Heathcliff: the biggest douchebag in English Literature
Prompted by this post on Pajiba (you can read it here) and subsequent discussion, I had to go and watch the recent Masterpiece Theater production of Wuthering Heights. Gotta say, Tom Hardy is IMO the douchiest Heathcliff of them all, and that's really saying something, considering that Heathcliff is perhaps the douchiest character in all of English literature.
But that got me thinking ... British and American lit is a veritable rogue's gallery of assclowns, bastards, and pricks. There's one in every book; the bigger the shithead, the better the story, generally speaking. I don't know about other world cannons--I don't think English-speaking nations hold the license on these characters, but I'm not well-read in other languages and couldn't inventory them as thoroughly. Besides, we've got plenty to work with right here.
God help me, I love these guys. What can I say? They're just plain fun. Fun to imagine, fun to live vicariously through when they do awesomely rotten things we'd never have the courage to do ourselves, and fun to watch crash and burn, because usually it's spectacular. I've written enough fiction to know they're fun to create, and known enough in real life to know they're fun to destroy.
But Heathcliff is a special case. Heathcliff is like the Muhummad Ali of literary douchebags. If you haven't read Wuthering Heights (which, if you're over twenty, you probably shouldn't even bother), the story can be summarized as follows: Urchin is whisked off the mean streets of London Liverpool (thanks for catching that, notmarcie) to live with well-to-do Yorkshire family. Father dotes on him, sister is fascinated with him, brother hates him but goes away to school; sister and he grow up together playing doctor on the moors. Father dies, brother returns, relegates him to the stables and abuses him, sister meets a rich ninny and chooses to marry said ninny. He runs away, makes a lot of money doing something they never quite explain (but you know it had to be bad), and returns with the intent to fuck up the lives of everyone who ever crossed him, as well as everyone related to them (which is every other character in the story). No one, neither children nor dogs, not even corpses are safe from this asshole. He is a horrible, miserable psycho, and yet ...
When you're sixteen, Heathcliff is sex on legs. I cannot deny this. Because, when you're sixteen, some very unhealthy things look a lot like love, of which Heathcliff is the poster child. You can go back to the book (as I have several times) and every time you get a different read on the character (victim, survivor, bastard, sociopath), but somewhere in the back of your mind, you're always thinking of how he made you feel the first time you met him, and that's probably the douchiest thing about him: he made you love him before you knew any better.
They probably shouldn't let high school girls read Wuthering Heights, but no other audience would be more receptive. Heathcliff has been the ultimate predator of horny virgins for 164 years and counting because you don't know what he's all about until it's too late. Suddenly I feel buckets of empathy for poor, duped Isabella Linton: seduced, traumatized, and destroyed by this creep and it never had a thing to do with her. Right before she leaves him, she yells that she is grateful he never loved her because he's nothing but a damnation to the things he loves. True dat.
But that got me thinking ... British and American lit is a veritable rogue's gallery of assclowns, bastards, and pricks. There's one in every book; the bigger the shithead, the better the story, generally speaking. I don't know about other world cannons--I don't think English-speaking nations hold the license on these characters, but I'm not well-read in other languages and couldn't inventory them as thoroughly. Besides, we've got plenty to work with right here.
God help me, I love these guys. What can I say? They're just plain fun. Fun to imagine, fun to live vicariously through when they do awesomely rotten things we'd never have the courage to do ourselves, and fun to watch crash and burn, because usually it's spectacular. I've written enough fiction to know they're fun to create, and known enough in real life to know they're fun to destroy.
But Heathcliff is a special case. Heathcliff is like the Muhummad Ali of literary douchebags. If you haven't read Wuthering Heights (which, if you're over twenty, you probably shouldn't even bother), the story can be summarized as follows: Urchin is whisked off the mean streets of London Liverpool (thanks for catching that, notmarcie) to live with well-to-do Yorkshire family. Father dotes on him, sister is fascinated with him, brother hates him but goes away to school; sister and he grow up together playing doctor on the moors. Father dies, brother returns, relegates him to the stables and abuses him, sister meets a rich ninny and chooses to marry said ninny. He runs away, makes a lot of money doing something they never quite explain (but you know it had to be bad), and returns with the intent to fuck up the lives of everyone who ever crossed him, as well as everyone related to them (which is every other character in the story). No one, neither children nor dogs, not even corpses are safe from this asshole. He is a horrible, miserable psycho, and yet ...
When you're sixteen, Heathcliff is sex on legs. I cannot deny this. Because, when you're sixteen, some very unhealthy things look a lot like love, of which Heathcliff is the poster child. You can go back to the book (as I have several times) and every time you get a different read on the character (victim, survivor, bastard, sociopath), but somewhere in the back of your mind, you're always thinking of how he made you feel the first time you met him, and that's probably the douchiest thing about him: he made you love him before you knew any better.
They probably shouldn't let high school girls read Wuthering Heights, but no other audience would be more receptive. Heathcliff has been the ultimate predator of horny virgins for 164 years and counting because you don't know what he's all about until it's too late. Suddenly I feel buckets of empathy for poor, duped Isabella Linton: seduced, traumatized, and destroyed by this creep and it never had a thing to do with her. Right before she leaves him, she yells that she is grateful he never loved her because he's nothing but a damnation to the things he loves. True dat.