Characters / Wuthering Heights

Heathcliff

Heathcliff

• Abusive Parents: To Linton and Hareton.
• Ambiguously Human: See Changeling Tale below. Isabella's letter to Nelly perfectly encapsulates this sentiment: "Is Mr. Heathcliff a man? If so, is he mad? If not, is he a devil?"
• Ambiguously Brown: Heathcliff's race is never clear; he is referred to as "dark" and a "gipsy." He might be literally Romani, but it could equally be that people just don't know what else to call him. At one point Nelly fancifully speculates that he could be the son of the Emperor of China and an Indian queen. Mr. Earnshaw returned with Heathcliff after a trip to Liverpool, which at the time (the 1760s) was a huge port city and the slave-trading capital of Britain. While Heathcliff's not, in Nelly's words, "a regular black", he might be black-biracial. The idea that he's some sort of biracial is also aided by the popular theory that he's actually Mr. Earnshaw's bastard son. Heathcliff simultaneously dips into tropes like Roguish Romani, Scary Black Man, and Mixed Ancestry Is Attractive.
• Bastard Bastard: Whether or not Mr. Earnshaw is his actual father, he has the status of a bastard; note that he has no surname. On top of that, Heathcliff's an absolute asshole.
• Betty and Veronica: The Veronica to Edgar Linton's Betty.
• Byronic Hero: Heathcliff is perhaps one of the most famous examples of Byronic hero: he starts out as a dark, outsider antihero, lonely and demonic. He may very well be one of the earliest deconstructions, as he increasingly lacks the sympathetic side of the classical Byronic hero as he indulges in further depravity for the sake of revenge and greed, becoming an outright Villain Protagonist.
• Changeling Tale: The story toys from time to time with whether or not Heathcliff is a supernatural being, a possibility supported by the fact that he is named after an Earnshaw son who died before the start of the story. Heathcliff's mysterious origins, his tendency to cause mischief, and the fact that he's a replacement for a deceased child draw a lot of parallels to traditional changeling folklore.
• The Chessmaster: To his credit, he manages to fool everyone to his own advantage, making him the richest man of the region while being neither a Linton nor an Earnshaw.
• Childhood Friend Romance: With Cathy, which may or may not be a case of Surprise Incest. It's safe to say that, in either case, said love is unhealthily passionate and lacks the heartwarming side usually provided by a childhood romance.
• Dark and Troubled Past: He lost his mother at a young age under some unclear circumstances, then was bullied by his adoptive brother (and later legal guardian) Hindley for most of his childhood. Later in his life, he makes a point of proving that anyone in his shoes would turn out as bad as him. And it spectacularly fails.
• Dark Is Evil: His dark skin, hair, and eyes are often portrayed by the book as a Red Right Hand reflecting his darkness of his soul.
• Deadpan Snarker: He has a sardonic sense of humour that fits a Byronic hero like him.
• Death by Despair: According to Nellie Dean, he basically lost interest in life and wanted to join Cathy as soon as possible.
• Did Not Get the Girl: And boy, everyone will pay for this.
• Domestic Abuse: He's emotionally and sexually abusive to Isabella during their marriage. Poor Isabella is the shadow of her former self after her marriage, and leaves him as soon as she can.
• Driven to Suicide: He basically let himself die, as he lost interest in his revenge and generally in life. He wanted to be reunited with Cathy.
• Evil Gloating: He occasionally does this to Nellie, gloating about how well his revenge is going and knowing there's nothing she can do.
• Evil Orphan: He was abandoned as a small child, and he's very evil.
• Evil Uncle: He's technically Cathy's uncle by marriage, as Cathy herself notes before finding out his true colours. Also, he's again technically this to Hareton, either if he was Hindley's foster brother or his bastard brother.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Through a combination of forced marriages, alcohol, and bribery, Heathcliff becomes the master of Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange despite not being a blood member of the Earnshaw or Linton families.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: Played with; while his attitude towards Lockwood can hardly be described as pleasant, there are some hints that Heathcliff is tired of his life of hatred and bitterness and, having finally met someone who doesn't know his past and who doesn't hate him on sight (or vice versa), is for once reaching out to try and form some kind of connection with someone else, however ineptly.
• It's All About Me: It's debatable whether he is an example of this or not, since he doesn't really care if most others are happy, but still very much gravitates around people. When he cannot center his life around being with Cathy, he starts obsessing over getting revenge on everyone.
• Jerkass: Prone to sadistically hurting people who have nothing to do with his vengeance and enjoying it.
• Kick the Dog: Literally. He hangs Isabella's dog for no reason.
• Lack of Empathy: He very often expresses his bewilderment at people who imagine that he will adopt a perfectly understandable and legitimate behavior towards them.

• Love Makes You Evil: His all-consuming obsession with Catherine drives him to commit evil acts.
• Manipulative Bastard: He easily exploits Hindley's alcoholism, Isabella's infatuation for him, and Catherine (II)'s ingenuity to make his elaborate plan of revenge on the Earnshaws and the Lintons.
• Marital Rape License: He is strongly implied to have raped Isabella during their short marriage.
• Masochism Tango: He and Catherine delight in emotionally hurting each other out of jealousy. In their last scene together before her death, in which they passionately embrace, they also physically hurt each other. Heathcliff grips Catherine's arm so tightly that he leaves bruises, while Catherine tightly clasps his hair.
• Meaningful Name: "Heathcliff", which brings to mind the wild and unrestrained natural setting of the moors.
• Meaningless Villain Victory: He ruins the lives of the Earnshaws and Lintons, but draws no joy from his victories and dies a bitter, empty man.
• Morality Pet: Heathcliff has one in Cathy (I). Downplayed, as she is no paragon of virtue, and their relationship amounts to The Masochism Tango. But he is tamer with her around, shows empathy to her alone, and becomes a truly terrible person after he loses her for good.
• Moses in the Bulrushes: Found on the streets of Liverpool at age seven by Mr. Earnshaw and the man brought him home. At least this is what he told. Some critics have argued that Heathcliff could have very well been Mr. Earnshaw's illegitimate son, as he casually happens to find him in the streets and casually names him with a typical Earnshaw name and his wife casually takes an instant dislike for the boy.
• Mysterious Past: For all of Heathcliff's life that we do know, he's still made of this trope. We don't know anything about his early years, to age seven or so, or why he couldn't speak English when he first came to the Heights, or what his name might have been before that time. The mystery only deepens in the three years he spends away from the Heights and somehow has made himself so rich in that time that he's bought the house from under Hindley's nose.
• Obnoxious In-Laws: To respectively Edgar and Catherine (II). Saying "obnoxious" is an understatement.
• Only One Name: His name is Heathcliff Heathcliff, since his parentage and surname are unknown.
• Outliving One's Offspring: He outlives his son Linton, who passes away from illness.
• Parental Favoritism: Heathcliff is Mr Earnshaw's favourite, above his own biological children.
  This endurance [of bullying by Hindley] made old Earnshaw furious, when he discovered his son persecuting the poor fatherless child, as he called him. He took to Heathcliff strangely, believing all he said (for that matter, he said precious little, and generally the truth), and petting him up far above Cathy, who was too mischievous and wayward for a favourite. [...] [Hindley] had learned to regard his father as an oppressor rather than a friend, and Heathcliff as a usurper of his parent’s affections and his privileges; and he grew bitter with brooding over these injuries.
• Parental Substitute: Weirdly enough, he's one for Hareton. He has basically robbed him of his inheritance but Hareton looks at him as a father figure since he's the only one he ever had.
• Perpetual Frowner: He's unlikely to ever smile.
• Playing Cyrano: Linton's love letters to Catherine (II) are so beautifully written that it's implied they were most likely written by Heathcliff, since it's unlikely Spoiled Brat Linton would have such fantasy.
• Psychopathic Manchild: Can come across as this due to his tendencies for Revenge by Proxy, Lack of Empathy, and general sadism, even towards those who have nothing to do with his revenge. Just ask Isabella's dog.
• Replacement Goldfish: A possible interpretation as to why Mr. Earnshaw decided to adopt Heathcliff. When asked what name the boy should be given, he settles on Heathcliff. Mrs. Earnshaw remarks that Heathcliff is the name of a son of theirs who died before the start of the story.
• Revenge by Proxy: His plan of revenge on Hindley and Edgar includes degrading their children.
  • His manipulation and abuse of Isabella and Linton could also apply as they were part of his ploy to take Edgar's property for himself.

• Self-Made Man: During the three years he was missing, he somehow managed to make a fortune on his own. Given his personality and the short time he made it, it's heavily implied that said fortune is legally and morally ambiguous.

• Stalker with a Crush: The reason he catches the first part of Cathy's Anguished Declaration of Love was because he had been eavesdropping and later after she’s married Edgar he spends many nights at Thrushcross Grange watching Cathy through the windows. There’s also that little matter of digging up her dead body! Though Cathy being Cathy, she doesn’t seem to mind all that much…
• Start of Darkness: Cathy's apparent rejection of him is what finally makes him wanting to get revenge on everyone.
• Tall, Dark, and Snarky: As he grows up, he gets Tall, Dark, and Handsome but with a dry humor and sharp tongue.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: When Catherine said her Anguished Declaration of Love to Nelly, Heathcliff, who had been eavesdropping, only heard the part where Catherine says that Heathcliff would "degrade her." This prompts the embittered Heathcliff, who believed he had been rejected by the person he cared about most, to leave Wuthering Heights and disappear for three years, returning wealthy and hell-bent on ruling both the Earnshaw and Linton families.
• Tragic Villain: While Heathcliff is a sociopathic monster, parts of his story are tragic. He was abandoned as a small child, adopted into a family with several members who were ambivalent about his presence, constantly treated as inferior due to his skin color and ancestry, and unable to marry the woman he longed for.
• Troubled Abuser: Heathcliff was an abused child who grew into an abusive man. His early life appears to have been rocky, he lost his mother at a young age, and he came to Wuthering Heights and was subjected to racist and classist scorn and abuse by Hindley for the rest of his adolescence. Then as an adult, he abuses Isabella, abuses his son Linton, abuses animals, disenfranchises Hareton, and is cruel to his tenants.
• Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: He starts planning his Roaring Rampage of Revenge at age 13.
  Heathcliff: I'm trying to settle how I shall pay Hindley back. I don't care how long I wait, if I can only do it at last. I hope he will not die before I do!
  Nelly: For shame, Heathcliff! It is for God to punish wicked people; we should learn to forgive.
  Heathcliff: No, God won't have the satisfaction that I shall.
• Together in Death: With Catherine. Some people can see them walking together as ghosts.
• Unbalanced By Rival's Kid: The source of his dislike for Catherine (II). Being his beloved Cathy's daughter doesn't spare her, since she is most of all Edgar's daughter and takes strongly after him. Also, Cathy died by giving birth to said daughter.
• The Unfettered: There's no action he won't stoop to ruin the Earnshaws and Lintons.

• Villain Protagonist: His life ambition is to wreak vengeance on all who have (in his opinion) stood between him and his would-be lover Catherine Earnshaw. He achieves this by mentally and physically abusing them and embezzling their property. He extends his revenge to the children of his enemies.
• Who's Your Daddy?: Nobody knows who actually were his parents. Some fans think he may have been Mr. Earnshaw's illegitimate son.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: After experiencing abandonment and discrimination throughout his childhood, Heathcliff proceeds to ruin the Earnshaws and Lintons.

Cathy

Catherine Earnshaw-Linton

• Adaptational Heroism: She comes off as a lot less of a Jerkass in the 1939 film and the 2009 miniseries.
• All Girls Want Bad Boys: Deconstructed—the love between Catherine and Heathcliff is passionate, but it is also clearly unhealthy and intensely destructive, leading to nothing but the ruin of the lovers and almost everyone around them.
• Anguished Declaration of Love: Her famous "I am Heathcliff!" speech to Nellie Dean. Too bad Heathcliff leaves before he can hear it.
• Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Heathcliff bribes the sexton (who is burying Edgar) to open up Cathy's coffin, and remarks that her face is still the same, and has not decayed (despite Cathy having been dead for seventeen years at that point). However, it's left open to the reader's interpretation whether her beauty was truly untarnished, or if it was just Heathcliff's obsession that altered his perception of her rotting corpse.
• Brain Fever: She's also a victim of her own contradictory passions, which accelerate her downfall.
• Brutal Honesty: One of her more decent actions is to (unsuccessfully) warn Isabella off loving/romanticizing Healthcliff.
  Cathy: Pray, don't imagine that he conceals depths of benevolence and affection beneath a stern exterior! He's not a rough diamond—a pearl-containing oyster of a rustic: he's a fierce, pitiless, wolfish man.
• Death by Despair: As she is dying, she claims that both Edgar and he have broken her heart.
• Decoy Protagonist: She's given roughly equal focus to Heathcliff early on, but dies halfway into the book, with the remainder focusing on her daughter instead.
• Death by Childbirth: She may have survived her mental agony had she not been heavily pregnant.
• Drama Queen: She goes into hysterics at the drop of a hat and never sees anything wrong with that. Her overreacting eventually causes her insanity and death.
• Cloud Cuckoolander: Moreso as her unhealthy and contradictory love for Heathcliff leads to Sanity Slippage.
• Freudian Excuse: She fell gravely ill at a very young age, and developed a persistent health problem where getting too angry could lead to seizures. Thus, to avoid exacerbating her health issues, her parents decided to just spoil her absolutely rotten.
• Gold Digger: Not that she didn't like Edgar, but blatantly states that she wants to socially elevate herself by marrying Edgar and even believes that with Edgar's money she can help Heathcliff get out from under Hindley.
• Hysterical Woman: Driven to this towards the middle of the novel, going as far as searching for Heathcliff across the moors during a storm, which causes her to catch a fever and almost die. Later, her anguish leads her to starve herself for days and then fall victim to Brain Fever, leading to her Death by Childbirth.
• It's All About Me: Well, since Heathcliff is the only one she has any deep-seated interest in, and she basically says she is him (and probably wants to identify entirely with him; see below), she may be a literal example. She is initially as abusive as her brother is towards Heathcliff, then manipulates Linton, doesn't care about the health of her brother, her sister-in-law, or poor Nelly, to whom she is very much a Jerk with a Heart of Jerk.
• Jerkass: Her selfish desire to try and have everything destroys two families across several generations. Worse, she knows both what Heathcliff is capable of and what her actions are bringing about, but refuses to change.
• Jerkass Has a Point: While her reasons for doing so are hardly altruistic, she isn’t the least bit wrong when she points out to Isabella what a profoundly bad idea it is to pursue a relationship with someone as unstable as Heathcliff!
• The Lost Lenore: To both Edgar and Heathcliff. Obviously, Heathcliff is the one who handles her loss far less well.
• Love Makes You Crazy: Her love for Heathcliff is passionate but incredibly unhealthy and twisted, and eventually consumes her with insanity. Pauline Nestor's introduction to the novel argues that her desire for total identification with the object of her love ('I am Heathcliff!' rather than 'I love Heathcliff') represents a regression to childlike lack of identity, also shown by her failing to recognise her own reflection in a mirror just before she dies. Catherine's love is so insane that it basically destroys her entire identity and personality.
• The Masochism Tango: The love between her and Heathcliff is violently passionate (even if most probably never consummated) so much that is intoxicating.
• Morality Pet: For Heathcliff. Downplayed, as she is no paragon of virtue, and their relationship amounts to The Masochism Tango. But he is tamer with her around, he shows empathy to her alone, and becomes a truly terrible person after he loses her for good.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Her desire to have her cake and eat it (marrying Edgar for money and status while keeping Heathcliff on the side) ultimately leads to her own death and Heathcliff's descent into madness and need for revenge.
• The Ophelia: As her mental health degenerates, she detaches from reality.
• Raven Hair, Ivory Skin: In contrast with the blonde and delicate Lintons, the Earnshaws are described as being dark haired and robust.
• She's All Grown Up: Her weeks at Thrushcross Grange, Catherine is made into a groomed and refined young lady.
• Spoiled Brat: With doctor's orders, nonetheless: we're told that from her first serious illness onward, she was allowed to run free and do as she pleased because she came dangerously close to a fit (seizure) whenever she was especially angry. Sure enough, after Heathcliff and Edgar finally do make her overwhelmingly angry, she develops a full-blown Brain Fever.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: She and Heathcliff are haunted by each other, separated by social convention but impossible to emotionally separate.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: The tomboy to Isabella's girly girl.

Hindley

Hindley Earnshaw

Catherine's older brother and after his father's death, the owner of Wuthering Heights.

• Abusive Parents: Nellie hides Hindley's young son whenever Hindley is drunk, due to the man's violent and unpredictable behavior.
• The Alcoholic: He becomes an alcoholic after his wife's death.
• Alcoholic Parent: Due to his drinking, he barely notices his son and comes close to accidentally killing him.
• Aloof Older Brother: He is this at his best (he and Catherine are not particularly close) but he's a Big Brother Bully at his worst, especially to Heathcliff.
• Asshole Victim: If you subscribe to the theory that Hindley is murdered by Heathcliff.
• Big Brother Bully: To his foster brother Heathcliff he's this since the beginning, and to a lesser extent to Catherine when she sticks to hanging out with Heathcliff.
• The Bully: He bullied Heathcliff when Heathcliff was a child.
• Dramatic Irony: Heathcliff's later treatment of his son Hareton mirrors the way Hindley himself treats Heathcliff when his father dies and he inherits the estate.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Hindley's death occurs off-page but is assumed to be a result of his drunkenness. Only Heathcliff is said to be with him when he dies and it is implied that he gambles away ownership of Wuthering Heights to the latter during this period. Whether or not Heathcliff had any hand in his death is ambiguous.
• Drowning My Sorrows: After his wife's death in childbirth. It's also strongly implied that Heathcliff encourages this.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He refrains from drinking on the day of Catherine's funeral, out of respect for his sister. He's also genuinely Happily Married to Frances and spirals into alcoholism due to grief at her death.

• Jerkass: His treatment of Heathcliff is largely what shapes the latter into the cruel and bitter person of the second half of the novel.
• My Sister Is Off-Limits: An element of his resentment towards Heathcliff is his inappropriate (in his opinion) affection for his sister.
• Sibling Rivalry: Hindley hates Heathcliff because his father preferred Heathcliff to him.
• The Unfavorite: Another reason for his hatred is that Mr. Earnshaw favoured Heathcliff over his own son. This goes straight to fuel Heathcliff's dubious parentage.

Edgar

Edgar Linton

• Badass Bookworm: Despite coming across as a nerd and a weakling, thrashes Heathcliff the one time they actually fight. Forever after, Heathcliff won't risk confronting him unarmed, even during the many long, solitary walks Edgar takes out on moors.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Heathcliff found this out the hard way. Edgar packs a nasty punch.
• Betty and Veronica: The Betty to Heathcliff's Veronica.
• Dogged Nice Guy: He extremely dotes on his wife and even lets Heathcliff hanging around his house because it'd make Cathy happy.
• Good Parents: He's the only major character that isn't abusive, and raises Cathy to be a good if not a little spoiled young lady.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: He's a blond-haired man with a noble, loving heart.
• Let Them Die Happy: He dies thinking that his daughter will be happy with Linton.
• Love at First Punch: He falls in love with Catherine after she acts like a huge brat to the servants and even hits him.
• My Sister Is Off-Limits: With good reasons, actually. He knows very well how Heathcliff is a terrible match for his sister, but sadly she won't listen, and boy does she pay.
• Nice Guy: Compared to everyone else, since everyone else is mostly a Jerkass. He's not a jerk to anyone without good reason. Sadly, this also leads him to believe the best in Linton, and think that Cathy II will be happy with him.
  • It also leads to him not explaining what exactly Heathcliff has done to Cathy II (he can't bring himself to). As a result, she can't put herself on guard against him until it's much too late. And even when he does try to explain his history with Heathcliff, he finds himself unable to explain it in detail.
• Only Sane Man: The only character who isn't a dick, an alcoholic, or abusive, the one who sees through Heathcliff's plotting. He's sadly not sane enough to actively prevent most of the madness that ensues.
• The Rival: To Heathcliff. It borders on Archenemy as the second part of the novel revolves around Heathcliff's plotting for Edgar's downfall, but Heathcliff never openly risks confronting him and waits for his death to take possession of his home.
• Romantic False Lead: Catherine marries him even though her passion is for Heathcliff.
• Sheltered Aristocrat: He lives a pampered life which has made him considerably softer than his neighbours the Earnshaws. Though, as previously noted, not quite as soft as you'd think, as Heathcliff finds out to his dismay.

Isabella

Isabella Linton-Heathcliff

• All Girls Want Bad Boys: Deconstructed. She wants Heathcliff at first but lives to thoroughly regret it.
• Break the Cutie: The proto-Lifetime Movie of the Week about marrying a man seemingly a Prince Charming that turns out to be an abusive hell. Only it's made better.
• Dating What Daddy Hates: Her brother was damn right, although, unfortunately, he decides to disown her for her elopement.
• Domestic Abuse: Heathcliff is emotionally and sexually abusive to her during their marriage.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: She dies off-page, twelve years after she left Wuthering Heights.
• Fallen Princess: She was the princess of her house until she had the bad idea of marrying Heathcliff against her family's will. She ended up disowned by her brother and trapped in an abusive marriage.
• Elopement: She's so love-struck that she agrees to run away with Heathcliff. She regrets that choice.
• Grew a Spine: Gains the courage to stand up to Heathcliff after he brutally beats Hindley, after which she flees Wuthering Heights for good.
• I Can Change My Beloved: With Heathcliff. It works as you'd expect.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: They match her pampered and naïve personality.
• Killed Offscreen: She dies "offscreen" from an illness when her son Linton is 12 years old, thus facilitating his appearance in the main plot and allowing Heathcliff's revenge scheme to kick off.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Married Heathcliff, and... it ends up as realistic as expected.
• Revenge by Proxy: Is on the receiving end of this courtesy of Heathcliff. He outright admits that he manipulated her into the marriage by playing a nice guy so that he could make her his personal chew toy until her brother suffers his wrath. Domestic Abuse and (undoubtedbly) Marital Rape License ensues until she books it.
• Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Between Cathy (I)'s and Hindley's deaths.
• Smitten Teenage Girl: She projects her Prince Charming reverie on resident bad boy Heathcliff.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: The girly-girl to Catherine's tomboy.

Nelly

Ellen "Nelly" Dean

• Beleaguered Assistant: She can barely tolerate Catherine's attitude, but is forced to if she wants to keep her job.
• Collateral Angst: She's only a servant, but she feels for all the tragedy she witnesses, especially when it comes to affect Catherine (II), whom she sees as her surrogate daughter.
• Character Narrator: Unreliable Narrator from certain angles.
• Fatal Flaw: Complacency. Nelly has a comfortable life as a live-in maid for a wealthy household, but it's because she knows how good she has it that she refuses to do anything that could jeapordize her position. She thus indirectly causes most of the plot to happen due to constantly enabling Heathcliff and Catherine's worst habits.
• Mama Bear: Say what you will about Ellen Dean but you will not mess with Cathy (II) or Hareton if she’s got anything to say about it! She takes her role as a Parental Substitute very seriously and will stand up to a drunken Hindley for the latter and a vengeful Heathcliff for the former, in fact the whole reason she tells the story to Lockwood is because she was hoping he would become Cathy’s Knight In Shining Armour
• Never My Fault: Her fatal flaw of sorts, as her not wanting to get herself into trouble ends up unintentionally enabling some of Heathcliff's manipulations; for example, electing to burn Cathy (II)'s love letters to Linton rather than tell Edgar about them.
• Only Sane Woman: She presents herself as one of the few level-headed people in a cast of broken, vicious, and deranged characters. Upon closer inspection, she herself willingly does many of the things that she abhors in other people—such as lying to Cathy, punishing her cruelly, and keeping her captive and ignorant.
• Parental Substitute: To Catherine (both of them, but especially the younger one). She was briefly one for Hareton until Heathcliff came to reclaim him.
• Servile Snarker: Being the Only Sane Woman does this to you.
• Shallow Cannot Comprehend True Love: The complacent, slightly classist Nelly reacts to the love-fueled insanity unfolding around her with bemusement as to why someone would choose passion over stability. It takes Hareton and Cathy hooking up for her to finally understand.
• Shipper on Deck: She ships Cathy/Lockwood hoping he rescues her from her terrible life. Later, she's all for Cathy/Hareton.
• Surrounded by Idiots: She thinks this of all the mess she witnesses, but she also could be an Unreliable Narrator who doesn't understand Cathy and Heathcliff's sentiments and how to handle them.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Shows shades of this towards the end and tries to have Heathcliff redeem himself, but he's having none of this.
• Unreliable Narrator: Sadly, we'll never have a different point of view of all this drama and we have to rely on her witness, which is partially contaminated by her dislike of Heathcliff and Catherine.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: She realizes that Heathcliff was eavesdropping on her conversation with Cathy and about how it would dishonor her to marry him, but decides not to alert her when he leaves. Big mistake, Nelly...

Mr. Lockwood

Mr. Lockwood

• Butt-Monkey: The first pages establish him as such in his less-than-idyllic sojourn at Wuthering Heights.
• Character Development: He's pretty much the only character in the book to actually learn something from the events of the past.
• First-Person Peripheral Narrator: Mr. Lockwood acts as the narrator for the first part of the book, even though he is not the main character.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Played with; he's inclined to think of Heathcliff as a "capital fellow" because he wants his landlord to be antisocial and reclusive. Heathcliff's less-than-gentlemanly conduct during their early meetings doesn't exactly escape his notice, but he seems willing to wave it off due to the above and, well, Heathcliff being his landlord. After hearing Nelly's full story, he seems to have a highly critical opinion of Heathcliff, but he doesn't do anything about it, as he owes Heathcliff six months' rent.
  • Tellingly, he also has a very high (and accurate) opinion of Hareton Earnshaw when everyone else considers him an uncultured lout because he notices Hareton being torn between loyalty to Heathcliff and Cathy. He's still prone to judging Cathy's rudeness a bit harshly even after learning what a Broken Bird she is, though.
• Naïve Newcomer: Combined with an early Horrible Judge of Character—he thinks Heathcliff is a "capital fellow" at first!
• Only One Name: His first name is never mentioned.
• Only Sane Man: To an extent. Though he seems to be very much an intended meta-Butt-Monkey.
• Refusal of the Call: Nelly tries to set him up as young Cathy's savior, but he's smart enough to know a romance between the two of them wouldn't work, although he is tempted by the idea.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Upon learning the full extent of Heathcliff's amorality, he curtly decides to leave.
• Sugar-and-Ice Personality: He claims to be such a man but finds out quickly that compared to Heathcliff, he's a softy.
• Unreliable Narrator: His judgment of character varies between good and bad and he's prone to misinterpreting the situations around him.

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Generation Xerox

Cathy

Catherine Heathcliff Earnshaw, née Linton

• Break the Haughty: She starts as a slightly haughty but kind-hearted girl, but the second part of the novel is about Heathcliff breaking her. Under Heathcliff's tyrannical rule over her new husband's home, she withers and becomes embittered and cold.
• Broken Bird: She's introduced as cold and bitchy, but she has damn good reasons to be like that.
• Daddy's Girl: Her father is a widowed man with a single daughter, so she was obviously the princess of the house.
• Dead Guy Junior: She's named after (surprise!) her mother.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: And a thing quite forward-thinking, she defrosts by herself taking things into her own hands and making her life less empty.
• Family Eye Resemblance: The only resemblance she has to her mother is her dark "Earnshaw" eyes.
• Hair of Gold: Double subverted. She appears cold, cynical, apathetic, and rude at the start of the story, subverting the image Lockwood assumes when he observes her beauty and blond hair. However, it's ultimately revealed that Cathy is a good person at heart.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Unlike her mother, who is this at her best, she is this at her worst, at the beginning of her storyline and during her Broken Bird phase. Even at her most bitter, she still asks for Lockwood to be led back home, instead of let out to get lost in the swamps under the tempest.
• Kissing Cousins: With Linton, as Heathcliff set up, but later falls for Hareton.
• Innocent Bigot: Towards servants and social inferiors. Given her treatment of Hareton, we suppose she got better.
• Innocently Insensitive: She's this to Hareton initially, but Hareton doesn't take the insult well.
• Slap-Slap-Kiss: With Hareton. They form a strong bond after years of dislike from Cathy's side and dissimulated feelings on Hareton's.
• Spirited Young Lady: She inherited a wild streak from her mother's side, but it's mostly tamed by Nelly and Edgar's efforts, making her a refined if lively young lady.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Nelly notes that although she looks nothing like Catherine except for having the same dark eyes, they are very similar in personality, particularly in their spirited and stubborn natures, although the younger Catherine's upbringing by Nelly and Edgar seems to temper her wilder impulses.
• Well, Excuse Me, Princess!: With Hareton Earnshaw. Their Belligerent Sexual Tension evolves into Kissing Cousins at the end.

Linton

Linton Heathcliff

• Being Tortured Makes You Evil: It's never quite stated, but he seems to have decided to Jump Off The Slippery Slope and has gone from jerk to sociopath during his stay at Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff is strongly implied to have brutalized him.
• Child by Rape: This was strongly implied to be how he was conceived since Isabella grew to hate Heathcliff, and it's implied he abused her both physically and sexually.
• Dirty Coward: This is how he manages to mimic his parents' worst traits and his apparent motivation for obeying Heathcliff, but there is actually more to it. His behavior seems to be partly motivated by a genuine pleasure taken in hurting others or seeing Heathcliff hurt them.
• Domestic Abuse: His plans for Cathy, as he drops the meek guy façade.
• Establishing Character Moment: The first we hear of his birth in a letter from Isabella, he's described as "an ailing, peevish creature."
• Hair of Gold: Subverted. Despite having the fair complexion and blond hair associated with the more "civilised" Lintons, Linton is a complete jerk.
• Ill Boy: He is perpetually sickly and ailing, and dies while still in his teens. It comes from his mother's side, as Isabella and Edgar both also pass away from a wasting illness a few years apart.

• Kissing Cousins: With Cathy as his father did set up.
• Momma's Boy: But who can blame him?
• Pretty Boy: The description seems to present him as this at first, as he inherits the blond hair and fine figure of the Lintons.
• Spoiled Brat: He has been spoiled rotten by his mother, which has made him weak-willed and cowardly, a thing his father loathes.
• Strong Family Resemblance: He looks just like his uncle Edgar, another reason his father doesn't like him.
• Two First Names: Heathcliff isn't actually a surname since his father is a foundling, but he has adopted this as his last name anyway.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: How he secures Catherine's loyalty early on—he provokes her with jeers about her mother, and when she lightly pushes him, he acts so injured that she's forced to tend to him out of guilt.

Hareton

Hareton Earnshaw

• Anti-Villain: He seems to be a type II-III, constantly undergoing trauma, first because of his father, and later Heathcliff, and believing the latter to have at least some right to do things as he does... He later pulls a Heel–Face Turn for Cathy.
• Berserk Button: Don't insult Heathcliff in front of him. Cathy eventually learns it's a lost cause trying to change his perception of Heathcliff.
• Create Your Own Villain: Arguably, Heathcliff tries this on him as a way to prove that, in the same conditions, anyone would have been as bad as he. It fails miserably, as weirdly enough, Hareton developed positive feelings for him and most of all has the gentle nature he has never had.
• Crush Blush: He blushes and strongly denies that he is Cathy's husband.
• He Cleans Up Nicely: Despite Heathcliff's best efforts to make him dirty and unrefined, it's evident he's good hunk material with his strong build, broad shoulders, dark hair, and dark eyes.
• Heel–Face Turn: Due to his crush on Cathy.
• Hot-Blooded: Whatever he does always sounds extreme, whether it's extremely tear-jerking or annoying, but he never seems to put much thought into what he does.
• Hunk: When he's cleaned up, he shines.
• Foil: For Linton Heathcliff and to a lesser extent Heathcliff himself.
• Hidden Depths: He seems to carry Heathcliff's spirit, as becomes an ignorant, dirty, and uneducated man, but he has the gentle heart Heathcliff will never have a thing that makes Heathcliff's plan for him fail miserably.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: As rude as he may seem, he never dreams of hurting everyone like his Parental Substitute Heathcliff does and has a gentle side which goes mostly unnoticed.
• Kissing Cousins: Unexpectedly to everyone, he forms an unlikely romance with Catherine (II) which brings an Happily Ever After in an otherwise dark story.
• Like a Son to Me: Heathcliff grudgingly admits to liking Hareton more than his own sickly, spoiled son. Had the boy not been Hindley's son, he'd like to have a son like Hareton. This doesn't quite stop Heathcliff from mistreating Hareton as his revenge contemplates.
• Love at First Sight: He's instantly smitten with Cathy (II) but it takes years for her to notice and like him back.
• Love Redeems: Cathy's love helps him rise above his circumstances.
• Made a Slave: Heathcliff raises him as a crude, illiterate servant-boy.
• Meaningful Name: He's named after the Hareton on the main door, which is obviously the ancestor of the Earnshaws. He's the one who starts a new beginning for the family.
• Never Learned to Read: Until Cathy starts to teach him, leading to the two bonding and Heathcliff eventually losing the will to continue his vendetta.
• Parental Abandonment: Is largely left to his own devices by Hindley Earnshaw after his mother dies; Hindley himself dies when Hareton is six years old. Nelly cares for him for a while, but then Heathcliff decided the boy was his business...
• Pet the Dog:
  • Any of the times he tries to be nice to Cathy. Though she's a bit of a bitch to him. Until she changes her mind, befriends and eventually falls for him.
  • Also he tried to be nice to Linton, but the latter treated him with contempt.
• She Is Not My Girlfriend: He strongly denies he has anything to do with Cathy (II) when Mr. Lockwood mistakes her for his wife.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Heathcliff allowed him to develop crude habits. All to further disadvantage him, of course.
• Slap-Slap-Kiss: Almost literally with Cathy (II). Their bickering becomes more and more benevolent as they grow fond of each other.
• Stockholm Syndrome: Heathcliff manages to make Hareton look at himself as his only friend and father figure, and when Cathy shows defiance towards Heathcliff by calling him out on his shit, Hareton wastes no time in striking her down. Wow.
• Tsundere: Rare male example. Especially towards Cathy. Because of his disadvantaged childhood and an abusive Parental Substitute, he has not learned how to properly express his feelings, so he could be a sweetheart one moment and then send you to hell if he feels threatened.
• Undying Loyalty: To Heathcliff. See below.
• Wealthy Ever After: At the end of the novel, with Heathcliff gone (and no will demanding otherwise), he and Cathy, his only relatives inherit both Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange.
• Well, Excuse Me, Princess!: With Catherine Linton... but love will find a way anyway
• Wild Child: Alternated with Creepy Child. He gets better.

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Others

Joseph

• Funetik Aksent: Joseph speaks with an impenetrable Yorkshire accent. One example:
  Joseph: There's nobbut t' missis; and shoo'll not oppen 't an ye mak' yer flaysome dins till neeght.
• Holier Than Thou: Joseph is an abrasive, Bible-thumping Calvinist.
  Nelly: He was, and is yet most likely, the wearisomest self-righteous Pharisee that ever ransacked a Bible to rake the promises to himself and fling the curses to his neighbours.

Frances Earnshaw

• Incurable Cough of Death: When Frances first arrives at Wuthering Heights, Nelly remarks that she has a "troublesome" cough in addition to getting out of breath when simply ascending the stairs.
• Definitely Just a Cold: Persists, along with Hindley, in insisting that her worsening consumption is just a fever. In fact, she dies immediately after telling Hindley that she'll be well enough to get up from bed the next day.

Mr. Earnshaw

• Parental Favoritism: His obvious favouritism towards Heathcliff inadvertently sets the story's events into motion. Mr. Earnshaw grows to dislike Hindley due to his mistreatment of Heathcliff, which he perceives as a personal affront, while Catherine is too mischievous and vexing to be a favourite.

Mrs. Earnshaw

• Killed Offscreen: She's only present in the novel long enough to admonish Mr. Earnshaw for bringing Heathcliff home. There's a two-year Time Skip in Nelly's narration, in which she mentions that Mrs. Earnshaw died. It's never mentioned how she died, and she isn't mentioned again afterwards.