Isabella Linton

Isabella Linton (later Isabella Heathcliff) is a fictional character in Emily Brontë's 1847 novel Wuthering Heights. She is the sister of Edgar Linton and, later in the novel, the wife of Heathcliff. Story Isabella Linton was raised in the safe, elegant environment of Thrushcross Grange with her brother, Edgar. When Catherine Earnshaw of Wuthering Heights suffers an accident while intruding on the Grange, the Lintons take her in and transform her into a lady in five weeks and return with no sign of mischief being a part of her. When Heathcliff returns to the neighbourhood to exact revenge on the Lintons for Edgar's marriage to his true love Catherine, Isabella is irresistibly attracted to him. Catherine is deeply shocked by this, and playfully tells Heathcliff, enabling him to see a route to vengeance. Isabella, hurt by Catherine's betrayal, grows cold and distant to everyone around her, and, with everyone opposing a relationship with Heathcliff, "moped around in the garden" in great distress. Even more nervous is Edgar, who is suspicious of Heathcliff's mysterious return to the neighbourhood, but does not know what to do about it. It becomes apparent that Heathcliff is seducing Isabella when he "embraces her", much to Catherine's dislike. In explanation, Heathcliff reveals to her that he "will have his vengeance", and that he does not love Isabella: if Catherine wished him to marry her, he, "would cut his throat." One night, it is revealed to Nelly Dean, a servant at Wuthering Heights and the primary narrator of the novel, that Isabella has run off with Heathcliff, although Edgar has warned her that, if she does so, he will cut off all ties with her. After several months, Heathcliff and Isabella marry, but she soon realises her mistake, sending a long letter to Nelly in which she details her hostile and displeasing "welcome" at the Heights and her hatred for Heathcliff, who has made it clear that he has married her only because he is now the heir to the Grange. Isabella is reduced to the status of the abused, hurt and degraded wife, and Nelly describes Heathcliff as looking like "the only one decent" in the household, while Isabella has seemingly lost the title of Miss Linton of Thrushcross Grange.