Selfishness As The Essence Of Human Nature

Human nature is a fixed and natural instinct, of which the most important aspect for a person is to acquire self-recognition. Even today when the development of technology has greatly helped in launching our unprecedented material achievements, such development has also led to a remarkable limitation of our self-recognition, making the understanding of human nature an urgent necessity at the present time.The exploration of human nature differs from person to person, but the one revealed in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights stood out unique, especially when approached from the perspectives of the main characters in the novel. Emily's uniqueness lied not merely in what she revealed but also in how she revealed, and both proved the significance relevant to our understanding of the theme of the work, of her eminence in the literary world, and of the continuous struggle of the self for recognition.Concentrating on the theme of Wuthering Heights, this thesis attempts to study Emily's unique success in her depiction of selfishness as human nature. The first part of the thesis serves as a brief introduction to the study of the novel and the theme of this paper, the former being a general survey and the latter an affirmation of Emily's recognition of selfishness as the essence of human nature in Wuthering Heights. The second part penetrates into a detailed discussion of the themes, which is further divided into four chapters: selfishness as the essence of human nature, Emily's life experience as was reflected in Wuthering Heights, diversity of selfishness as was shown through the key characters in the novel, and the hope for an ideal self as was implied at the end of the story. The third part draws the conclusion that Emily's eminence in Wuthering Heights is thatshe not only put forward the problem, but also offered the way to solve it: selfishness, as the essence of human nature, is neither kind nor wicked; if one's selfishness extremely hinders others' interests, or even hurts others, it is wickedness; but if people could be respectful, charitable, content and tolerant while reasonably satisfying his natural selfishness, the world would certainly grow healthy.