The heights of Emily (III)

The literary quality of Wuthering Heights is remarkable. The use of English language is in top standards in every sense: narration, action, description, portrait. The novel even contents the experiment of Joseph's jargon. His gibberish is hardly decipherable: "Aw wonder how yah can faishion to stand thear i' idleness un war, when all on 'em's goan out!". All and all, I think that Emily could have been sensitive at the incapability of humble people of her time to speak, read and write properly, if not at all. And, precisely because of her dedication to study, along with her preference for a rural and quite life, Brontë's story was rather unique. She started as a teacher in the law school at Halifax and wrote poetry. She had to feel veneration for the English language. I don't think that the mockery of Cathy (both mother and daughter) towards the uneducated and ill-bred Heathcliff and, later, Hareton is gratuitous. The latter can hardly read the inscription at the entrance of the premises of Wuthering Heights and Cathy's taunts were about to re-write the wretched story of her mother. The fact that, dead Heathcliff, Cathy and Hareton chirp in love next to the hearth of fire while she teaches and he learns is a foremost expression of the power of love in the eyes of the romantic Emily Brontë. This detail must be important, because it is what allows re-editing the whole story in the right way.

My dear M. put name for me to a second literary resort: "media res". The novel starts at some point in the middle of the story. As a matter of fact, Wuthering Heights starts in 1801, twenty years ahead of the beginning of Ellen Dean's tale, and finishes about two years later. The tool seems not to be completely original, though, as we find it applied in Frankenstein. There, Shelley starts when Victor is saved from the Arctic ice where he was persecuting the monster. The story is written by a sailor (Victor dies finally) and also spred many years backwards and only a small time forward.

The multiple narrators is also an important feature of both novels. In Frankenstein the book is written by a sailor; in Wuthering, Mr Lockwood, Heathcliff's tenant in Thrushcross Grange. The writer, though, gives way to a second character in the course of the story to tell parts of the action: the all-efficient housekeeper Ellen Dean takes the job in Wuthering Heights, while Victor does the job in Frankenstein.

Now, although both novels share these elements, do not take for it that are comparable in quality. Wuthering Heights is far, far more brilliant, delicate, thoughtful, rich. Powerful. It is the work of an exquisite English scholar. The novel's characters are deep and profound and the land so real. You can almost smell the grass of the moor in summer, stumble across its undulations, feel the snow and the hail, to be revive next to the reviving fire. You can kneel mesmerized to the red and sunset of the spring. Feel the breeze, feel the rain. And birds, and insects and the trot of the horse. Everything is so real, so true. And all the real passions of humans within such a real environment. I wrote countless notes on the margins of my edition as I read through: "It is so, it is so". "Oh...". That was all I could say.

Furthermore, in Wuthering Heights there is not only a second narrator, but many. It is amazingly good: sometimes, in two contiguous pages there are several "I" (how many "I" are written? Thousand?), all of them referring to different narrators and, still, it made sense! I got myself to jot down all narrators and circumstances of Wuthering Heights:

1.- Mr Lockwood pays a visit to his landlord, Heathcliff. The night breeds terrible and, much dis-comfortably, he had to spend the night in Wuthering Heights. Mr. Lockwood introduces the characters. The atmosphere is hostile and gloomy.

2.- The tenant, as anyone of us might, feel the next days in "low spirits and solitude" and, seeks the conversation of nice Ellen Dean, the wonderful housekeeper. She goes back twenty years ago and starts the story.

3.- The night Heathcliff returned alone to the house after the incident of Cathy and the dog in Grange he, the boy, tells what happened.

4.- During Mr. Lockwood's convalescence, Nelly Dean continues with the story.

5.- The miserable and unhappy Isabella, unfortunately married to Heathcliff, finally escaped from the house. She sends a letter to Nelly and we know what happened from the letter... It is stunning to read Isabella confessing she was giving Heathcliff a hard time on purpose -so unhappy she was-and that she had to leave to spare her life.

6.- Then, Nelly pays a visit to Wuthering Heights.

7.- With Mr. Lockwood in convalescence, Ellen continues.

8.- Proceeds Isabella, when came to the Grange after Catherine's death. I've just realized that Cathy mother died almost immediately after Cathy daughter was born. The scene of Heathcliff under the rain in the yard, howling like a beast with sorrow, on one side; Ellen is left with a baby girl no-one cares about, on another.

9.- Ellen continues.

10.- Then it comes the story of Catherine escaping Wuthering Heights to run to the Grange and meeting Heathcliff's son, Linton and Hareton. She tells the story to a crossed and disappointed Nelly. Sooner of later, the dangers of the world that every mother -or tutor- fears for her daughter break through.

11.- Here it comes the episode of Linton's death, Cathy's father. It grips your heart. Ellen is kidnapped during four or five days, so Heathcliff can do and undo as he pleases with Cathy. The story of the developments of those days is told by Zillah. Ellen run into her in the moor sometime after. Zillah is the counter-ego of Ellen, the housekeeper of Heathcliff, but "narrow-minded and selfish". The story is in current time already.

12.- Mr Lockwood acts as a messenger-boy for Ellen, who is forbidden to see Cathy. Here it comes the scene of the letter.

12.- Mr Lockwood finishes the story. He is in business around the area and visits Wuthering Heights, about a year later. Meets Ellen: Heathcliff is dead and she tells him his final days. The final comments are Mr. Lockwood's.

(PLEASE, LEAVE YOUR COMMENT).

The heights of Emily (II)

In a sense, the transformation of the villain into the true hero in Wuthering Heights -namely, the wicked Heathcliff- is not original, nor the final unraveling of the story for the romantic period. From what we read of Emily Brontë's life, she was a diligent student. A scholar, I would say. In a moment when Romanticism had already yielded its most important creations, Emily must have known and been aware of its main trends and tricks as a well-read and studied woman. I mean: Emily Brontë fits well in the Romantic tradition. The ending of Wuthering Heights is, in my opinion, a classic one borrowed from Romanticism out of necessity, in the trail of the Frankenstein's ending. Naturally, when attention is concentrated on single individuals who step away from the crowd, it is a question of time that someone will perform a more serious exploration of personalities and individual actions, and that is, I think, the first characteristic of Emily's cutting-edge production. Camus says in The Rebel: "Much more than the cult of the individual, Romanticism inaugurates the cult of 'character'".

We can talk about the Romantic element of Wuthering Heights. Let us start from the beginning and highlight the previous point in Stabilo Boss yellow. The centrality of Wuthering Heights, its core, is the story of Heathcliff: the novel is all about his crusade as a rebel against the human's world who humiliated and despised him.

Of course, there is Love in it. Heathcliff loved Catherine in health and sickness. He had many reasons to forget about her, but he would not do it, just in the same way the boy who loves his indolent sweetheart would not do it and is bound to be miserable. On the other side, Catherine was just too real to us as a woman then. She treated Heathcliff with harshness; as a matter of fact, Catherine turned her back on him at least twice, but in two vital moments. And she did it in most harmful way for a man: by changing. Oh! How sorrowful and poisonous is for a man the experience of not recognizing the woman who has been, hitherto, his. The change, inevitably, distilled indifference  Cathy and Heathcliff were flesh and bone in the beginning; it was so until the night when they both run from the house under the rain and ended up in Thrushcross Grange. Catherine was attacked by a dog and had to stay at the Lintons, who took her in their care until her ankle healed. That night, however, Heathcliff had to return alone to Wuthering Heights, soaking wet. When Cathy came back five weeks later, she had changed: she was no longer an accomplice nor the partner of his games. And, worse, she was different.

At the time, Catherine was growing an impossible beauty. Heathcliff's pain magnifies here: first, the distance derived from someone who changes and, second, the realization of a utter impossibility to revert the situation. Catherine has learned to lie in order to have her will done, even if that means to get herself deceived. This was her perdition.

But at this point Heathcliff changed. And improved and gave her another opportunity. Exactly in the same way, Frankenstein, the monster, hidden away in a cave, learns the language of the humans and read the classics. At the same time, Heathcliff continued loving Cathy. This Love is even proclaimed at the central pages of the novel: the scene of a handsome Heathcliff and a dying Catherine Linton, both in tears, recognizing the mistake at a non-return point is told, precisely, about half-way through the novel. He is not allowed to see her and both know that Catherine will die from the encounter. I am looking now at the watercolor including in my edition of the novel, which portraits this moment. Below it it is written: "'How can I bear it', he murmured?". That is terrible; Camus says: "For the dandy [romantic rebel], to be alone is not to exist". How could Frankenstein resist without the bride he asked Victor and that he denied?

All the Romantic tradition explodes here. That was too much for them. Efforts have been done in vain and the victim is left faithless. Heathcliff could have been something, but now there is only a could-have-been. The monster of Victor Frankenstein was also good-willing until a collection of repeatable episodes of denial turned him into it. The world has been just too bad for them. The uttermost Romantic verse of Milton's Paradise Lost blasts in fury: "Evil, be Thy my Good". As Camus says, Heathcliff was willing to "put his love above God and (...) go to Hell in order to be reunited  with the woman he loves". He also says: "The romantic hero considers himself compelled to do evil by his nostalgia for impracticable good". Heathcliff destroys everyone who had hurt him, devastating everything and using everyone in his way to the most atrocious consequences, starting from his son Linton. Once Heathcliff's will is fulfilled -he is the only heir of both houses and the last man standing- the evil fire that prompted his transformation ceases and his life stops making sense. In the same way, the beast of Frankenstein burns himself in the ice of the Arctic once Victor passes away; in the same way, the Terminator terminates himself in melted metal after O'Connor is safe. And so, Heathcliff abandons himself to die. This is a powerful element of Romanticism: once the labor is done, the hero has no more reason to exist.

But, of course, after the tempest, the sea rests... . And from the most devastating land and grayish sky new forms of life emerge and the sun comes to shine again.


Wuthering Heights finishes so tenderly:

"I sought, and soon discovered, the three head-stones on the slope next the moor: the middle one grey, and half-buried in heath; Edgar Linton's only harmonized by the turf and the moss creeping up its foot; Heathcliff's still bare.

I lingered round them, under that benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath and hare-bells, listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass, and wondered how any one could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth".


(PLEASE, LEAVE YOUR COMMENT).

The heights of Emily (I)

Wuthering Heights is probably one of the best novels I've read so far. The way it is written, all its originality, its literary excellence and its rich and deep exhibition of human experiences _all makes Emily Brontë's only novel a master piece. I enjoyed its reading a lot, in form and content: a worn edition with red hard-covers that my dear M. and I found in a thrift's market in Camden Town for a little more than the price of one half-pint.

Emily was only 28 when she wrote the novel. Soon afterwards, she died from tuberculosis, "the romantic disease par excellence", as my friend A. commented last week. It leaves me in awe the fact that an extremely shy girl from Yorkshire could have had such knowledge on the human passions, sorrows and desires, particularly the evil ones. We read of her interests and hobbies, her little travels with her sister and her reduced circle of acquaintances and, certainly: it is not like the old rock start, partner of all imaginable sins, recently rehabilitated and telling the world the secrets that Itself (us) does covet but fear.

It is amazing: the depth of Wuthering Height's characters, the detailed accounts of their feelings and reactions, the very pace of the narration _all this work is absolutely unique for a woman of Emily's age, an indisputable gift to the woman she must have been. Really: is there anyone who could say where and how she got all this knowledge from? It is not only a question of material knowledge, we know. Life is an experiential journey; that is why people wish to travel and socialize and make new friends and meet people: they don't want to miss out anything. There is no more peace for the trouble soul these days that the advice from an old and battered poor devil, who has lived and is coming back home. However, Emily wrote like someone who already knew, who already has been there. Again: how could she know that much?

(PLEASE, LEAVE YOUR COMMENT).

Top performer

It is 5 pm. I need to leave in ten minutes if I want to be on time. The library is crowded, packed with brain-washed, selfish but gregarious students drinking from the vanity waters of London. I am in a rush, and I tend to be edgy and grumpy when I am in a rush. Sometimes do not. Sometimes do. I mean... You know... . I need to print large documents and, although there are four printers, the area is ground zero for jumpiness. Of course, the main tray runs out of paper just in my turn. It sucks paper from another, but goes slowly. The guy behind me has already sent his job and becomes nervous. I become nervous. "It is going to take a while... Let me see... How do you open the tray door?"; "I've already sent the job"; "Perhaps you can use this other printer (I point out)"; "I've already sent the job; just one page... How long is it gonna take?"; "(hotter) It is going to take a while; it is a long document and there is no paper in the main try... How do you open the... tray?"; "(hot sigh) I've already sent the job".

The guy suddenly jerks away. In a minute, he shows up back and walks toward the machine opposite to mine. "Excuse me...". The girl printing her work there (it takes just 60 heart-beats to have an available machine occupied again) reluctantly moves back a quarter of an inch and the guy sends his job again in the second machine... But the girl is taking longer than I. Her machine is going slower, desperately slower. Suddenly, students start coming out from the corners of the ground, from underneath tables, chairs and the borrow/renew placards,  I swear I saw them diffusing through the walls from outside. The population soars up to a million. Noise, noise, noise. Something goes wrong with the second machine. The maintenance guy shows up. My heart pounds fast, "c'mon, c'mon, relax, there is no need...". I am really scare of myself in panicking situations. How would have I behaved if I had been on board the Titanic? Oh, horror! I am just another George Constanza pushing away children and old aunties struggling in baby-walkers while screaming: "Fire! Fire!".

I finish. I finish! The chaos is considerable. I haven't seen something like that since the time I visited the Spanish Consulate in London to renew my passport. How is it possible people can feel any pinch of comfort in such gregarious atmosphere? It is the point where the entire social network, from the Zulu Islands to Azerbaijan, has become flesh!

I check that my documents are complete and notice that the last page is not mine. Of course, it is the guy's just-one-page. I sigh in relieve. At least... . I look around but I cannot find the guy. Does he have left? I would understand if he got crossed and said "f***, s***, f*** them, come back later". Would it he? I look down to the last sheet of paper. A circle mark is on the top, centered: "FIND YOUR DREAM JOB". And below: "The Top Performer's Agreement: I ______________ accept the challenge of becoming a top performer by committing to the following six key tenets:". "What is this?" I say: "what...?". I fly off my eyes down to the bottom: "Please print and sign this agreement and fax it back to me at XXX-XXX-XXXX or email it to me at XXXXX@XXXXX.XXX with the subject line, "Top Performers Agreement". Oh... . I feel curious now, surprised. This was something I have never come across with and started to wonder what purpose someone could have by offering this idea out and, conversely, taking it. I still don't know. All one can get when popping in the web page displayed in the mail is this: http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/dreamjob/. Pffff!... No comment.

"Where is this guy? Where has he gone?". The guy is gone, gone, gone. I eye then at the key rules to become a top performer. A total of six simple rules. The sixth: "I will honor the 5 hours a week I committed to complete this strategically-designed course and (...)". The fifth: "I will not quit when things get challenged (...)"... LOL... Well, the guy is gone, is he not? I wouldn't honor much something that did not operate any change on me: the first little challenge, and I did give up.

(PLEASE, LEAVE YOUR COMMENT).

A pair of trainers

On the verge of me coming to London, there was a period of a couple of months -maybe less- when I could not stop watching Carly Simon singing Nobody Does it Better. Summer -had to be summer- of 87, off the cost of Massachusetts, in Martha's Vineyard. Happy and exciting days. The woman cast a spell on me -her slim figure, her long, long hair, "bright hair flapping free" and the enormous contour of her lips giving birth to an all-welcoming smile. Imperfection was doubtless blessed and blessing. Simon's body and motions wrote in the book of innocence. It was the very same innocence that overcomes some people's eyes when looking at a new, to-be-discovered stage of life. The same innocence twinkling in mine.

There was something sensational in a fragile-looking woman wearing unaffected trainers. As a kid, such footwear was the humble attribute of fruiterers and fishmongers and, for the same, you had to oppose it and wear the more sophisticated brand of All Star Converse. It was the clear distinction of the past against the future, the youth against the old, success against failure.

There is nothing like having to travel long distances in the tube constantly (I think I could say which line I am with blind eyes just from the way the seats feel in my buttocks) to see now young people, beautiful women and fashionable guys wearing the base-line trainers... Ahhh... The river is the same, I guess... Touching and rubbing, wetting and flowing around a different skin, I guess.

(PLEASE, LEAVE YOUR COMMENT).

The in-out inter-flow theory

I don't really know the history. Whether Stanislavsky's method was a reaction to something or a new creation; whether its concept was original or a follow-up I don't know. I am not familiar with the school, either. Got to read. I only recall what the gossip -boisterously, perhaps- has propagated: that it is a mode of interpretation based on the recollection by the actor of emotions previously experienced. The actor, thus, must dig deep down his memories and tribulations in life in order to find and rescue the suitable guts for the role in the play and bring them to the surface for display on the stage. If such experiences cannot be found in the past, the actor must -what else if not- live them up in the present, somehow. The mythical stories of actors or writers incarnating a second personality are countless and the percentage of those who become nuts is not negligible. So they say. The actor on the stage, consequently, abandons himself -his flesh, bones, character and spirit are truly put on a loan. The character is born from the inside and takes the actor's body almost in hostage.

As a opposed, the classical conception of the character -again, my judgement is based on hearsay- is built on the idea that everything that happens in the core of a human being is reflected on his outer crust and, thus, a credible impersonation of the character can be achieved by emulating his body language, facial expressions or overall externalization of emotions without sharing at all the causes and inner discourse that are at the root of such expressions. The actor is, certainly, himself, never forgets he is Paul or John or Ellie playing the game at being a different person. As a matter of fact, the origins of the word "persona" are in the masks the old Greek comedians used on the stage to play different characters. We see here that the classical conception implies that an actor is simply a professional doing his work, as a carpenter fixes furniture or a mechanic repairs cars. At the end of the show, the actor undresses and leave the skin of Richard the Third or Julius Caesar in the hanger of the dressing room. The character is a mere outflow recreation.

I don't think that any of both conceptions (the inner and the outer representations) excludes the other. I would only say at this point, though, that the classic one makes some more sense to me in most cases. Actors are definitely not the saviors of the world, nor the pundits of the human nature, holding any substantial or reserve piece of knowledge that makes them any bit special. That you have to be somewhat sick to be an actor or different is pure crap. You got to have some skills to be an actor, that is true, skills that would make you a poor air-traffic controller or a poor methodical researcher, for example, but that does not imply that the actor is anything more than the rest of mortals.

So, lets' just say it makes sense: you study the rules, you practice and follow them and you play a game on the stage.

**

I have mentioned some time before that it seems to be in fashion the idea that to be an efficient communicator -whatever that means- or, even, a successful teacher, you have to rely on certain acting skills. In other words, there is a significant number of advocates of the classic, superficial theory for communication purposes. As such, presentations, lessons or negotiations are -not only, but significantly- a matter of appearance, a shiny and well-maintained facade. Well, I disagree. Don't you? What this world is suffering from is an excess of cretinism; what it is missing, a good load of genuine hearts. We are in darkness and we miss the light that only a human touch can provide. Being touch and flipped by another! Being transformed by another! What a wondrous vital experience. For that, only the in-to-out theory works: a new beast must break through our pitiful and pretentious selves. Those were the old fathers of the ancient times; those, the couple of masters that we all had at school and that we dearly remember.

(PLEASE, LEAVE YOUR COMMENT).