Gothic Structures of Being in Emily Bronte’s ‘Wuthering Heights’

Abstract

The current study attempts to uncover Gothic structures of being in Emily Bronte’s novel ‘Wuthering Heights’. The Gothic could be seen as illustrating a comeback to the mystery of the Middle Ages. We see mystery as a search for the unknown, unconscious part of the being. According to Jung, our past is always underlying the structure of our being, lurking beneath the rational, conscious mind. It is a pivotal part of our spirit, as, ‘…Without these inferior levels, our spirit is left hanging in the air’ (Jung, 1997: 41). Jung states that there is a sort of primitive fear regarding the possible contents of the unconscious, a secret terror towards the ‘perils of the soul’ (Jung, 1997: 20). It is these ‘perils’ we are trying to shed light on in the current paper, in the hope of presenting a reading of the novel that will enrich its meaning and clarify some of the mythical patterns which form the basis of the story.