Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte, is part of the Barnes & Noble Classicsseries, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics:
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Emily Brontë’s only novel, Wuthering Heights remains one of literature’s most disturbing explorations into the dark side of romantic passion. Heathcliff and Cathy believe they’re destined to love each other forever, but when cruelty and snobbery separate them, their untamed emotions literally consume them.
Set amid the wild and stormy Yorkshire moors, Wuthering Heights, an unpolished and devastating epic of childhood playmates who grow into soul mates, is widely regarded as the most original tale of thwarted desire and heartbreak in the English language.
Daphne Merkin is the author of a novel, Enchantment, which won the Edward Lewis Wallant award for best new work of American-Jewish fiction, and an essay collection, Dreaming of Hitler. She has written essays and reviews for publications that include American Scholar, the New York Times, where she is a regular contributor to the Book Review, the Los Angeles Times Book Review, Elle, and Vogue.
B+ This classic of English literature has certainly stood the test of time. From the commencement of the novel with moody images to its likewise saturnine conclusion, Bronte's work with tone and characterization sets the bar high for authors of all kinds. The raging zealousness of love that so possess Heathcliff and Catherine melts off the pages in molten waves - truly, has a romance so deluded and inherently doomed ever been described so well? The passions of Romeo and Juliet seem lame in comparison. But never have protagonists been so unlikable. It is hard to sympathize with either one of them, which is the major disappointment of the novel. It is with relief, then, that the romance between young Catherine and Hareton is established. Innocent and true without the sadness that is a trademark of Heathcliff's obsession, the reader begins to glimpse the true meaning of love. The book is intensely readable and page-turning, accessible and unique. The bulk of Wuthering Heights is a psychological exploration of what the past does to a person - it does not so much examine a passionate affair than it does the consequences of actions undertaken by the abused and misguided. Surely Bronte's masterpiece of the human soul will linger as long as Heathcliff's intensity for his lost idol.
A bit of a letdown Often held up as the standard of the classic gothic novel, Wuthering Heights is, for the most part, a showcase of emotional savagery and a dismal portrayal of the human heart. Not well received when first published under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, Emily Bronte went to her grave believing that her one and only novel was a complete failure. A subsequent edition, edited by sister Charlotte, was released after Emily's death and became a worldwide success.
Everyone has heard the name Heathcliff, and that must be due to his being surely one of the vilest, most hateful literary characters to ever exist on a page. An unidentified foundling who is brought to the Earnshaw home as a young boy, Heathcliff is forever painfully aware of his lack of identity and culture and lashes out at everyone with whom he comes into contact. For awhile, his dearest childhood ally, Catherine, is his one sanctuary, but in time he begins to hate her almost as much as he loves her. From that hatred is born several generations of misery and pain, as Heathcliff devotes his entire existence to ruining Catherine, her family, and everything she ever held dear, and no one is immune from Heathcliff's wrath - not even his own children.
Most of the story is told as a look-back by aging housekeeper Nelly Dean as she relates the whole sordid tale to Mr. Lockwood, a tenant who comes to Wuthering Heights to rent for a short time and becomes curious about his angry, tormented landlord. The past soon fuses into the present, as Heathcliff's revenge continues to plague both his and Catherine's hapless descendants.
As dark and depressing a story as it appears on the surface, Bronte's unfettered examination of the twin emotions of intense love and equally intense hatred is powerful, and stays with the reader long after the last page has been turned. It's nothing if not a poignant and eerie lesson in the damage one person's tortured soul can wreak on everyone around him. I found myself much more affected by it than I thought I would be. Recommended for any fan of classic literature, particularly the gothic era of the 19th century.
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