The Tenant

 The Tenant - notes

Q 1 Answer each of the following questions in 30-40 words.

 a) Mr Lockwood was Mr Heathcliff’s new tenant and wanted to rent Thrushcross Grange. He called upon his landlord on his arrival to solicit the occupation of the place. He had heard the day before that Mr Heathcliff had some thoughts regarding it. 

b) Joseph was a very old man, though hale and sinewy. He was apparently one of the senior staff of Mr Heathcliff’s household. He spoke in undertones with a sour face while relieving the narrator of his horse. His attitude indicated peevish displeasure. He did not appear when Mr Heathcliff called him to get some tea. 

c) Mr Heathcliff tried to calm down the narrator after he was attacked by the dogs. He told the narrator that guests were so rare in his house that neither he nor the dogs knew how to receive them. He and his dogs were willing to own up to it. 

d) The house and furniture at Wuthering Heights would have been nothing extraordinary as belonging to a homely, northern farmer. But Mr Heathcliff formed a singular contrast to his abode and style of living. He was a dark-skinned gipsy in aspect, in dress and manners a gentleman like a country squire and rather slovenly. Yet, he did not look amiss because he had an erect and handsome but rather a morose figure.

Q 2 Answer each of the following questions in 80-100 words. 

a. Mr Heathcliff met Mr Lockwood at the gate of his house. He interrupted Mr. Lockwood with a wince as he was giving his introduction and reason for his visit. Instead of using welcoming words he said ‘walk in’ with closed teeth. The narrator felt that even the gate over which he leant manifested no sympathising movement to the words. When he saw the narrator’s horse pushing the barrier, only then did he put out his hand to unchain it, and then sullenly preceded him up the causeway. 

b. Mr Heathcliff went in search of Joseph when he did not respond to his call for tea and left the narrator with the ruffian canine and a pair of grim shaggy sheep-dogs. The narrator did not want to come in contact with their fangs so he sat still but unfortunately indulged in winking and making faces at the trio, and something irritated the canine that she suddenly broke into a fury and leapt on the narrator’s knees. He flung her back and hastened to place the table between them. This proceeding aroused about half-a-dozen more of four-footed fiends, of various sizes and ages, who came in from hidden dens to the room. The narrator felt his heels and coat-laps being targets of assault. He was trying to parry off the large dogs as effectively as he could with the poker. But then he had to loudly demand assistance from the others in the household to re-establish peace.