The Parental Bonds of the Second Generation

Follows the parents of the second generation as they shape their children through love, neglect, or cruelty.

increasingBearing stren­gth in each eventdecreasing

Old Earnshaw's Favour

A Partial Love The Father and the Foundling Mr. Earnshaw takes the foundling into his heart, petting him above his own children and believing all he says. His love is the boy's only shelter, but it breeds jealousy in Hindley and gives Heathcliff a dangerous sense of entitlement. A Soul Left Unfinished The old man dies without reconciling his children, leaving his favourite to face the world he has made. A father's indulgence, intended as protection, becomes the seed of persecution.

Edgar's Single Treasure

A Despot's Sceptre The Father's Devotion Edgar Linton pours his entire lonely heart into his daughter, teaching her himself, indulging her every wish, and guarding her from the world. The child, in turn, adores him with an intensity that amounts to worship. The Cost of Shelter His love keeps her safe but leaves her dangerously ignorant of evil. When the world finally breaks in, her trust and her grief are equally overwhelming, and she nearly drowns.

Hareton's Orphaned Heart

A Child Without a Mother And a Father Lost to Drink Hareton is raised by servants and by chance, his mother a faint memory and his father a terrifying stranger. Hindley's grief prevents him from ever being a father to the boy; Hareton grows up craving the approval he never receives. A Loyalty to His Captor Deprived of all natural affection, Hareton transfers his devotion to Heathcliff, the only constant figure in his life. The pattern of abused children clinging to abusers is one of the novel's subtler griefs.

The Mothers' Legacies

Eyes from the Grave A Mother's Face in a Son Hareton, said Nelly, has his father's and his mother's best qualities lost in a wilderness of weeds; and Cathy's dark eyes recall the grandmother she never knew. Heathcliff himself is tormented by the resemblance of Hareton's face to Catherine's. A Careful Inheritance The second generation carries forward not property only but expression, temperament, and fate. In the end their mothers' legacies are softened into the faces of the living, healing what the parents wounded.

the years of Heathcliff's childhood under old Mr. Earnshaw

the twelve years of Cathy's upbringing at the Grange

the years from Frances's death to Hareton's maturity

the parallel afterlives of Frances Earnshaw and Catherine Earnshaw in their children