Allison Connell: Final Post

While both Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights are commendable works of English literature, Bronte’s novel, with its more challenging series of plot sequences, wide range of literary devices, and deep exploration of the human psyche, would be the better choice for the classroom. Firstly, while Pride and Prejudice contains straightforward narration, characters with easily understandable motives, and “hardly suspenseful” endings, Wuthering Heights employs twists and turns, love triangles, and actions that leave the reader grasping for an explanation. Secondly, although Austen implements irony and satire very skillfully, Bronte’s use of frame narration, the Byronic hero, light versus dark symbolism, and significant perspectives is more beneficial to a group of young writers. Bronte’s superb application of these tools provides these impressionable students with worthy examples of literary devices to implement in their own writing. Finally, while Austen delivers an admirable critique of women’s limited independence in 18^th century society, these are familiar concepts to the reader and cannot compare to Bronte’s unprecedented probing voyage into human nature. Bronte takes the reader deep into the consciousness of Catherine, Heathcliff, and other characters, inviting him or her to examine their words and actions and wonder what emotions drive them to act the way they do. This journey into the very essence of the human psyche presents many interesting discussion topics that would be excellent themes to delve into in the classroom. Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, with its ability to transcend common literature’s purposes and offer a complex view into the nature of the human soul, is clearly the superior novel to analyze.

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Easton, Celia A. "How to read Jane Austen." An Introductory Talk for the First Day of ENGL 358 Major Authors: Jane Austen SUNY Geneso.

Goldstone, Herbert. "Wuthering Heights Revisited." The English Journal XLVIII (1949): 4.