The Eternal Triangle

I finished reading Wuthering Heights for the first time today, & the basic plot of it prompted the following reflections.


"The comlokest to discrye
There glent with yen gray,
A semloker that ever he sye
Soth myght no mon say."

- Sir Gawain & the Green Knight, ll. 81-4, describing Guinevere.

"The comeliest to see
Glinting there with her grey eyes,
That he ever saw one as beautiful
No man might truly say."

( - trans. MTB)


There is said to be a proportion which occurs over & over again in architecture & painting, both by design & by intuition, called the Golden Section. It is supposed to be uniquely satisfying to the human mind. Whether or not there really is such a thing as the Golden Section, I do not propose to inquire. There is however a piece of geometry which occurs & recurs endlessly as a basic plot in storytelling - the Eternal Triangle. I will mention four examples sufficiently famous & sufficiently diverse in time & context to make the point.

The relative weight of each element, that is the person in each corner, of the Triangle varies, as does the precise inter-relationships in each case: but the Triangle itself endures.

I was set off thinking about it because of the Triangle in Wuthering Heights - Edgar / Cathy / Heathcliff. Edgar is almost completely eclipsed by the intensity of Cathy & Heathcliff's relationship, which can hardly be called love, even in the most extreme form of that emotion: it is rather a merged mutual identity, each one is the other; they are one yet separated by being in different bodies. Edgar, a cipher, is there almost solely to be the third point in the Triangle, to be the obstacle between Heathcliff & Cathy without which there isn't any story. With no Edgar in the way, all you would be left with is a brief account of an extremely close bond between two people which they were able to express in their life together. No conflict - no story. The final image of the book is of their three graves together, a perfect representation of the Triangle.


We find the Triangle as the basic plot & motive of the narrative in the earliest written epics of Western civilisation: the Illiad & the Odyssey. The Triangle in this case is Menelaus / Helen / Paris. Menelaus is a man of action, a warrior & leader of warriors. If someone steals his wife, he is going to do something about it, something direct & violent: & he's not going to give up until he gets her back. Menelaus trying to get his wife back is why the Greeks go to besiege Troy, it is what they are doing there, it's the driver form which everything else that happens in the Illiad happens, including the ultimate destruction of Troy. Similarly, if he had not gone to Troy for that reason with the other Greeks, Odysseus would not need to make his perilous journey back to Ithaca.


The Triangle forms one of the central motifs in Arthurian myth, in this case Arthur / Guinevere / Lancelot. Lancelot is Arthur's best friend & most trusted follower, his public & private roles binding him with the closest possible ties to his King: and yet he is in love with Arthur's wife. He can't help it, he wishes for everyone's sake he was not, & yet he is. Nor is it hard to understand how it came about. The qualities which attract Guinevere to Arthur & vice versa, & Arthur to Lancelot & vice versa, also tend to attract Lancelot to Guinevere. The two interlocking mutual attractions easily make the third.


The fourth Triangle is in Gone With The Wind: Ashley / Scarlett / Rhett. Here it is all about Scarlett & what she wants. Her hopeless passion for Ashley has two sources, I think. Firstly it is her unrealistic picture in her mind of who Ashley is; the actual Ashley the audience can see does not really fit Scarlett's heightened view of him. Secondly, Scarlett is extremely attractive & can have any man she wants - except Ashley Wilkes. His fascination for her lies partly in the fact that he is uniquely unattainable. This applies to Guinevere from Lancelot's point of view as well. There is the most extraordinary moment early in Gone With The Wind where Scarlett accepts a marriage proposal from the callow & entirely unsuitable Charles Hamilton as she is actually watching through the window Ashley kiss his new wife Melanie (Charles' older sister) with all the tenderness imaginable, a goodbye kiss because he is riding off to fight for the South in the Civil War. Scarlett hardly registers what Charles is saying to her as he stammers his absurd & unlikely proposal; all her attention is on the scene of Ashley & Melanie; when she realises what Charles is asking, she accepts him because of the bitter sight just playing out in front of her. A less passionate, or more realistic, woman would have had her illusions finally shattered by that marital kiss. But Scarlett is as tenacious & determined in her follies as in everything else, & will not give her hopes of Ashley yet.

In each example of the Triangle here adduced, one person in the Triangle is in the grip of an extreme passion for one of the others, whether it is returned or not: Heathcliff for Cathy; Helen for Paris; Lancelot for Guinevere; Scarlett for Ashley.

Why is the Triangle so enduring as a situation in stories ? I suggest two reasons, which I am sure are not the only ones. First, its attraction for storytellers: the conflict between desire & social convention, between passion & duty, has almost endless dramatic possibilities. Second, linked to this, why it is compelling to an audience; because the audience recognises the emotions involved in the more mundane setting of their own lives & relationships, heightened in the stories by being about Kings, Queens, Knights, Warriors - & these the most peerless ever seen.