For all that Catherine couldn't have been thought a heroine of a Gothic novel, especially in her infancy, she seems to me to be a very engaging modern heroine.

She's very much like most of us--not ravishingly beautiful, not a protege at anything in particular, and not particularly studious about becoming exceptional.

I can definitely remember it being fun to roll down hills, and vainly wishing I were a better artist.

I can definitely identify with our heroine, which is what I think we mostly expect to be able to do today.

But heroines in early novels, and especially in Gothic novels, I think were supposed be people whom we admired and aspired to be like, rather than people we were like.