Book Review: Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

This book is not entirely what I was expecting. I don’t know why, but I was expecting more of a Jane Eyre type of novel, with a romance between a sensitive lady and a stodgy gentleman that you grow to like as the novel progresses, but Wuthering Heights was infinitely darker. I rooted for Jane and Mr. Rochester, but I definitely never rooted for the characters in Wuthering Heights, with the exception of Catherine number 2 (Catherine’s daughter). I wasn’t expecting a romance between two of the most unsympathetic characters with almost no redeeming qualities. Heathcliff in particular was an awful person, though remarkably complex. In fact, all of the characters were complex, despite the choice of POV, which I’ll get into below. 

Even though it wasn’t what I was expecting, it was engrossing to read about what atrocious things the characters would do next in a train-wreck scandal sort of way. And Ellen Dean was a fantastic storyteller. That being said, I’m not sure I liked the narrative structure. Although Ellen Dean was surprisingly my favorite character even though she was just the narrator and not a major player, and I can’t quite imagine the story without her, I think I would’ve been more invested in the characters if it wasn’t a third-hand account written in outsider first-person. The story is obviously unreliable, since it was told to an outsider by the servant Ellen Dean, and then the outsider wrote it down for us readers. Their biases are strong, but the fact that even Catherine and Healthcliff seemingly deemed Nelly a worthy confidant and had an affectionate nickname for her makes me adore Ellen Dean even more and realize that no one else could tell their story like her once Bronte chose this narrative structure. But I don’t think it was the right choice; it made the novel more awkward and distant. 

I wouldn’t call this a love story. It’s a story about obsession, about revenge, about generational trauma and cycles of abuse, and about the complexities of attachment. I read it in three sittings, which tells me I was at least invested in the novel, but for me, it doesn’t compare with Jane Eyre by her sister, Charlotte Bronte. I don’t think the prose itself is particularly awe-inspiring, I truly hated reading any of Joseph’s dialogue as I couldn’t understand a word of it (I understand trying to capture an accent, but please make it readable), and I could care less about the setting as I wasn’t feeling Emily Bronte’s descriptive power. I ultimately think the story was incredibly promising and was done adequately, but could have been edited and reworked into a higher level of excellence.