"I'll Cry Myself Sick": Illness in Wuthering Heights

Abstract

When she accedes to society's definition of her role, Wuthering Heights 's Catherine Earnshaw denies her nature and faces personal disintegration. When she violates society's rules, however, she falls ill. Like Emily Bront�, Catherine is anorexic, destroyed by her illness and her society. In contrast, the emotional and physical health of her daughter, also named Catherine, helps restore order and bring mythic and psychological resolution to the novel.