, Ms. Place, is that this book, which is about a dysfunctional relationship that destroys lives, has become a popular and enduring classic. Now how cockamamie is that? And my guess as to why people aren’t embracing my new book – Normal Thoughts for Ordinary People -with the same enthusiasm as for this over the top gothic drivel is as good as yours.

heights_2After Cathy married Edgar, Heathcliff ran off, got rich, and returned to torment Cathy by pretending to court Isabella. Right there that tells us that bats have entered Heathcliff’s belfry.  The scene in which Ms. Brontë described Cathy dying in Heathcliff’s arms, with him clinging to her and growling at her and telling her things like “haunt me” and “I love my murderer” indicates that Heathcliff’s bats have turned rabid. Honestogod, were these folks for real or were they a figment of someone’s imagination?

I understand that a new production of Wuthering Heights is scheduled to be aired on PBS on January 18th and 25th. I’ll ask my staff to schedule Heathcliff for my show. Considering some of the loony bin guests I’ve had on recently, he will fit right in.

Sincerely,

Dr. Phyl

If you missed the first airing of Wuthering Heights, you can view past episodes at this link starting the 19th.

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The Last Frost Fair on the Thames River

January 16, 2009 by Vic

The northeast has been in the grip of a cold spell that it has not seen in years, and today is the coldest day our region has experienced in a decade. Time to resurrect a post I featured in 2007: the 1814 Frost Fair. I’ve added a few links and some additional information to the original post:

Frost Fair 1694

Frost Fair 1694

During a mini ice age two hundred years ago, the winters were so cold that the river Thames would freeze in solid sheets of ice. The last time this event occurred was in 1814.  The old London Bridge was bulkier than the new London Bridge built in 1823, and it acted like a dam, blocking the sluggish currents and allowing the water to ice over. After the new bridge was built and the old one was demolished, and after embankments were erected (which narrowed the river channel), the river flowed too swiftly for the waters to freeze.

London Bridte Frost Fair 1814

London Bridge Frost Fair 1814

Since the beginning of the 17th century, a Frost Fair was held whenever the river iced over. This practice lasted for 200 years. People ventured out on the ice, vendors set up stalls, and a variety of entertainments were offered. “…Men and Beasts, Coaches and Carts, went as frequently thereon, as Boats were wont to pass before. There was also a Street of Booths built from the Temple to Southwark, where were Sold all sorts of Goods imaginable, namely, Cloaths, Plate, Earthen Ware, Meat, Drink, Brandy, Tobacco, and a Hundred sorts of other Commodities …” (Print of the Frost Fair) The fairs were widely popular and people arrived from the countryside to join in the festivities. John Evelyn, 17th century chronicler, wrote a colorful description: “Coaches plied from Westminster to the Temple, and from several other stairs too and fro, as in the streets, sleds, sliding with skates, bull-baiting, horse and coach races, puppet plays and interludes, cooks, tippling and other lewd places, so that it seemed to be a bacchanalian triumph, or carnival on the water.”

And this is what they did with the Great Frost. By February, as Lord William Pitt Lennox tells us in his Recollections, the Thames between London Bridge and Blackfriars became a thoroughly solid surface of ice. There were notices at the ends of all the local streets announcing that it was safe to cross the ice, and, as in times of Elizabeth 1, full advantage was taken of this new area and the public interest in it. As before, there now sprang up a Frost Fair. The people moved across the river by way of what was called Freezeland Street. On either side, crowded together, were booths for bakers, butchers, barbers and cooks. There were swings, bookstalls, skittle alleys, toyshops, almost everything that might be found in an ordinary fair. There were even gambling establishments and the ‘wheel of fortune, and pricking the garter; pedlars, hawkers of ballads, fruit, oysters, perambulating pie-men; and purveyers of the usual luxuries, gin beer, brandy-balls and gingerbread.’ – The Prince of Pleasure and His Regency, J.B. Priestley, p 113.

The first recorded Frost Fair was in 1608, and it seems to have been a relatively small affair. Visitors to the fair could play games, eat food, purchase beverages, and visit a variety of stalls. The biggest and most famous Frost Fair occurred in 1683/84, lasting for several months in total and featuring a wide range of diversions. However, contemporaries wrote that this Frost Fair carried a hidden cost; pollution increased greatly due to open fires, for example, and neighboring parks were stripped of game.

The festivals on the ice would have been a pleasant way to wile away an afternoon for English people of all classes. King and nobles visited the Frost Fairs alongside less fortunate members of British society, with many people purchasing souvenirs to commemorate their attendance. – What Were the River Thames Frost Fairs? Wise Geek

Frost Fair near the Temple Stairs

Frost Fair near the Temple Stairs

Jane Austen was still alive when the last Frost Fair was held in 1814. She must also have felt the chill of that cold February in which London experienced the hardest frost it had known in centuries. Though the fair lasted for only four days it was made memorable by an elephant, which was led across the river below Blackfriars Bridge. The print below shows how raucous some of the festivities became.

frost-fair-1814

Read more on the topic at these links

Last Image: Collage, City of London

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The Regency Estate: How it was Apportioned

January 14, 2009 by Vic

The Duchess of Kent, Queen Victoria's mother, 1821, depended on an annuity and jointure after her husband's death.

The Duchess of Kent, Queen Victoria's mother, 1821, depended on an annuity and jointure after her husband's death.

The laws of primogeniture were clear: In order to keep lands and estates intact, the bulk of the inheritance was handed down to the eldest son. Other much smaller claims to the property went as follows:

  • Jointures: Provision for an annual income for the wife after her husband has died and arranged at marriage. The amount is typically based on the assets the wife brings to the union. Elopements had dire consequences, for a woman forfeits this protection when she runs away to be married.
  • Marriage Portions: Lump sums paid to the bride, which she brings to the marriage.  Mrs. Bennet brough £5,000 to the marriage, and her daughters’ portions from her estate will be £ 1,000 each. Portions obviously vary. Princess Anne, the eldest daughter of George II, received an £80,000 marriage portion, voted by Parliament in 1733.
  • Cash Settlements: Passed on to younger sons, but often these monies were not enough to sustain them. Most younger sons had to find employment or marry well.
  • Entails: Property that is entailed on the male heirs cannot be inherited by females. This practice ensures that the succession of the title, property, and lands remains within the family, although a clause could be inserted to describe what would happen if there are no males left to inherit.  Mr. Bennet’s property is entailed and will go to Mr. Collins, the next male in line.

  • Annuities: Annual moneys donated by other members of the family for support.  Several of Jane Austen’s brothers provided an annuity of £50 to their sisters and mother. In Sense and Sensibility, Fanny and John Dashwood discuss the amount of an annuity for John’s stepmother and sisters before selfishly discarding the idea. The conversation begins with John:

“That is very true, and, therefore, I do not know whether, upon the whole, it would not be more advisable to do something for their mother while she lives, rather than for them–something of the annuity kind I mean.–My sisters would feel the good effects of it as well as herself. A hundred a year would make them all perfectly comfortable.”

His wife hesitated a little, however, in giving her consent to this plan.

“To be sure,” said she, “it is better than parting with fifteen hundred pounds at once. But, then, if Mrs. Dashwood should live fifteen years we shall be completely taken in.”

“Fifteen years! my dear Fanny; her life cannot be worth half that purchase.”

“Certainly not; but if you observe, people always live for ever when there is an annuity to be paid them.”

More on English Inheritance Laws:

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Tears for Tess: Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Review Part 2

January 12, 2009 by Vic

wedding-kiss-2My review of Masterpiece Classic’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles (2008 ), Part One, was rather benign considering all the horrible events the poor girl had to endure. Tess, having weathered as much misfortune in two years as most people experience in a lifetime, weds her Angel and confesses her sin. Now here’s where the plot became problematic for me: As a woman living in the modern world, I cannot like Angel. Yes, he’s young and idealistic and has already bent the rules by marrying Tess, sacrificing a bit of the family honor in the process, but his actions smack too much of high school, happy-with-you-21where a boy will pursue a girl, then drop her because she’s a slut. “The woman that I love is not you,” he said after hearing her out, and I know this is the point author Thomas Hardy was trying to make. Different worlds. Different manners. Different mores. Clash of cultures. Regardless, I cannot forgive Angel for abandoning Tess after she’s revealed that she’s carried another man’s child. Angel’s attitude remained prevalent well into the 1960’s, and I thank my lucky stars to be living in this enlightened, more forgiving time. Without this crucial plot development, we’d be staring at a happy ending, but the viewer still has almost half of this two-part film to watch.

angels-reaction-21Eddy Redmayne and Gemma Arterton were splendid in this scene. Gemma as Tess is at first brimming with hope, then crestfallen as she begs for Angel’s forgiveness. Redmayne manages to show conflicting feelings – anger, hurt, and love – as he bids Tess goodbye, unable to accept from his rigid, puritanical upbringing that she’s a fallen woman.

Groby

Groby

Tess returns home, having failed once again. Explaining her decision to reveal her secret, she says simply to her mother: “I love him. It would have been a sin to deceive him,”demonstrating her purity of heart and innate goodness. With Angel heading for Brazil, Tess prepares to find employment … and jumps from the frying pan straight into the fires of hell. In her new position as a farm girl on bleak Flintcombe-Ash farm, Tess remeets an evil enemy from her time on the D’Urberville estate. Groby, the farm manager, shows her no pity and cuts her no slack during a harsh winter. Worse, Tess will not be paid until after a year’s hard labor.

Bleak Farm

Bleak Farm

Coincidentally (for the plot now depends on many such twists) Tess finds Marion, her milkmaid friend, working at this inhospitable place. Not surprisingly, Izz joins them too. And when the two former milkmaids ask questions about her marriage, Tess’s replies: “No pity. No questions either. I’m just plain Tess Durbeyfield, just as before.”working-the-night-through-2

One cannot help to continue watching this trainwreck of a plot as the melodrama keeps churning. It is human nature, after all, to stand still and observe another’s misfortune. Tess goes to visit Angel’s family to ask them for help, but changes her mind. Returning to the farm, she stumbles upon a revival tent with Alec inside it. One must suspend disbelief and suppose that everyone lived within walking distance of each other, and that frequent encounters out of the blue did not seem coincidental.

Alec, the preacher

Alec, the preacher

After his mother’s death and a tussle with his soul, Alec becomes a preacher, but one look at Tess and all the faith is knocked out of him. Alec then leaves his new calling … just like that. Hans Matheson and the film’s writer try their best to interject some reality into Alec’s scenes and solicit sympathy for his character, but at this point I felt it was best just to watch the film and not make logical sense out of events as they unfolded.

Tess was put on this earth to suffer, and suffer she does, with misfortune rolling her way every time she turns around. She forfeits a year’s wages for her backbreaking work when she returns home to visit her ill father. After his death, the family must leave their leased house because, while her mother and siblings are respectable, Tess is not. The persistent Alec follows the family as they seek another lodging, stalking Tess and pressuring her to be with him. With no money, house, job, or prospects, Tess finally succumbs to his relentless advances. She has given up on Angel, believing he will never return.

i-am-his-creature-2Meanwhile Angel has been sick in Brazil and has undergone a sea change in attitude. After recovering from yellow fever, he returns home and goes on a quest to find Tess. He pays a heavy penance as he learns of her life after he abandoned her, realizing what misery she’s experienced. When he locates her in the resort town of Sandbourne, looking like the scarlet woman she’s become, she begs him to leave, crying out: “It is too late for me now, I’m already dead!” Portentous words. After coming such a long way to find her, he seems to give her up rather quickly, but Tess is made of sterner stuff.

Moment of bliss

Moment of bliss

Gemma’s beautiful features flit from innocent to worldly to distressed and angry as she convincingly plays an older and wiser Tess. She confronts Alec, who is nasty, spiteful, and possessive, and kills him. One can imagine how scandalized the Victorian reading public was with this turn of events. According to the PBS press release, “Tess of the D’Urbervilles was so shocking that Hardy had to withhold selected chapters during its first appearance in serial form.These chapters were later restored in the published volume.”

after-passion-3Tess and Angel share only two days of tender bliss as he tries to help her escape from the law. Angel is now completely on her side and will not abandon her, but Tess knows it’s too late. Instead of leaving their shelter she begs him for one more night as man and wife: “Why put an end to all this joy?” Why indeed?

Poor Tess. Poor, doomed Tess. Hunted as fugitives, she and Angel spend their last night together at Stonehenge. This stone age monolith is an appropriate setting for the denouement of a tale that is all about a clash of sleeping-as-if-in-a-tomb-2cultures in a changing age. The death imagery is a bit heavy handed in these scenes, but at this point the viewer has given up on subtletly. As the law closes in on her, Tess tearfully embraces Angel: “It couldn’t have lasted,” she said, “Too much happiness.” Which is when I drew out my hanky and bawled.

Thomas Hardy felt passionate about this novel. “To him, Tess was a symbol of rural Britain, a pagan goddess at odds with the social and technological change sweeping across England’s West Country in the late 19th century.” asleep-as-if-in-a-tomb-2(PBS Press Release) To me, her story is heart breaking. I agree with her friend Izz Huet, who concluded after speaking with Angel, “Whatever she’s done, she doesn’t deserve this.”

For sheer gut wrenching entertainment value, I give this production high marks, but as a Janeite, I can only give Hardy’s soap opera plot a grade that barely passes.

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Congé

January 11, 2009 by Vic

Turgot's Dismissal

Turgot's Dismissal

Reading novels of old, one frequently runs across vocabulary rarely used these days. Congé, a French/middle English term, refers to an abrupt dismissal. Georgette Heyer uses it whenever a bored nobleman dismisses his mistress, usually with a generous parting gift. There are also less severe connotations attached to the term, such as a formal military permission to depart, or a simple leave taking.

These key sentences will place the term in context:

At the fete [the Prince Regent] gave in June 1811 to celebrate the advent of the Regency neither his legal nor his morganatic wife were invited. Mrs. Fitzherbert had already been given her congé, and the Princess of Wales was not allowed anywhere near Carlton House. – High Society, Venetia Murray, p 21

She thinks he is infatuated. but will find out his mistake and return to her,” replied old Mrs Poyntz, who was an authority of great value having been the wildest of flirts some forty years ago. “Then I dare say she will give him his congé. Meanwhile being a very proud and clever girl/ she pretends to see nothing – ignores the whole affair.  Frank Leslie’s Pleasant Hours By Frank Leslie, 1879.

After some time of active service he obtained a congé and permission to travel,  which carried him after some wanderings to Milan, where he staid at a friend’s chateau near the city. Harper’s New Monthly Magazine By Henry Mills Alden, 1858.

Wessex himself fought a very different war, his captaincy almost a formality; a liveried carte blanche that provided him the congé to some of the circles in which he must move. A Heart for Every Fate

          Image, History of France

          Posted in jane austen, Jane Austen's World, Regency Life, Regency style, Regency World | Tagged , | 4 Comments »

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