Bronte's Wuthering Heights: Apollonian and Daemonic Influences

Most literature tells a story combining the elements of love, hate, and revenge. Everyone can relate to these universal emotions. The way in which characters deal with these emotions varies greatly. Some characters let their head rule their heart, others let their hearts overrule every objection of their head. Scholars classify these two groups as Apollonian and daemonic. Daemonic figures act on their impulses without thinking about the consequences. Controlled by their emotions, Daemonic characters live in disorder and chaos, since emotions have no stability. As Paglia points out that, "Love and hate are both equally daemonic because they are orderless, uncontrollable, and irrational" (1990:1). They cannot control their emotions and act on them causing extreme joy and extreme suffering. "The Apollonian is society's attempt to control these irrational forces, humanity's invention to control nature's chaos" (Paglia, 1990:1). Members of this group rationalize the world by classifying things, using manners, and analyzing behaviors. Clarity, restraint, and harmony characterize the Apollonian. In Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights the circular plot shows the difficulties and the extremes of Apollonian and daemonic personalities interacting can cause and the changes that need to occur to resolve the conflict. Heathcliff and Edgar inhabit opposing ends of the spectrum and Catherine gets caught in the balance. Heathcliff and Catherine fall in love, but she marries Edgar for social reasons. The differences between Catherine's dual personalities and the men each correspond to, eventually causes her death. The second generation: Hareton, Cathy, and Linton, resolves the first generation's conflicts by creating a balance between the extremes. Bronte uses Edgar to represent the Apollonian in contrast with the daemonic, represented by Heathcliff, to show the destructive nature of the extremes on Catherine, and the need for balance found in Cathy and Hareton. Edgar Linton