BookBrowse Reviews Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

BookBrowse:

Emily Brontë's gothic masterpiece is a fierce multigenerational tale of obsession, revenge, and emotional ruin set on the Yorkshire moors.

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It is a commonly held belief that there are two types of people in the world: Jane Eyre people and Wuthering Heights people. Which is to say, if you consider Charlotte Brontë's most famous novel, a staid and straightforward romance in which the heroine gets her man, to be one of your favorites, you are probably less impressed by her sister Emily's chaotic story of passionate but miserable people loving and dying passionately. In case it isn't already clear, I fall into the latter camp.

The plot of Wuthering Heights is confusing to relate for a number of reasons—characters share names, the central story is narrated within the frame of another story, it unfolds over decades, and part of the conflict revolves around 18th century British inheritance law. But a very cursory summary would involve the following facts. When Catherine Earnshaw and her brother Hindley are children, their father returns home from a trip with a small, "dark-skinned" boy called Heathcliff, who he found on the streets of Liverpool, and who he intends to raise as his own. Heathcliff and Catherine become close friends, but when Mr. Earnshaw dies and Hindley inherits the estate (after which the book is named), Heathcliff is relegated to the status of stable boy. After a misunderstanding with Catherine, Heathcliff runs away, and in his absence, she marries Edgar Linton, son of the wealthy owner of Thrushcross Grange, a neighboring property. Heathcliff returns and vows he will get revenge on Hindley, and Edgar for stealing the love of his life. He insinuates himself into the home of the former by manipulation and marries the latter's sister. Despite her marriage, Catherine has reciprocal feelings for Heathcliff, and one might think the story will consist largely of the two finding their way back to each other. Instead, Catherine dies at the end of the first act, while giving birth to her daughter, who is christened Catherine (called Cathy by her father).

This story of the Earnshaws and Lintons is being narrated by Nelly Dean, who was a servant in both households at various times, to Mr. Lockwood, who is renting Thrushcross Grange after the death of Edgar Linton. Her narration catches up to the present day, and Brontë subverts the reader's expectations, first suggesting that Lockwood might be developing romantic feelings for Cathy Linton, now living at Wuthering Heights under the iron first of Heathcliff, after marrying his son who has since died. Instead, in a redemptive turn of events, Heathcliff dies and Cathy and Hindley Earnshaw's son Hareton fall in love at the end of the novel. If you're thinking, "Hey, aren't a lot of these people first cousins?" the answer is yes.

Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights share a gothic atmosphere and brooding leading man, but the former has very little of the latter's desperate, clinging, needy desire. Heathcliff's obsession with Catherine will appeal to anyone who has ever been taken apart by love, or blown to pieces by it, or even anyone who has ever desired to have such an experience. Heathcliff is a cruel, odious person, but he talks the talk:

"If he loved with all the powers of his puny being, he couldn't love as much in eighty years as I could in a day. And Catherine has a heart as deep as I have: the sea could be as readily contained in that horse-trough as her whole affection monopolised by him. Tush! He is scarcely a degree dearer to her than her dog, or her horse. It is not in him to be loved like me: how can she love in him what he has not?"

And he certainly also walks the walk, as he succumbs to madness as a result of being haunted by Catherine's ghost and ultimately walks into an early grave with open arms to receive his lover's cold kiss of death. The book still manages to achieve a happy ending for Young Cathy, quite a feat given the general atmosphere, but certainly Jane Eyre is much easier on the heart and more forgiving.

That's not to say Wuthering Heights is a miserable read. The plot is exciting, and the dialogue is at times very funny. The book's legacy and ongoing popularity (a new film adaptation is set for a February 2026 release) is indicative of the enduring human appetite for an all-consuming love that never wavers, even after death, demonstrated through coarse meanness and acts of sadism.

This review first ran in the January 28, 2026 issue of BookBrowse Recommends.