The novel setting is Cape Cod in the 1920s, at the Chatham School, an academy for rebellious boys situated on the Atlantic seacoast and around the waters of Black Pond. The dismal New England community sets the stage for contrasting the cold with the passionate, as Henry himself contrasts his life with that of the exotic Miss Charming and the hot passions that arise when both she and Mr. Reed arrive at the school. Henry's life seems bleak, like gray New England, and Miss Channing seems clearly out of place there. Henry likens the landscape to the windswept moors of Wuthering Heights, shrouded in fog and grayness, and so in contrast to the hot passions of Catherine and Heathcliff that smolder on the moors, even after death. Black Pond, the cold, gray climate, and the rigid structure of Chatham School and the small community all define the image...