Tabitha Adams - English
this is the height of Heathcliff’s anguish as an outsider, which mars and embitters his character
forever.
Many of Heathcliff’s despicable deeds in his adulthood stem from a desire to assert himself as
an insider, in a place where as a child he was excluded and deprived and so to take revenge on
his enemies who afforded him this deprivation. He says in Chapter 20, “I want the triumph of
seeing my descendant fairly lord of their estates: my child hiring their children to till their
fathers’ land for wages” 16 . Both Heathcliff and Odysseus seek revenge on those who have
wronged them, and both succeed in taking revenge on the society which has deprived them.
This triumph over the society in which they are cast as an outsider enables us to view them as
the hero- Odysseus slaughters the suitors and regains his kingdom and Heathcliff, defies the
oppression and constraints of Victorian society and is able to monopolize both Wuthering
Heights and The Grange. Moreover, as an outsider both heroes endure a considerable amount
of suffering, evoking admiration and sympathy from the reader and contributing to our view of
them as heroes.
Through the literary device of their unconventional heroes, Brontë and Homer were challenging
not only literary conventions but also the conventions of their contemporary societies.
Odysseus, through his suffering, degradation and treatment as an outsider is forced to a base
level of humanity. By making an example of Odysseus’ spiritual humbling, Homer is able to
challenge flaws in both the heroic way of life and the Homeric society. Homer challenges the
values of the contemporary society in Book 19 when Odysseus, disguised still as a beggar, is
offered comforts at the palace by his wife. He refuses them declaring, “I have a dislike of
blankets and gleaming rugs… So I will lie just as I have often lain … For many’s the night I’ve
spent in some wretched place... Nor does the prospect of having my feet washed appeal to
me.” 17 This former king, rejecting even the smallest luxuries, challenges the materialism and
indulgence of his contemporary society and calls for a more basic lifestyle. Homer uses
Odysseus, a hero and king, a person of the highest order, to look critically upon the ways of
society by subverting Odysseus’ authority through disguising him as a beggar.
Homer makes an important defiance to heroic convention in Book 22 when Odysseus
slaughters the suitors. At first Odysseus seems suddenly to exhibit the conventional bloody
ferocity of a Homeric hero. He is described in Book 22 as “among the corpses of the dead,
spattered with blood and gore, like a lion when he comes feeding” 18 , this very vivid and
animalistic image of Odysseus would relate him to a hero such as Achilles but crucially,
16
Pg. 151, Brontë, Wuthering Heights
Pg. 258, Homer, The Odyssey
18
Pg. 298, Homer, The Odyssey
17
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