This is such an excellent, insightful and well-researched piece. After visiting the Bronte home in Howarth, I, too, would have taken long walks with Keeper to try and remain sane.
What a rewarding piece to read for the way you keep Emily Brontë and her work at its heart, encouraging us to wonder and think about her (and the interplay between family dynamics and its legends and creativity work) through different lenses, but never making those lenses didactic and reductive…never appropriating or stealong her for your arguments.
Your discussion of Heathcliff was interesting to read alongside What To Read If’s current piece on men in fiction.
Thank you for reading and for such a thoughtful comment, Nicolas. Yes, I set out to find out more about my favourite of the Bronte sisters, and soon realised that it was unfair to label her with words that others had decided to attribute to her. In the end, she remains as enigmatic (and therefore even more interesting) to me as her writing.
Fantastic essay! I recently re read Wuthering Heights and I can’t believe it is seen as a romantic tale. There’s so much darkness and abuse. It’s a shame more isn’t known about Emily
This was absolutely fascinating to read. I read Wuthering Heights in high school when my English was not very good.... I am so curious to read it again, with this perspective in mind.
I just admire them all so much for being ages ahead of their times. My personal favorite sister is Charlotte and I thought that Vilette was just PHENOMENAL.
Thanks, Petya! They were SO amazing to have come up with these themes and stories when they lived such isolated lives. I've visited the Parsonage where they lived a couple of times, and you really grasp the isolation they must have felt there.
As an Emily, as a youngster, I read Wuthering Heights for that reason alone. I'm glad I did. But I read it at an age where I didn't understand half of what was going on. I reread it late last year and wow. Completely different viewpoint as a 50-year-old woman versus a 15-year-old girl reader. Thank you for this post, I'm going to save it so I can return to it. It seems every now and then I get a hankering for revisiting what is a very dark and disturbing but beautifully haunting tale. (Also I love the title of this post. I couldn't resist opening it!)
Thank you, Emily! I know exactly what you mean; I first read it a bit older, around my late teens, and felt more sympathy towards Cathy and Heathcliff. When I returned to it in my 40's, I couldn't believe their bad behaviour and toxic relationship!
This is such an excellent, insightful and well-researched piece. After visiting the Bronte home in Howarth, I, too, would have taken long walks with Keeper to try and remain sane.
Thank you! I know what you mean; it's an interesting but lonely place.
What a rewarding piece to read for the way you keep Emily Brontë and her work at its heart, encouraging us to wonder and think about her (and the interplay between family dynamics and its legends and creativity work) through different lenses, but never making those lenses didactic and reductive…never appropriating or stealong her for your arguments.
Your discussion of Heathcliff was interesting to read alongside What To Read If’s current piece on men in fiction.
Thank you for reading and for such a thoughtful comment, Nicolas. Yes, I set out to find out more about my favourite of the Bronte sisters, and soon realised that it was unfair to label her with words that others had decided to attribute to her. In the end, she remains as enigmatic (and therefore even more interesting) to me as her writing.
Beautiful - thank you, Kate. I love Emily, the Brontës and Haworth. And the title of your essay 🤎
Thank you, Victoria! I had a feeling you would be a fan 💕
Fantastic essay! I recently re read Wuthering Heights and I can’t believe it is seen as a romantic tale. There’s so much darkness and abuse. It’s a shame more isn’t known about Emily
Thanks! 💕 I know, it's such a violent and toxic story.
This was absolutely fascinating to read. I read Wuthering Heights in high school when my English was not very good.... I am so curious to read it again, with this perspective in mind.
I just admire them all so much for being ages ahead of their times. My personal favorite sister is Charlotte and I thought that Vilette was just PHENOMENAL.
Thanks, Petya! They were SO amazing to have come up with these themes and stories when they lived such isolated lives. I've visited the Parsonage where they lived a couple of times, and you really grasp the isolation they must have felt there.
Fascinating essay - thank you, Kate. I need to add Harman's biography to my TBR list!
Thanks! 😀
As an Emily, as a youngster, I read Wuthering Heights for that reason alone. I'm glad I did. But I read it at an age where I didn't understand half of what was going on. I reread it late last year and wow. Completely different viewpoint as a 50-year-old woman versus a 15-year-old girl reader. Thank you for this post, I'm going to save it so I can return to it. It seems every now and then I get a hankering for revisiting what is a very dark and disturbing but beautifully haunting tale. (Also I love the title of this post. I couldn't resist opening it!)
Thank you, Emily! I know exactly what you mean; I first read it a bit older, around my late teens, and felt more sympathy towards Cathy and Heathcliff. When I returned to it in my 40's, I couldn't believe their bad behaviour and toxic relationship!