Emily Brontë and Dogs: Transformation Within the Human-Dog Bond

Maureen B. Adams 1
Sonoma, California

This paper examines the bond between humans and dogs as demonstrated in the life and work of Emily Brontë (1818-1848). The nineteenth century author, publishing under the pseudonym, Ellis Bell, evinced, both in her personal and professional life, the complex range of emotions explicit in the human-dog bond: attachment and companionship to domination and abuse. In Wuthering Heights, Brontë portrays the dog as scapegoat, illustrating the dark side of the bond found in many cultures. Moreover, she writes with awareness of connections—unknown in the nineteenth century—between animal abuse and domestic violence. In her personal life, Brontë's early power struggles with her companion animal mastiff, Keeper, evolve into a caring relationship. In a human-dog bond transformation that survives Brontë's death, Keeper, becomes both bridge and barrier to other human relationships. A dog may, and in this case Keeper does, take on a comprehensive role in which he both mourns his own loss and comforts others in their collective grief.

When one thinks of Emily Brontë (1818-1848), one might imagine her late at night writing fantasies with her brother and sisters in the lonely parsonage on the windswept Yorkshire moors. Or one might recall Wuthering Heights with its passionate love scenes between Heathcliff and Cathy, its violence, its hints of incest and necrophilia.

One usually does not think of Emily Bronte in connection with dogs; yet if we look closely at her life and her novel, three important aspects of the human-dog bond emerge. First, Emily, who did not form attachments outside her family, was able to develop a close bond with her dog Keeper that suggests how important a connection with an animal can be for a solitary individual. Second, Wuthering Heights and Emily's experience with Keeper show that she knew well the dark side of the human-dog bond, the seldom written-about abuse and cruelty toward dogs. Third, when we examine the bond between Bronte and Keeper we discover that it changed over time from an abusive relationship to a caring one. It also becomes clear that the bond was reciprocal. Keeper played an important role in establishing and maintaining the bond, and he, as well as Emily, was changed because of it. The bond between the two transcended even their individual connection when, after Emily's death, Keeper comforted the grieving family.

The history of the one individual bond between a human and a dog offers insight into the dynamics of any human-dog bond. Because Emily wrote freely and lived unconventionally, she has much to teach us about the human-dog bond, especially the possibility for transformation that lies within it.

Turning first to Wuthering Heights, one shocking incident stands out--Heathcliff hangs a spaniel named Fanny. Although Fanny survives, the scene can be viewed as a reenactment of the ritual of a dog used as scapegoat. It also can be looked at as an early portrayal of the link between animal abuse and domestic violence. Heathcliff's motives for abuse—to retaliate and to threaten—often are present in today's cases of animal abuse. If we look at the victim, the dog Fanny, we are struck by the disgust she provokes because she remains loyal to a mistress who has abandoned her. Loyalty to the abuser is a powerful dynamic in situations of domestic violence. Still another layer of meaning emerges when we consider that Fanny is a spaniel and explore the meanings that spaniels held for Victorians in England. Finally, the author's neutral tone in this scene leads to speculation about Emily's own conflicts concerning dependency and attachment

If we look next at Emily's own life, we focus on her experience with her dog Keeper even though the Brontë family had other dogs. Although little has survived that was written by Emily about Keeper (or anything else about her personal life), there are glimpses of him in the guard dogs in Wuthering Heights, dogs with impressive names like Growler, Wolf, Thrasher, and Sulker. Most of the information we have about Keeper comes from Charlotte Brontë's letters and from the villagers of Haworth who recalled Keeper and Emily wandering the moors together.

To allow another being to become as close to her as Keeper eventually did was significant because Bronte had no friends other than her siblings and the family servant. Twice she left home alone to earn a living as a teacher. Both times, homesickness forced her return. Today Emily might be classified as an avoidant personality disorder or an agoraphobic, but, even if we avoid labeling her, her withdrawn behavior and severe separation anxiety are noteworthy. In all likelihood, they stem from early years filled with traumatic loss. Emily's mother, who was ill throughout the child's infancy, died before she was three. At six, she went to boarding school where her two older sisters died unexpectedly within weeks of each other. She grew up a recluse, engrossed in her inner world and her writing. Gradually, Keeper became an important link between Emily and the outside world.

Emily and Keeper's relationship began as a fierce power struggle, but it became one of mutual respect. One reason for the transformation appears to be Keeper's consistent devotion and loyalty. With Keeper, she could feel safe and protected. This suggests how the dog's behavior and temperament influence the nature of each human-dog bond. In turn, Keeper was changed by his experiences with her. Early accounts describe Keeper as a dangerous dog, liable to attack anyone who tried to discipline him. After years with Emily, however, Keeper became a different dog, a quiet presence in the Brontë home. When Emily died after a short illness, observers were impressed by Keeper's grief-stricken behavior during the funeral services. Branwell, then Emily, and then Anne died within months of each other .Keeper continued to provide support to the Brontë family. The survivors, Charlotte and Mr. Brontë, came to rely on Keeper (and Anne's dog Flossey) for solace in their grief.


Cruelty in Wuthering Heights: Heathcliff Hangs the Spaniel Fanny

Although disturbing to read, the scene where Heathcliff hangs Fanny is remarkable for what it reveals about Emily's knowledge of the underlying dynamics that can lead to such cruelty. The background of the scene is as follows: Heathcliff and his cousin Cathy Earnshaw have loved each other since childhood, but Cathy marries Edgar Linton, whom she does not love. In a rage, Heathcliff elopes with Edgar's sister, Isabelle. Heathcliff describes hanging Isabelle's dog Fanny the night that he and Isabelle elope:

The first thing she [Isabelle] saw me do, on coming out of the Grange, was to hang up her little dog, and when she pleaded for it, the first words I uttered were a wish that I had the hanging of every being belonging to her. (Brontë, 1999, p. 149)
Heathcliff shows no remorse or empathy for the little dog or for Isabelle. Even more chilling is Emily's depiction of the seductive quality of violence. Isabelle is so determined to be with Heathcliff that she runs off with him and leaves her dog hanging on a bridle hook, strung up by Heathcliff's handkerchief. Only by chance does a servant see the white, ghostlike shape in the dark garden and rush to rescue Fanny, “nearly at its [sic] last gasp” (Brontë, 1999, p. 127).

The scene is horrible (it is left out of movie versions of the book), but by looking carefully at its different elements we can learn more about people's cruelty to dogs. Within this one incident the following themes occur: (a) the dog as a scapegoat, (b) the connection between animal abuse and domestic violence, and (c) characteristics of the victim that provoke abuse.

The Dog as Scapegoat

The scene has the quality of a ritual reenactment in which Fanny plays the role of the scapegoat. Heathcliff uses Fanny as a scapegoat for his hatred of the Lintons and of Cathy who has betrayed and abandoned him to marry Edgar. Heathcliff knew he was losing Cathy when, after spending time in the Linton home, she changed from his tomboy companion to a Victorian lady. When she returned to Wuthering Heights, Cathy's attitude toward her dogs revealed how much she had changed. She refused to touch her dogs when they “came bounding up to welcome her...lest they should fawn upon her splendid garments” (Brontë, 1999, p. 52). Heathcliff realized that Cathy's new appearance meant he had lost her, and he sulked like “a vicious cur” (p. 57). When Heathcliff continued to be sullen, Cathy impulsively decided to marry Edgar. Heathcliff first displaces his rage about her marriage onto the Lintons and then onto the hapless Fanny.

The dog as scapegoat is an aspect of the dark side of the human-dog bond that appears in many cultures. Green (1966) reports that dogs were often sacrificed to cure illness and cites examples from Jamaica, Brittany, Africa, China, and India. Today, dogs continue to be used as scapegoats. Serpell (1995) discovered in his research that it is precisely because “no other species comes as close to us as the dog in affective or symbolic terms” (p. 246) that we so often choose a dog as scapegoat, a “...convenient and socially acceptable outlet...for the exercise of dominance, power and displaced anger" (p. 248).

Animal Abuse and Domestic Violence

If we look at Heathcliff's motives for hanging Fanny, we see that Emily was aware of what we now know about reasons that people abuse animals. Among the many motives for animal abuse discussed by Ascione and Arkow (1999), two seem specifically relevant to Heathcliff's behavior: animal abuse as a way of retaliating against another person and as a way of threatening someone. Hanging Fanny lets Heathcliff get back at both Isabelle and Edgar Linton. Heathcliff knew how attached they were to Fanny because one night, as children, he and Cathy had spied on the Lintons. Even then, Heathcliff was scornful of Fanny,

In the middle of the table sat a little dog, shaking its paw and yelping, which...they had nearly pulled in two between them. The idiots! That was their pleasure! To quarrel who should hold a heap of warm hair. (Brontë, 1999, p. 49)
The second motive is to threaten Isabelle. Once Isabelle moves into Wuthering Heights with Heathcliff, his violence toward her escalates. Later, their son becomes the victim, and his son's passivity especially enrages Heathcliff: the way he cringes “exactly as a spaniel might” (Brontë, 1999, p. 270). Inside Wuthering Heights, the atmosphere sounds uncannily like contemporary descriptions of homes in which animal abuse and domestic violence occur (Ascione & Arkow, 1999). Heathcliff coerces, controls, and intimidates all the inhabitants—animals and people alike. For example, Isabelle describes Heathcliff's nephew casually hanging a litter of puppies on the back of a kitchen chair. Heathcliff's own son dies as a result of his father's abuse and neglect.

Another important aspect of domestic violence dynamics that appears in Heathcliff's treatment of Fanny is the disgust that loyalty to an abuser provokes in others. The servant who cuts Fanny down is appalled when she realizes that Fanny is not following her inside. "Instead of going to the house door, it [sic] coursed up and down snuffing the grass, and it would have escaped to the road [after Isabelle]" (Bronte, 1999, p. 129} .The servant's reaction is a common complaint about dogs. Serpell (1995) observes that a dog's loyalty can be “construed as sycophantic, servile and obsequious” (p. 252). Fanny's loyalty to Isabelle is uncomfortably similar to Isabelle's loyalty to Heathcliff. Heathcliff says that Isabelle, no matter what he does to her, “still creep[s] shamefully cringing back” (Brontë, 1999, p. 149). When Isabelle finally leaves Heathcliff, she reclaims Fanny “who yelped wild with joy at recovering her mistress” (Bronte, p. 181).

Characteristics of Fanny that May Have Provoked Abuse

Fanny may have become the target of Heathcliff's hatred simply because she was a spaniel. In Victorian England, especially among the rural poor who lived in Haworth, spaniels were considered useless dogs. As playthings for the rich, they were despised (and perhaps envied) for being overbred, overfed, and for having overactive sexual appetites (Ritvo, 1994). In their early history, spaniels, known as comfort dogs, were carried by ladies at court as living hot water bottles and were used for relief of physical pain and for sexual pleasure (Dale-Green, 1966; Garber, 1996). The real life model for Fanny was most likely Anne Brontë's Flossey, a King Charles spaniel, with a “long, silky, black and white coat” ( Smith 1995, p. 362).

As spaniels, both Flossey and Fanny were pretty, playful dogs with temperaments characterized by close attunement to their owners' moods. They were dependent and subservient dogs, and these characteristics—in a dog or a person—can provoke intense reactions in others. Yi-Fu Tuan (1984) in his study of the role of domination in pet keeping explains the following: “Dominance may be cruel and exploitative....What it produces is the victim. On the other hand, dominance may be combined with affection, and what it produces is the pet" (p. 2). Emily, writing before present-day concern about the word “pet”, was aware of the power imbalance inherent in our relationships with pets. In an essay written long before Wuthering Heights, Brontë (1974) described a “delicate lady who has murdered a half a dozen lap dogs by sheer affection” (p.10).

We can speculate that Emily's scornful attitude towards pets, especially spaniels and lapdogs, came from her own conflicts about attachment and dependency. As mentioned, Emily experienced many losses in her early years. Children can recover from such trauma if an adult becomes a buffer for them, but Emily did not have such a person. When her mother died, her father withdrew from the children in grief. Aunt Branwell, who came to stay with the family, concentrated on the baby Anne and the only boy, Branwell. Emily, a toddler, depended on her bereaved sisters for attention. When six-year-old Emily went to boarding school, she may have been the youngest child in the school. A teacher recalled her as "a darling child...quite the pet nursling of the school” (Barker, 1998, p. 9) Her few months as a “pet nursling” ended with the sudden deaths of her sisters and her swift return home. Never again was Emily referred to as a pet. Instead, those who met her were struck with her lack of interest in other people. Emily's secluded, withdrawn adult life and her avoidance of attachments seem to be clearly linked to her early losses.

In addition to her inability to form attachments, Emily was well known for her refusal to be pleasing to others. When she attempted to be a teacher, she ended up screaming at her class that the only thing she cared for in the entire school was the housedog (Gerin, 1971). After her failures at teaching, Emily was able to stay home as housekeeper for her father, but she was well aware that this existence would end with his death. She knew about the subservient life of a governess from her sisters' letters. For Emily, as for any unmarried, educated, poor woman in Victorian England, the only options in life were to be a teacher, companion, governess or to find a husband. Until Charlotte came up with the idea of publishing their writing, the Brontë sisters' very existence, like that of a pet spaniel's, depended on pleasing others.

Emily and Keeper

Early Power Struggles

Keeper, a large mastiff, was an impressive dog, a match for Emily. A villager remembered Keeper as a “conglomerate, combining every species of English caninity from the turnspit to the sheepdog, with a strain of Haworth originality superadded” ( Smith, 1995, p. 332). Charlotte said that when Keeper stood silently, he was “like a devouring flame," and she noted in one letter, “Keeper is well, big—and grim as ever” (Smith, p. 259).

According to Gaskell (1975) Charlotte's confidante and first biographer, Keeper had been given to Emily with a warning: although he was faithful, if he were ever hit, he would hang on to that person's throat “till one or the other was at the point of death” (Gaskell, p. 266). Among the village stories that abound about Emily and Keeper's confrontations, one comes from the diary of John Greenwood, the Haworth stationer:

Onone occasion...Keeper and another great powerful dog out of the village were fighting down the lane. She was in the garden at the time, and the servant went to tell her...She never spoke a word, nor appeared the least at a loss what to do, but rushed at once into the kitchen, took the pepper box, and away into the lane where she found the two savage brutes each holding the other by the throat. In deadly grip, while several other animals, who thought themselves men, were standing looking on like cowards as they were, afraid to touch them—there they stood gaping, watching this fragile creature spring upon the beasts—seizing Keeper 'round the neck with one arm, while with the other hand she dredges their noses with pepper, and separating them by force of her great will, driving Keeper, that great powerful dog, before her into the house, never once noticing the men, so called, standing there thunderstruck at the deed. (Evans, 1982, p. 115)
Emily's power struggles with Keeper seemed to have been a way for her to discharge her feeling of powerlessness, an example of the psychological mechanism of “identification with the aggressor” that Ascione (1995) says often underlies animal abuse. He explains, “Powerlessness is frightening and demoralizing, and, unfortunately, exerting control over another can restore a sense of self-efficacy” (p. 55). Unlike the subjects in Ascione's research, Emily's sense of powerlessness came not from a personal history of abuse but from the circumstances of her life. To understand her behavior toward Keeper (but not to justify it),we must realize how powerless Emily was in almost all aspects of her life. She was physically the strongest of all the Brontës and unusually intelligent (Evans, 1982). A tutor, M. Heger, said of her, “She should have been a man—a great navigator. Her powerful reason would have deduced new spheres of discovery from the knowledge of the old; and her strong imperious will would never have been daunted by opposition or difficulty “(Gaskell, 1975, p.230). However, circumstances forced Emily into a constrained, narrow life. Like other talented women of her time and class, Emily used writing as a way of taking some control of her life (Frank, 1990; Kavaler-Adler, 1993), but her pent-up anger and rage must have frightened her. By subduing those same feelings when they arose in Keeper, she could prove to herself that they could be contained.

Ellen Nussey, Charlotte's friend and one of the few visitors to the Brontë home, recalled,

Keeper used to steal upstairs and sleep on the beds, which were covered in white counterpanes. This upset Emily, who was in charge of all of the housekeeping chores. One evening the servant Tabby came and told Emily that Keeper was sleeping on the bed again. Emily immediately went up after the dog while Tabby and Charlotte watched:
Down-stairs came Emily, dragging after the unwilling Keeper, his hind legs set in a heavy attitude of resistance, held by the "scruff of his neck" but growling low and savagely all the time…She let him go, planted in a dark corner at the bottom of the stairs...her bare clenched fist struck against his red fierce eyes, before he had time to make his spring...she “punished him” till his eyes were swelled up, and the half-blind, stupefied beast was led to his accustomed lair to have his swelled head fomented and cared for by the very Emily herself. The generous dog owed her no grudge; he loved her dearly ever after. (Gaskell, 1975, pp. 268-269)

The Transformation of the Relationship

A dog responding to rage with devotion can inspire contempt—as Heathcliff responded to Fanny—or it can lead to a transformation of the bond. Because Keeper responded to Emily's harshness with devotion and loyalty, she began to depend on him for protection and companionship. She must have respected Keeper because he was not a useless, docile dog—like a spaniel—but a dog suited for hunting and for protection. He had an independent streak very much like Emily's. Like her, he was strong, determined, and headstrong. In Keeper, Emily had found a dog who could be experienced by her as another individual and one who cared about her. Even if she had not named him herself, Emily would have known that Keeper means “one who keeps,” one who stands guard over another (Oxford English Dictionary, 1971, p.665).

In response to his attentiveness, Emily became attached to Keeper. Slowly, because attachment did not come easy to either of them, their bond grew—as all attachment does—through proximity and physical touch. Ellen remembered evenings in the parsonage with Emily, “habitually kneeling on the hearth, reading a book, with her arm round Keeper” (Gerin, 1971, p.156). Ellen recalled that Emily and Keeper developed small, daily rituals that are an important part of the human-dog bond, “The two dogs, Keeper and Flossey were always in quiet waiting by the side of Emily and Anne during their breakfast of Scotch oatmeal and milk, and always had a share handed down to them at the close of the meal” (Shorter, 1896, p. 178).

Keeper and Flossey had become part of the family, somehow winning over Aunt Branwell who allowed previous dogs only into the parlor of the house and then only at stated times (Frank, 1990). The dogs' taken-for-granted presence in everyday life can be seen in the “diary papers” that Emily and Anne wrote for each other on their birthdays. On July 31,1845, Anne wrote, “Keeper and Flossey are I do not know where” and then added that Charlotte “has let Flossey in by the by and [s] he is now lying on the sofa” (Smith, 1995, p.410). In a diary paper dated 1841, Emily wrote, “ Victoria and Adelaide [the geese] are ensconced in the peat-house—Keeper is in the kitchen—We are all stout and healthy” (Barker, 1998, p. 95).

Emily's drawings of Keeper also suggest the deepening bond between them. One is a head study in which Keeper is lying down with both eyes open and alert and one ear pricked back towards Emily. In another, Keeper rests peacefully under a tree with Flossey curled against his flank and a cat sitting at his head. One rough sketch shows Emily writing at her lap desk with Keeper lying on the floor beside her and Flossey asleep on the bed ( Barker, 1998, p. 95).

Keeper helped Emily in her relationships with other people. Dogs often act as bridges between people, especially for those who, like Emily, are closed off to others (Hart, 1995; Sanders, 1999). Ellen found that the best approach to Emily, who was indifferent to friendly overtures, was through Keeper. Once Keeper tried to climb up on Emily's lap but could not quite fit, so he stretched out across Ellen's knees. She did not complain about his heaviness because she knew that “Emily's heart was won by [my] unresisting endurance” (Gerin, 1971, p.110). Keeper also served as a protective barrier between Emily and others. Branwell, in the last years of his life, often exploded in drunken rages. According to the villagers, it was Emily who went to the pub to bring him home, who carried him up the stairs, and who put out the fire the night he set the curtains ablaze (Frank, 1990; Gerin, 1971). In the close living quarters of the parsonage or on the dark road to the village pub, the great mastiff must have been a dependable ally and reassuring guide.

The Human-Dog Bond after Emily and Anne's Deaths

On December 19, 1848, Emily, 29 years old, died of tuberculosis. She had become ill three months earlier at Branwell's funeral. Branwell died of tuberculosis aggravated by his dissolute life style. According to Charlotte, as Emily slowly withdrew from life, Keeper continually “lay at the side of her dying-bed” ( Barker, 1998, p. 240).

By the time of Emily's death, the power struggles between them were long over. Even as her strength waned, Emily was determined to continue caring for both Keeper and Flossey. Barker (1994) wrote, “The evening before her death she insisted on feeding the dogs...as she had always done. As she stepped from the warmth of the kitchen into the cold air of the damp, stone-flagged passage, she staggered and almost fell against the wall” (p. 576). The next afternoon Emily died.

The accounts of Emily's funeral all mention Keeper (Garber, 1996). Charlotte wrote that Keeper “followed her funeral to the vault,” and then came into the church with the family, “lying in the pew couched at [their] feet while the burial service was being read”( Barker, 1998, p. 240). According to Gaskell (1975), Keeper “walked first among the mourners to her funeral; he slept moaning for nights at the door of her empty room, and never, so to speak, rejoiced, dog fashion after her death” (p. 269). In her visits with Mrs. Gaskell after Emily's death, Charlotte seemed to find reassurance in talking about the funeral. Mrs. Gaskell noted how often Charlotte spoke about Keeper walking “side by side with her father” toward the graveyard and how often she mentioned Keeper sleeping every night at the door of Emily's empty room, “snuffing under it, and whining every morning” ( Wise, 1980, vol. 4, p. 87).

On May 28, 1849, only a few months after Emily's death, Anne died, also the victim of tuberculosis. Charlotte and her father were alone in the parsonage. In their grief and loneliness, they often turned to Keeper and Flossey for comfort (Garber, 1996). Not only were the dogs a link to the lost sisters, but their very presence was a source of support. Mr. Brontë developed a strong attachment to the aging Keeper. A visitor recalled the "superannnuated mastiff” standing by Mr. Brontë's side who vanished when they tried to coax him forward ( Wise 1980, vol.3, p.168). When Mr. Brontë had to undergo cataract surgery, he cried out to Charlotte that if he died in surgery, “I shall never feel Keeper's paws on my knees again! (Wise 1980, vol.4, pp. 91-92)

Charlotte had never been much of dog lover. She often misspelled Flossey's name, forgot whether the spaniel was male or female, referred to Keeper as “it”, but after the loss of all her siblings, Charlotte came to appreciate both dogs. She wrote to Ellen after a trip to London:

I got home a little before eight o'clock… Papa and the servants were well....The dogs seemed in strange ecstasy. I am certain they regarded me as the harbinger of others – the dumb creatures thought that as I was returned – those who had been so long absent were not far behind” (Barker 1998, p. 239).
About the same sad homecoming, Charlotte wrote in even more detail to her publisher and friend William Smith Williams:

The ecstasy of these poor animals when I came in was something singular—at former returns from brief absences they always welcomed me warmly—but not in that strange, heart-touching way—I am certain they thought that, as I was returned, my sisters were not far behind—but here my Sisters will come no more. Keeper may visit Emily's little bedroom—as he still does day by day—and Flossy may look wistfully round for Anne—they will never see them again—nor shall I. (Barker 1998, p. 239)
In the silence of the empty home, Charlotte often felt close to despair. She kept busy during the day but found the evenings, when she used to visit with her sisters, unbearable. She told friends that what kept her going through her loneliness was the thought of her father and the presence of the dogs. When she felt overwhelmed by bitterness and desolation, she discovered that it was only “some caress from the poor dogs which restores me to softer sentiments and more rational views" ( Barker 1998, p. 240).

Three years after Emily's death, and also in December, Keeper died. By this time, Charlotte realized how much the dog had come to mean to her and to her father. She wrote Ellen to tell her the news:

Poor old Keeper died last Monday Morning—after being ill one night—he went gently to sleep—we laid his old, faithful head in the garden. Flossy is dull and misses him. There was something very sad in losing the old dog; yet I am glad he met a natural fate—people kept hinting that he ought to be put away which neither Pap nor I liked to think of ( Barker, 1998, p. 339).

Conclusion

The life and writing of Emily Brontë indicate the complex range of emotions possible in the human-dog bond, including attachment and companionship, domination and abuse. The dark side of the human-dog bond appears in Wuthering Heights and was part of the early relationship between Emily Brontë and Keeper. However, the relationship between the powerful mastiff and the reclusive writer changed over their years together to one of caring. The enduring strength of the human-dog bond can be seen in the way that the presence of Keeper and Flossey provided comfort to Charlotte and Patrick Brontë in their grief and how attached the two surviving Brontës became to each of the dogs.

References

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Note

1 Correspondence should be sent to Maureen B. Adams, Ed.D., 740 Cordilleras Drive, Sonoma, CA 95476. E-mail: adams1@vom.com
 

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