As it spoke, I discerned, obscurely, a child's face looking through the window- Terror made me cruel; and, finding it useless to attempt shaking the creature off, I pulled its wrist on to the broken pane, and rubbbed it to and fro till blook ran down and soaked the bed clothes; still it wailed, "Let me in!" and maintained its tenacious gripe almost maddening me with fear. "How can I?" I said at length. "Let me go if you want me to let you in!" The fingers relaxed, I snatched mine through the hole, hurriedly piled the books up in a pyramid against it, and stopped my ears to exude the lamentable prayer. I seemed to keep them closed above a quarter of an hour, yet, the instant I listened, again, there was the doleful cry moaning on! "Begone!" I shouted, "I'll never let you in, not if you beg for twenty years!" "It's twenty years," mourned the voice, "twenty years, I've been a waif for twenty years" (Brontë 43).

The scene in which Lockwood attempts to pin down the ghost of Cathy is a metaphor for the adaptation process. Lookwood sees Cathy's "spirit" and is immediately overwhelmed. Much like Lockwood, I believe adaptors are overwhelmed by the daunting task of trying to capture a literary "classic" on screen. However, Lockwood does not just try to capture the "spirit," he mutilates it. His reaction to Cathy's ghost is one of repeated violence. Lockwood is not content with just capturing the spirit but feels the need to slice Cathy's wrist along the broken shards of glass ... repeatedly. I am wondering if ever attempt to pin down Wuthering Heights is just another slice. With each attempt to the adaptors stray further and further from the "truth"?

Even in chapter one of the novel, specifically the first page of chapter one, the words, "no sympathizing movement to the words" are written (Brontë 24). This also mirrors the adaptation process. The film adaptations do not do the words on the page justice, but that may not solely be the adaptation's fault, but rather, this is novel that does not lend itself to adaptation. Some of the "problems" within the film adaptations are anticipated by the novel itself. For example: thhere is no central story, the novel is narrated through others, the passage of time skews one's recollection, the moors are an unknowable territory, the atmosphere of Wuthering Heights is hazy and unclear, heightened emotions/grief amongst the characters, and Heathcliff is an enigmatic character.

Keywords:

Wuthering Heights; Adaptation; Film; Novel; Emily Brontë; Luis Benuel; William Wyler; Andrea Arnold; Spirit; Cathy Earnshaw; Heathcliff; Edgar Linton; Alejandro; Eduardo; Catalina; The Moors; Thrushcross Grange