Editing Wuthering Heights (section)

=== Class and money ===
Lockwood arrives at Thrushcross Grange in 1801, a time when, according to Q.D. Leavis, "the old rough farming culture, based on a naturally patriarchal family life, was to be challenged, tamed and routed by social and cultural changes". At this date the [[Industrial Revolution]] was well under way, and was by 1847 a dominant force in much of England, and especially in [[West Yorkshire]]. This caused a disruption in "the traditional relationship of social classes" with an expanding upwardly mobile middle-class, which created "a new standard for defining a gentleman", and challenged the traditional criteria of breeding and family and the more recent criterion of character.<ref name="cuny">{{cite web |date=13 October 2011 |title=Wuthering Heights as Socio-Economic Novel |url=http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/novel_19c/wuthering/economic.html |access-date=11 November 2024 |website=academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu}}</ref>

Marxist critic [[Arnold Kettle]] sees ''Wuthering Heights'' "as a symbolic representation of the class system of 19th-century England", with its concerns "with property-ownership, the attraction of social comforts", marriage, education, religion, and social status.<ref>Arnold Kettle, ''An Introduction to the English Novel'', vol. 1 London: Harpers, 1951, p. 110.</ref> Driven by a pathological hatred Heathcliff uses against his enemies "their own weapons of money and arranged marriages", as well as "the classic methods of the ruling class, expropriation and property deals".<ref>Arnold Kettle, ''An Introduction to the English Novel'', p. 110.</ref>

Later, another Marxist, [[Terry Eagleton]], in ''Myths of Power: A Marxist Study of the Brontës'' (London: McMillan, 1975), further explores the power relationships between "the landed gentry and aristocracy, the traditional power-holders, and the capitalist, industrial middle classes". Haworth in the [[West Riding]] of Yorkshire was especially affected by changes to society and its class structure "because of the concentration of large estates and industrial centers" there.<ref name= cuny />

==== Race ====
There has been debate about Heathcliff's race or ethnicity. In the novel Heathcliff is first described as a "dark-skinned gipsy" in appearance with "black eyes", as well as later being said to be "as white as the wall behind him"<ref name=Bronte/>{{rp|21}} and "pale...with an
expression of mortal hate.".<ref name=Bronte/>{{rp|243}} Mr Linton, the Earnshaws' neighbour, suggests that he might be "a little [[Lascar]] (a 19th-century term for Indian sailors;<ref name="Onanuga"/>), or an American or Spanish castaway".<ref name=Bronte>{{cite book|last=Brontë|first=Emily|author-link=Emily Brontë|title=Wuthering Heights|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780199209286|publisher=Oxford World's Classics|date=1998|orig-year=1847|editor-last=Jack|editor-first=Ian|isbn=978-0192833549}}</ref>{{rp|44}}  Mr Earnshaw calls him "as dark almost as if it came from the devil",<ref name="Brontë Chapter 4"/> and Nelly Dean speculates fancifully regarding his origins thus: "Who knows but your father was Emperor of China, and your mother an Indian queen?"<ref>{{cite book |last=Brontë |first=Emily |title=Wuthering Heights |url=https://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Emily_Bronte/Wuthering_Heights/Chapter_VII_p4.html |page=chapter VII, p 4 |access-date=30 May 2020}}</ref> Novelist [[Caryl Phillips]] suggests that Heathcliff may have been an escaped slave, noting the similarities between the way Heathcliff is treated and the way slaves were treated at the time: he is referred to as "it", his name "served him" as both his "Christian and surname",<ref name="Brontë Chapter 4" /> and Mr Earnshaw is referred to as "his owner".<ref>Caryl Philips, A Regular Black: The Hidden Wuthering Heights, dir. by Adam Low (Lone Star Productions, 2010).</ref> Maja-Lisa von Sneidern states that "Heathcliff's racial otherness cannot be a matter of dispute; Brontë makes that explicit", further noting that "by 1804 Liverpool merchants were responsible for more than eighty-four percent of the British transatlantic slave trade."<ref>[[Lecturer]] Maja-Lisa von Sneidern, "''Wuthering Heights'' and the Liverpool Slave Trade". ''[[ELH]]'', vol. 62, no. 1 (Spring 1995), p. 172</ref> Michael Stewart sees Heathcliff's race as "ambiguous" and argues that Emily Brontë "deliberately gives us this missing hole in the narrative".<ref>{{cite journal|last1=O'Callaghan|first1=Claire|last2=Stewart|first2=Michael|date=2020|title=Heathcliff, Race and Adam Low's Documentary, A Regular Black: The Hidden Wuthering Heights (2010)|journal=Brontë Studies|volume=45|issue=2|pages=156–167|doi=10.1080/14748932.2020.1715045|s2cid=213118293|url=https://figshare.com/articles/journal_contribution/11359529 |via=TandF Online}}</ref>