The Servant as an Agent of Retributive and Restorative Justice in Wuthering Heights

Esra Melikoğlu

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The Servant as an Agent of Retributive and Restorative Justice in Wuthering Heights

于Best Served Cold: Studies on Revenge

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Esra Melikoğlu

Esra Melikoğlu
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类型:: 章节

Page Range:: 61–69

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9781848880436_008

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The ghosts, in Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, attest to an unacknowledged cultural crime- and consequent trauma- that must be both remembered and revenged: classdivision. Brontë’s servant character Ellen Dean’s story of masters/mistresses and servants, into which she inserts the story of her own underprivileged life, expands to a history of the crimes committed by both the feudal yeomanry and industrial middle class against servants. This article aims at examining the servant’s role as Nemesis, in which she unleashes her desire for retribution for the wrongdoing, hubris and undeserved good fortune of her social superiors. Her surname, ‘Dean’, alludes to the fact that she wreaks her retribution not merely as an individual, but on behalf of an institution or community. Yet as the agent of retribution, Ellen must renounce lawless retaliation. Genteel Lockwood lets blood, as punishment for his class-arrogance, but the desire for bloodthirsty revenge is checked by the concept of proportionate revenge or measure for measure. Lockwood is subjected to humiliation, expropriation and exclusion, which are the traditional crimes committed against the servant. It will also be argued that revenge is, however, only the prelude to reconciliation. Story-telling is not only instrumental in the act of taking revenge, but also in coping with trauma and reconciling the victim with the offender. We see a foreshadowing of the concept of modern restorative justice, for criminal Lockwood shall be reformed through Ellen’s tale. Restorative justice encourages both the victim and offender to narrate the full impact of the crime on his/ her life. Indeed, Ellen and Lockwood enter into dialogue as narrator and recipient of a story, respectively. Although this dialogue suggests the possibility of reconciliation, social reform, as envisioned by future-facing restorative justice, remains a utopia.

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Best Served Cold: Studies on Revenge

ISBN:: 9781848880436

出版社:: Brill

印刷出版日期:: 29 Apr 2010

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The Servant as an Agent of Retributive and Restorative Justice in Wuthering Heights

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Best Served Cold: Studies on Revenge

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