Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë's only

novel, was published in 1847 under the
pseudonym "Ellis Bell". It was written
between October 1845 and June 1846.[1]
Wuthering Heights and Anne Brontë's
Agnes Grey were accepted by publisher
Thomas Newby before the success of
their sister Charlotte's novel Jane Eyre.
After Emily's death, Charlotte edited the
manuscript of Wuthering Heights and
arranged for the edited version to be
published as a posthumous second
edition in 1850.[2]
Wuthering Heights

Title page of the first edition

Author Emily Brontë

Country United Kingdom

Language English

Genre Tragedy Gothic

Published December 1847

Publisher Thomas Cautley

Newby

ISBN 0-486-29256-8

OCLC 71126926
Dewey Decimal 823.8

LC Class PR4172 .W7 2007

Text Wuthering Heights

online

Although Wuthering Heights is now a

classic of English literature,
contemporary reviews were deeply
polarised; it was controversial because
of its unusually stark depiction of mental
and physical cruelty, and it challenged
strict Victorian ideals regarding religious
hypocrisy, morality, social classes and
gender inequality.[3][4][5] The English poet
and painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti,
although an admirer of the book, referred
to it as "A fiend of a book – an incredible
monster  [...] The action is laid in hell, –
only it seems places and people have
English names there."[6]

Wuthering Heights contains elements of

gothic fiction,[7] and another significant
aspect is the moorland setting. The novel
has inspired adaptations, including film,
radio and television dramatisations, a
musical, a ballet, operas, and a song by
Kate Bush.

Plot
Opening (chapters 1 to 3)
In 1801, Lockwood, a wealthy young man
from the South of England, who is
seeking peace and recuperation, rents
Thrushcross Grange in Yorkshire. He
visits his landlord, Heathcliff, who lives in
a remote moorland farmhouse,
Wuthering Heights. There Lockwood
finds an odd assemblage: Heathcliff, who
seems to be a gentleman, but his
manners are uncouth; the reserved
mistress of the house, who is in her mid-
teens; and a young man, who seems to
be a member of the family, yet dresses
and speaks as if he is a servant.

Snowed in, Lockwood is grudgingly

allowed to stay and is shown to a
bedchamber, where he notices books
and graffiti left by a former inhabitant
named Catherine. He falls asleep and
has a nightmare, in which he sees the
ghostly Catherine trying to enter through
the window. He cries out in fear, rousing
Heathcliff, who rushes into the room.
Lockwood is convinced that what he saw
was real. Heathcliff, believing Lockwood
to be right, examines the window and
opens it, hoping to allow Catherine's
spirit to enter. When nothing happens,
Heathcliff shows Lockwood to his own
bedroom and returns to keep watch at
the window.
At sunrise, Heathcliff escorts Lockwood
back to Thrushcross Grange. After his
visit to the Heights, Lockwood becomes
ill and is confined to his bed for some
length of time. The Grange housekeeper,
Ellen (Nelly) Dean, who is looking after
him, tells him the story of the family at
the Heights during his convalescence.

Heathcliff's childhood
(chapters 4 to 17)

Thirty years earlier, the owner of

Wuthering Heights was Mr. Earnshaw,
who lived with his son Hindley and
younger daughter Catherine. On a trip to
Liverpool, Earnshaw encounters a
homeless boy, described as a "dark-
skinned gypsy in aspect". He adopts the
boy and names him Heathcliff. Hindley
feels that Heathcliff has supplanted him
in his father's affections and becomes
bitterly jealous. Catherine and Heathcliff
become friends and spend hours each
day playing on the moors. They grow
close.

Hindley is sent to university/college.

Three years later Earnshaw dies, and
Hindley becomes the landowner; he is
now master of Wuthering Heights. He
returns to live there with his new wife,
Frances. He allows Heathcliff to stay, but
only as a servant, and regularly mistreats
him.

The climb to Top Withens, thought to have inspired

the Earnshaws' home in Wuthering Heights

A few months after Hindley's return,

Heathcliff and Catherine walk to
Thrushcross Grange to spy on Edgar and
Isabella Linton, who live there. After
being discovered, they try to run away,
but are caught. Catherine is injured by
the Lintons' dog and taken into the house
to recuperate, while Heathcliff is sent
home. Catherine stays with the Lintons.
The Lintons are landed gentry, and
Catherine is influenced by their elegant
appearance and genteel manners. When
she returns to Wuthering Heights, her
appearance and manners are more
ladylike, and she laughs at Heathcliff's
unkempt appearance. The next day,
knowing that the Lintons are to visit,
Heathcliff, upon Nelly's advice, tries to
dress up, in an effort to impress
Catherine, but he and Edgar get into an
argument, and Hindley humiliates
Heathcliff by locking him in the attic.
Catherine tries to comfort Heathcliff, but
he vows revenge on Hindley.
The following year, Frances Earnshaw
gives birth to a son, named Hareton, but
she dies a few months later. Hindley
descends into drunkenness. Two more
years pass, and Catherine and Edgar
Linton become friends, while she
becomes more distant from Heathcliff.
Edgar visits Catherine while Hindley is
away, and they declare themselves lovers
soon afterwards.

Catherine confesses to Nelly that Edgar

has proposed marriage and she has
accepted, although her love for Edgar is
not comparable to her love for Heathcliff,
whom she cannot marry because of his
low social status and lack of education.
She hopes to use her position as Edgar's
wife to raise Heathcliff's standing.
Heathcliff overhears her say that it would
"degrade" her to marry him (but not how
much she loves him), and he runs away
and disappears without a trace.
Distraught over Heathcliff's departure,
Catherine makes herself ill. Nelly and
Edgar begin to pander to her every whim
to prevent her from becoming ill again.

Three years pass. Edgar and Catherine

marry and go to live together at
Thrushcross Grange, where Catherine
enjoys being "lady of the manor". Six
months later, Heathcliff returns, now a
wealthy gentleman. Catherine is
delighted, but Edgar is not. Edgar's sister,
Isabella, soon falls in love with Heathcliff,
who despises her, but encourages the
infatuation as a means of revenge. This
leads to an argument with Catherine at
Thrushcross Grange, which Edgar
overhears. Finally, enraged by Heathcliff's
constant appearance and foul parlance,
he forbids Heathcliff from visiting
Catherine altogether. Upset, Catherine
locks herself in her room and begins to
make herself ill again. She is also now
pregnant with Edgar's child.

Heathcliff takes up residence at

Wuthering Heights and spends his time
gambling with Hindley and teaching
Hareton bad habits. Hindley dissipates
his wealth and mortgages the farmhouse
to Heathcliff to pay his debts. Heathcliff
elopes with Isabella Linton. Two months
after their elopement, Heathcliff and
Isabella return to Wuthering Heights,
where Heathcliff discovers that Catherine
is dying. With Nelly's help, he visits
Catherine secretly. The following day, she
gives birth to a daughter, Cathy, shortly
before dying. While Catherine is lying in
her coffin overnight, prior to the funeral,
Heathcliff returns and replaces the lock
of Edgar's hair in her necklace with a lock
of his own.
Shortly after the funeral, Isabella leaves
Heathcliff and finds refuge in the South
of England. She gives birth to a son,
Linton. Hindley dies six months after
Catherine, and Heathcliff thus finds
himself master of Wuthering Heights.

Heathcliff's maturity
(chapters 18 to 31)

Brontë Society plaque at Top Withens

Twelve years pass. Catherine's daughter,
Cathy, has become a beautiful, high-
spirited girl. Edgar learns that his sister
Isabella is dying, so he leaves to retrieve
her son Linton in order to adopt and
educate him. Cathy, who has rarely left
home, takes advantage of her father's
absence to venture further afield. She
rides over the moors to Wuthering
Heights and discovers that she has not
one but two cousins: Hareton, in addition
to Linton. She also lets it be known that
her father has gone to fetch Linton. When
Edgar returns with Linton, a weak and
sickly boy, Heathcliff insists that he live
at Wuthering Heights.
Three years pass. Walking on the moors,
Nelly and Cathy encounter Heathcliff,
who takes them to Wuthering Heights to
see Linton and Hareton. Heathcliff hopes
that Linton and Cathy will marry, so that
Linton will become the heir to
Thrushcross Grange. Linton and Cathy
begin a secret friendship, echoing the
childhood friendship between their
respective parents, Heathcliff and
Catherine. Nelly finds out about the
letters.

The following year, Edgar becomes very

ill and takes a turn for the worse while
Nelly and Cathy are out on the moors,
where Heathcliff and Linton trick them
into entering Wuthering Heights.
Heathcliff keeps them captive to enable
the marriage of Cathy and Linton to take
place. After five days, Nelly is released,
and later, with Linton's help, Cathy
escapes. She returns to the Grange to
see her father shortly before he dies.

Now master of both Wuthering Heights

and Thrushcross Grange, Cathy's father-
in-law, Heathcliff, insists on her returning
to live at Wuthering Heights. Soon after
she arrives, Linton dies. Hareton tries to
be kind to Cathy, but she withdraws from
the world.

At this point, Nelly's tale catches up to

the present day (1801). Time passes and,
after being ill for a period, Lockwood
grows tired of the moors and informs
Heathcliff that he will be leaving
Thrushcross Grange.

Ending (chapters 32 to 34)

Eight months later, Lockwood returns to

the area by chance. Given that his
tenancy at Thrushcross Grange is still
valid, he decides to stay there again. He
finds Nelly living at Wuthering Heights
and enquires what has happened since
he left. She explains that she moved to
Wuthering Heights to replace the
housekeeper, Zillah, who had left.
Hareton has an accident and is confined
to the farmhouse. During his
convalescence, he and Cathy overcome
their mutual antipathy and become close.
While their friendship develops,
Heathcliff begins to act strangely and
has visions of Catherine. He stops eating
and, after four days of increasingly bad
health, is found dead in Catherine's old
room. He is buried next to Catherine.

Lockwood learns that Hareton and Cathy

plan to marry on New Year's Day. As he
gets ready to leave, he passes the graves
of Catherine, Edgar, and Heathcliff and
pauses to contemplate the quiet of the
moors.
Characters
Heathcliff: Found, presumably
orphaned, on the streets of Liverpool
and taken by Mr. Earnshaw to
Wuthering Heights, where he is
reluctantly cared for by the family. He
and Catherine grow close and their
love is the central theme of the first
volume. His revenge against the man
she chooses to marry and its
consequences are the central theme of
the second volume. Heathcliff has
been considered a Byronic hero, but
critics have pointed out that he
reinvents himself at various points,
making his character hard to fit into
any single type. He has an ambiguous
position in society, and his lack of
status is underlined by the fact that
"Heathcliff" is both his given name and
his surname.
Catherine Earnshaw: First introduced
to the reader after her death, through
Lockwood's discovery of her diary and
carvings. The description of her life is
confined almost entirely to the first
volume. She seems unsure whether
she is, or wants to become, more like
Heathcliff, or aspires to be more like
Edgar. Some critics have argued that
her decision to marry Edgar Linton is
allegorically a rejection of nature and a
surrender to culture, a choice with
unfortunate, fateful consequences for
all the other characters.[8]
Edgar Linton: Introduced as a child in
the Linton family, he resides at
Thrushcross Grange. Edgar's style and
manners are in sharp contrast to those
of Heathcliff, who instantly dislikes
him, and of Catherine, who is drawn to
him. Catherine marries him instead of
Heathcliff because of his higher social
status, with disastrous results to all
characters in the story.
Nelly Dean: The main narrator of the
novel, Nelly is a servant to three
generations of the Earnshaws and two
of the Linton family. Humbly born, she
regards herself nevertheless as
Hindley's foster-sister (they are the
same age and her mother is his nurse).
She lives and works among the rough
inhabitants of Wuthering Heights, but
is well-read, and she also experiences
the more genteel manners of
Thrushcross Grange. She is referred to
as Ellen, her given name, to show
respect, and as Nelly among those
close to her. Critics have discussed
how far her actions as an apparent
bystander affect the other characters
and how much her narrative can be
relied on.[9]
Isabella Linton: Isabella is seen only in
relation to other characters, although
some insight into her thoughts and
feelings is provided by the chapter, a
long letter to Ellen, detailing her arrival
at Wuthering Heights after her
marriage to Heathcliff. She views
Heathcliff romantically, despite
Catherine's warnings, and becomes an
unwitting participant in his plot for
revenge against Edgar. Heathcliff
marries her, but treats her abusively.
While pregnant, she escapes to
London and gives birth to a son,
Linton.
Hindley Earnshaw: Catherine's elder
brother, Hindley, despises Heathcliff
immediately and bullies him
throughout their childhood before his
father sends him away to college.
Hindley returns with his wife, Frances,
after Mr Earnshaw dies. He is more
mature, but his hatred of Heathcliff
remains the same. After Frances's
death, Hindley reverts to destructive
behaviour and ruins the Earnshaw
family by drinking and gambling to
excess. Heathcliff beats up Hindley at
one point after Hindley fails in his
attempt to kill Heathcliff with a pistol.
Hareton Earnshaw: The son of Hindley
and Frances, raised at first by Nelly but
soon by Heathcliff. Nelly works to
instill a sense of pride in the Earnshaw
heritage (even though Hareton will not
inherit Earnshaw property, because
Hindley has mortgaged it to
Heathcliff). Heathcliff, in contrast,
teaches him vulgarities, as a way of
avenging himself on Hindley. Hareton
speaks with an accent similar to
Joseph's, and occupies a position
similar to a servant at Wuthering
Heights, unaware how he has been
done out of his inheritance. In
appearance he reminds Heathcliff of
his aunt, Catherine.
Cathy Linton: The daughter of
Catherine and Edgar, a spirited and
strong-willed girl unaware of her
parents' history. Edgar is very
protective of her and as a result she is
eager to discover what lies beyond the
confines of the Grange. Although one
of the more sympathetic characters of
the novel, she is also somewhat
snobbish against Hareton and his lack
of education.
Linton Heathcliff: The son of Heathcliff
and Isabella. A weak child, his early
years are spent with his mother in the
south of England. He learns of his
father's identity and existence only
after his mother dies, when he is
twelve. In his selfishness and capacity
for cruelty he resembles Heathcliff.
Physically he resembles his mother. He
marries Cathy Linton because his
father, who terrifies him, directs him to
do so, and soon after dies from a
wasting illness associated with
tuberculosis.
Joseph: A servant at Wuthering
Heights for 60 years who is a rigid,
self-righteous Christian but lacks any
trace of genuine kindness or humanity.
He speaks a broad Yorkshire dialect
and hates nearly everyone in the novel.
Mr Lockwood: The first narrator, he
rents Thrushcross Grange to escape
society, but in the end decides society
is preferable. He narrates the book
until Chapter 4, when the main narrator,
Nelly, picks up the tale.
Frances: Hindley's ailing wife and
mother of Hareton Earnshaw. She is
described as somewhat silly and is
obviously from humble family
backgrounds.
Mr and Mrs Earnshaw: Catherine's and
Hindley's father, Mr Earnshaw is the
master of Wuthering Heights at the
beginning of Nelly's story and is
described as an irascible but loving
and kind-hearted man. He favours his
adopted son, Heathcliff, which causes
trouble in the family. In contrast, his
wife mistrusts Heathcliff from their
first encounter.
Mr and Mrs Linton: Edgar's and
Isabella's parents, they educate their
children in a well-behaved and
sophisticated way. Mr Linton also
serves as the magistrate of
Gimmerton, like his son in later years.
Dr Kenneth: The longtime doctor of
Gimmerton and a friend of Hindley's
who is present at the cases of illness
during the novel. Although not much of
his character is known, he seems to be
a rough but honest person.
Zillah: A servant to Heathcliff at
Wuthering Heights during the period
following Catherine's death. Although
she is kind to Lockwood, she doesn't
like or help Cathy at Wuthering Heights
because of Cathy's arrogance and
Heathcliff's instructions.
 Mr Green: Edgar's corruptible lawyer
who should have changed Edgar's will
to prevent Heathcliff from gaining
Thrushcross Grange. But Green
changes sides and helps Heathcliff to
inherit Grange as his property.

Family relationships map

Timeline
 The stone above the front door of
Wuthering Heights, bearing the
1500: name Earnshaw, is inscribed,
presumably to mark the completion
of the house.
1757:Hindley Earnshaw born (summer)
1762:Edgar Linton born
Catherine Earnshaw born
1765: (summer); Isabella Linton born
(late 1765)
Heathcliff brought to Wuthering
1771: Heights by Mr Earnshaw (late
summer)
1773:Mrs Earnshaw dies (spring)
Hindley sent off to college by his
1774:
father
1775:Hindley marries Frances; Mr
 Earnshaw dies and Hindley comes
back (October); Heathcliff and
Catherine visit Thrushcross Grange
for the first time; Catherine remains
behind (November), and then
returns to Wuthering Heights
(Christmas Eve)
1778:Hareton born (June); Frances dies
Heathcliff runs away from
1780: Wuthering Heights; Mr and Mrs
Linton both die
Catherine has married Edgar
1783: (March); Heathcliff comes back
(September)
1784:Heathcliff marries Isabella
(February); Catherine dies and
Cathy born (20 March); Hindley