A comparison that I noticed was the striking similarities between Heathcliff’s relationship with Catherine and Pip’s relationship with Estella. Both relationships revolve around two individuals with strong class rivalries. Pip, for example, comes from poor or working class roots like Heathcliff, and is able to obtain finances in an attempt to be ‘good enough’ for his significant other just like him. Nevertheless, however much money they gain, neither men are able to acquire the love of their crushes in the longterm.

The main difference between the two is the emotions of their significant others. Estella, for example, is depicted as heartless, and does not feel anything for him, even though he is now a wealthy man. She says, ““Oh! I have a heart to be stabbed in or shot in, I have no doubt,” said Estella, “and of course if it ceased to beat I should cease to be. But you know what I mean. I have no softness there, no—sympathy—sentiment—nonsense” (Chapter 29 Paragraph 70). Even though he has gained money, he is not “old money” and is therefore still below her. The same can be seen in Wuthering Heights, where Catherine, who feels passionate emotions for Heathcliff, also feels like Edgar Linton is the safer, more socially acceptable match. Catherine’s strong emotions are even seen at the height of her illness, and main similarity between her passionate love for Heathcliff and Estella and Pip’s story is that they end up apart. Even though both relationships started in childhood, it seems like Pip’s relationship is a lot more one-sided than Heathcliff’s feelings for Catherine.

A common theme I see in both Wuthering Heights and Great Expectations is identity. In Wuthering Heights Heathcliff is an orphan with no identity and seeks it out in Catherine, and in Great Expectations Pip is being raised by his sister and seeks out his identity after being introduced to Estella. Pip is confused about his own life he does not understand his expectations or who he is. He is uncertain where he came from and where he is going much like Heathcliff and his self-discovery journey. Estella made Pip want to become a different man. He realized that his social status made him fall far below Estella, which is something he went out to change, much like Heathcliff did for Catherine. Both boys are abused by the people who raise them and feel betrayed by the world, they seek out the greater things in life like money, love, and identity but both are met with people who require them to change completely. They have very elite women in their lives that shape their identities.

In both Wuthering Heights and Great Expectations, the audience sees the novels’ respective protagonists, Catherine and Pip, rise from “obscurity” and “coarseness” to higher social stations. For Catherine, this advancement in social standing occurs as a result of her marriage to Linton, a man she does not truly love. Catherine recognizes that as Mrs. Linton she will be rich, proud of her husband, and “the greatest woman of the neighborhood.” These reasons display the more selfish aspects of Catherine’s characterization and perhaps demonstrate the inherent selfishness of desiring to rise in society’s ranks in the name of pride and pride only. However, Catherine later reveals that her motive for marrying Linton is not entirely selfish, as her decision is not merely informed by her pridefulness and desire to be wealthy and highly esteemed. Rather, in marrying Linton, Catherine endeavors to raise not only herself from her coarse and disenfranchised situation at Wuthering Heights but seeks to lift Heathcliff from the same conditions, as well. Indeed, Catherine tells Nelly that her marriage with Linton will free Heathcliff from her “brother’s power” and that, if she were to marry Heathcliff instead of Linton, they would be beggars. Catherine has great expectations, for herself and Heathcliff, and is willing to sacrifice her own happiness and integrity in order to ensure that the two will eventually meet the great expectations she establishes for them. Upon the novel’s close, it appears that Catherine’s great expectations have been met, though the reader must wonder: at what cost? While Catherine was able to experience an ephemeral moment as “the greatest woman of the neighborhood” and while Heathcliff rose out from under Hindley’s thumb, the two ultimately die tragically. However, they are reunited in death and freed from the societal constricts and plots that initially separated them.

Pip also creates great expectations for himself, though he believes that these great expectations have been assigned to him. While Pip is assigned a guardian and an anonymous sponsor who supports his transformation into a gentleman, Pip truly begins this transformation far earlier in the novel, when Estella first chastises him for his coarseness and thick boots. After this moment, Pip begins to resent his humble upbringing and seeks to become a gentleman, instead of a blacksmith, despite being apprenticed to Joe. Thus, Pip sets great expectations for himself and begins to distance himself emotionally from those he perceives as unrefined, such as Joe and Biddy, who nevertheless love him fiercely. Pip ultimately, through the prodding of his guardianship and sponsorship, sets off for London to formally begin his training as a gentleman. Since the novel is told from the perspective of an older Pip, there is a fair amount of reflection embedded within the novel, thus, the reader is privy to some of Pip’s regrets regarding his behavior and his establishment and pursuit of his great expectations. Indeed, there is a sense of regret imbued within each of these reflections, particularly those surrounding Pip’s treatment of Joe and Biddy.

Thus, both Catherine and Pip illustrate the danger of great expectations. Though both characters sought to improve their social situations, their motives were in part selfish, and while one might consider their desire to raise their social standings as a byproduct of an unjust, hierarchical society, the benefits of their social improvement are ultimately offset by the loss, however temporary, of loved ones that Catherine and Pip both experience. Indeed, Catherine, in marrying Linton, inadvertently sends Heathcliff away for many years and sacrifices what might have been a happy, albeit poor, life with her soulmate for a brief, though comfortable one with Linton. While I have not yet completed Great Expectations and cannot know how Pip’s relationships with Joe and Biddy will turn out, I know that Pip does not intend to visit either during his time home, choosing to spend the entire trip with Estella, instead. Perhaps Pip will succeed where Catherine failed and recognize that true love reaps more benefits than the great expectations of rising in a flimsy society, itself built on unjust principles.

Once again, strong parallels can be formed between the central characters of Wuthering Heights and Great Expectations. In the content of this week’s chapters, this is most notable in Pip and Heathcliff’s rise in social class. Both have similar lowly backgrounds and rise through Victorian societies to positions of greater respect and value. Additionally, both seem to be motivated by both their upbringing, but also an external love, Catherine and Estella. The repetition of this plot device across both novels may give us insights into Victorian class and society.

One of the most crucial parallels between Heathcliff and Pip’s rise is in their purpose. Once again, both looked to better themselves in the eyes of Catherine or Estella. Both made a triumphant return to their hometown, after spending considerable time away to reinvent themselves. And both were disappointed when they returned, as all of their work to better their social standing did not completely award them with everything they looked to gain, much to their surprise.

This last parallel is of great interest to me. Both Bront and Dickens seem to suggest that Victorian society in the eyes of a commoner is a ladder. They believe that by climbing and raising themselves up, they will earn everything they look for, in this case, Catherine or Estella. However, while wealth and position are acquired by both Heathcliff and Pip, neither is able to completely win over their love. They are hyper-focused on rising through Victorian society, believing status alone is how they prove themselves. Still, Estelia and Catherine are not perfect parallels as characters, but the relationships they share with a young Pip and Heathcliff have strong similarities.

In reading of Pip’s ascent to fortune and gentleman status, I am reminded of Heathcliff’s ascent in Wuthering Heights. Both Pip and Heathcliff are propelled to a higher social status at a young age with the help of a benefactor–that is, (most likely) Ms. Havisham in Pip’s case and Mr. Earnshaw in Heathcliff’s. Both characters come from a background in which they were once orphans, though Pip has living familial connections whereas Heathcliff was left to fend for himself on the streets before Mr. Earnshaw brought him back to the Heights.

I am sensing a Victorian motif in the form of “the benefactor,” though Dickens and Bronte take a pretty unrealistic approach to the concept—it is as if both authors are writing of benefactors in an imagined, idealized way instead of as they would exist in real life. It is pretty hard to imagine a case in which a perfect stranger would endow penniless boys with the comfort of a high-class life purely out of the goodness of their heart’s, as is essentially the case in both novels. It should be noted that in Great Expectations, there is a certain social status that comes from being a benefactor as is evidenced by Pumblechook trying to take credit for Pip’s social elevation.

With all of this in mind, I think the argument can be made to look at the role of the benefactor in both novels not as a representation of actual life in Victorian England, but rather as an imagined dream of the working class during the time. The real world doesn’t just plant rich men who want to make you rich on your doorstep, but the thought that this could happen must have been comforting to poor working class people. From this viewpoint, the benefactor is not a real person, but rather an imagined reality in which any of us could be like Pip and score big…pay no mind to the legislative, social, and societal road blocks that squash these dreams as soon as they are put into action.

Although we don’t get the full story of Miss Havisham’s past, Herbert does tell Pip some things about her that he didn’t previously know, shedding a little bit of light onto her obscure past. We find out that the man she was supposed to marry, swindled her out of some money before leaving her at the altar. This scheme was devised by the man and Miss Havisham’s half brother Arthur, who apparently did not like her much. This story just reminded me so much of Heathcliff and his behavior of revenge against his adopted brother Hindley. He didn’t like the man so much that he vowed to exact revenge by any means possible and harbored these negative feelings around with him which ultimately led to the destruction of any relationship he had or could have had. It is definitely interesting to see how people cope with these traumas and find ways to manipulate others to fit their agendas, no matter the cost.

While everything about Ms. Havisham is greatly interesting, nothing could be more fascinating about her than the clocks that surround her. These clocks are not ticking, but rather, are stuck on a specific time (8:40), which would be precisely when she was left at the altar. The pause is literally representative that her wedding never happened, but even presently, Ms. Havisham’s wedding has never happened. She is quite literally stuck in the moment before her wedding, and she thus acts as both a bride and not a bride, and in that contradiction, she is neither. Simply put, the ritual that would have caused her title to change from Ms. to Mrs. never happened, and the aberrance of the ritual that would have kept her Ms. never happened either. She exists caught between those two facts. All of this is not unlike Heathcliff, who after Catherine’s death exists between both life and death. However, Heathcliff is more proactive than Ms. Havisham as he recognizes he is caught in a liminal space, and seeks to do everything he can to complete the ritual of his love, even going so far as to unearth Catherine’s body. But even further than that, Heathcliff effectively kills himself so that he may escape the torturous liminality he exists in, that of being unable to fulfill his love for Catherine and also being unable to dispel his love for Catherine. Liminality exists definitively within both of these books, and it will be interesting to see how Ms. Havisham deals with her own precarious standing in contrast to how Heathcliff dealt with his.

As I was reading the chapters for this week, I was struck by something in Herbert’s story. In chapter 22, he explains to Pip the tragedy of Miss Havisham and the wedding that never was. In his description of Miss Havisham’s bridegroom, Herbert seems to indicate that the man had little money or status, and that he was really supported by Miss Havisham. I was surprised by this because Herbert makes no explicit reference to the class difference between the couple, only references it through other comments. He doesn’t say anything about the marriage being taboo, and nothing else in his story or the book up to this point indicates this either. I had expected this to cause at least a few issues, but it didn’t.

Perhaps why I was so prepared for the class divide to be focused on more than it is in these chapters of Great Expectations is because it was such a significant obstacle in Wuthering Heights. Cathy married Edgar because he was of her class, and therefore suited to her. But Cathy did not love Edgar, she loved Heathcliff. In a conversation with Nelly, she states that she wants to be with Heathcliff, and wants to marry him, but that doing so would shame her. This in effect, is really the main driving force of Wuthering Heights. I just expected the reaction to be similar in Great Expectations; at least significant enough for Herbert to mention in his story.

While reading Great Expectations, Estella’s description stood out to me. In line 15 of chapter 22, she is described as being “brought up by Miss Havisham to wreak revenge on all the male sex.” Due to heartbreak from Compeyson leaving her, Miss Havisham lived a vengeful life. After adopting Estella, Miss Havisham decided to use her to get revenge on men and raised her to view men negatively. This passage instantly reminded me of Catherine from Wuthering Heights.

In Wuthering Heights, Catherine is described as being a strong woman who did not depend on men. Although her goal was not to wreak revenge on men, she wished to obtain a high role in society which would allow her to have power over men. Even from a young age, Catherine was described as being “the queen of the country-side; she had no peer; and she did turn out a haughty, headstrong creature!” (Wuthering Heights, Chapter 8) Many women who lived during the Victorian Era were described as being dainty and obedient to the men in their lives, but Catherine did not fit this description. Similarly to Miss Havisham and Estella, she was unwilling to live a timid life. This lifestyle led her to become a strong female character that many women from the Victorian Era looked up to.

In chapters 20-29 of Great Expectations, readers discover that Miss Havisham once came very close to marrying a man that she loved deeply, but when it came time to marry, her fiance stood her up and stole her money. He had been scheming alongside Miss Havisham’s half-brother who did not have a good relationship with Miss Havisham or their father. Ever since, Miss Havisham has been heartbroken and bound to her house. Her heartbreak explains her strange behavior: her staying inside, eating alone, stopping the clocks, wearing her wedding dress and her obsession with bringing Pip and Estella together. I think this can be paralleled with the actions of certain men in Wuthering Heights. Specifically, I find Miss Havisham’s situation to be similar to Catherine’s situation in Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff, in an effort to gain property and power, decides to manipulate Isabella Linton into marrying him at which point things reach at breaking point at Thrushcross Grange. Linton comes home and demands that Heathcliff leaves and yells at Catherine for engaging with Heathcliff. As a result, Catherine decides to lock herself in her room, practically starve herself and drive herself mad. In both novels, there are men that do whatever it takes to gain money/power and women suffer as a result. Miss Havisham suffers from heartbreak at the hands of her ex-fiance while Catherine suffers from an inner turmoil as a result of her husband and Heathcliff’s abhorrence of each other. I thought that this parallel between the novels was interesting to note because it could be indicative of a shared viewpoint of the two authors. Perhaps the men’s aggressive pursuit of money/power could be evidence of these authors’ condemnation of capitalism. In further research about Dickens I found that while his novels weren’t politically subversive and he wasn’t explicitly anti-capitalism, he was known to expose the ills of Victorian Society in his writing. Bronte was known to have grown up in a non-conformist community and seems to show her outward rejection of Victorian society in multiple ways throughout Wuthering Heights.