Wuthering Heights Emily Bronte

This novel of “Emily Brontë” was published in December 1847 under the pen name “Ellis Bell”, and it is her only novel. The book is currently widely appreciated as an exemplary sample of British Romantic literature. At the time of publication, most critical reviews of “Wuthering Heights” were disapproving at best and scathing at worst, so much so that her sister “Charlotte Brontë”, who wrote “Jane Eyre” under the pen name “Currer Bell”, was concerned that it might negatively impact the literary brand “Charlotte” and her sisters were trying to develop. Only the year before, in 1846, with their sister “Anne Brontë”, author of “Agnes Grey” under the pseudonym “Acton Bell”, “Charlotte” and “Emily”; “Brontë” had published a joint collection of poetry titled ‘Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell’. Despite the negativity of the early reviews, “Wuthering Heights” is now celebrated as a unique work of literature, intriguing scholars and fans alike with its complexity and high emotion.

Most of the novel is told in retrospective narration by “Nelly Dean”, the housekeeper of “Wuthering Heights”, and in the housekeeper’s story-telling, the reader may hear interesting echoes of the own voice of “Emily Brontë”; after a brief and unsuccessful career as a governess in Brussels, “Emily Brontë” returned home to West Yorkshire where she put herself in charge of domestics at the “Brontë” family home. The “Brontës” lived in a parsonage in Haworth, the West Yorkshire village set in a moorland landscape in north of England. Some scholars believe other autobiographical elements beyond this identification with the narrator- housekeeper can be found in this novel

“Wuthering Heights”, a frame novel, contains clear evidence of the influence of second-wave Romanticism. The role of the landscape of northern England plays a significant part in the emotionally intense lives of the characters. The residents of both Wuthering Heights and neighboring Thrushcross Grange seek to rise above the doldrums of their daily lives with books, hard labor, and tense exchanges with each other. Much like other Romantic characters in literature, they are all complex individuals with complicated motivations.