The Weirdness of Wuthering Heights

I almost did a double take when I read that the new film adaptation of Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights is being released this weekend to coincide with Valentine's Day. Seriously? This book is many things — brilliant, intense and unforgettable — but a date-night romance it is not. At least not in any traditional sense.

For many years, I put off reading this book, but I finally tackled it during the pandemic when I had more time to read. I don't know what took me so long. Perhaps I didn't see a need for any Brontë sister in my life other than Charlotte. I had read Jane Eyre when I was probably 14 or 15, and it remains one of my favorite books of all time. But I must admit that Wuthering Heights is a much bolder and more challenging novel, and it's astonishing that Emily Brontë wrote it when she was just 28. Sadly, she died a year later from tuberculosis, and this was her only novel. (I also read The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë, the third sister, during lockdown, and that's also a fascinating 19th-century novel that I would like to revisit another time.)

Many people know the broad outlines of the plot: the doomed love of Heathcliff and Catherine set against the backdrop of the wild moors of northern England. Their passionate relationship is why Wuthering Heights is often catalogued as a romance, but in reality, it's a very dark and twisted tale of obsession, grievance and cruelty, with supernatural elements running throughout the story.

Here's a quick summary: A man named Mr. Lockwood rents a country estate (the titular Wuthering Heights) in Yorkshire. After he thinks he hears a ghost wailing outside his window, he asks the housekeeper, Nelly Dean, what is going on. She tells him about the fraught history of two neighboring families, the Earnshaws and the Lintons, and that the conflict can be traced back to when the Earnshaws brought home Heathcliff, a mysterious orphan. Heathcliff and Catherine grow up together, become inseparable and fall intensely in love. But Catherine later spurns Heathcliff in favor of marriage to Edgar Linton, a man with much higher social status. Heathcliff does not take this news well, to say the least, and he goes on a revenge spree for the ages.

Heathcliff is a breathtakingly monstrous character and kind of a psychopath. The impulsive and complicated Catherine is somewhat more sympathetic but not exactly likeable. The book can also be confusing — there are multiple narrators, and several characters have similar names. There is a gentle love story that ultimately emerges, but it's not that of Heathcliff and Catherine.

Wuthering Heights was dismissed by critics when it was first published.

When it was first published in 1847, Wuthering Heights was panned by many critics who found it strange and disturbing. They weren't wrong, but it is also a powerful exploration of the depths of human emotion and how love can turn into something wild and destructive. This is what makes it a classic.

Emily Brontë herself remains such a mystery. I have read a bit about her and the rest of the Brontë family, and it is remarkable how she managed to dream up this book. She never married, never had a romantic relationship (as far as we know), and was considered a recluse who rarely socialized beyond her family. Her imagination was simply extraordinary.

Getting back to film versions, there have been a lot of them, and I watched a few after reading the book. First, I watched the 1939 version, featuring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon. It has a lot of old Hollywood charm, but it in no way captures the book's darkness. It also covers only the first half of the plot! I then watched a 1992 version with Juliette Binoche playing Catherine and speaking French-accented English (odd casting choice) and Ralph Fiennes (good choice) as Heathcliff. On the whole, this movie was pretty good.

See the new film if you wish (I might), but Halloween feels like a more fitting occasion than Valentine's Day. And consider finding time for the book if you have never read it. It's well worth it.