It has been proven evident throughout the history of literature that authors will tend to incorporate their own lives into their works. This is the case in Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. Although the novel is in itself fictional, Brontë invites readers into her private life by the way in which she writes her novel. Literary elements are often taken into consideration when determining the value of a literary work. However, they offer more than just layers of complexity to a work. Brontë uses countless metaphors to portray relevance to her own life. The ongoing comparison between the characters in Wuthering Heights and Brontë’s own life only exemplifies how often authors use their works to reflect their lives.
The never-ending question pertaining to Emily Brontë is “how can such a sheltered child write such scandalous stories?” (The New Republic). Emily Brontë grew up in Yorkshire, England. Her mother, Maria Branwell, succumbed to cancer at the age of thirty eight, leaving Emily motherless at the age of three. Her father, Patrick Brontë, was a clergyman who secluded himself from even his family. He was even known to eat dinner in his own room. Mr. Brontë never remarried, leaving himself to raise six children on his own. This upbringing led to Emily’s lack of familiarity with the outside world (Emily Jane Brontë).
Emily Brontë was the fifth of six children, all of which turned to literature as a comforting form of expression (The New Republic). Emily Brontë’s only friends were her siblings, yet she was extremely more unsocial and reserved (Emily Jane Brontë). Soon after beginning their education at Clergy Daughter’s School at Cowan Bridge, two of Emily’s sisters contracted tuberculosis. Maria and Elizabeth returned from school...
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...rs. Wuthering Heights. New York: Random House, 1943. Print.
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Charlotte “Jane Eyre” Bronte was born April 21, 1816. She was born the third daughter out of six children. In 1824, Charlotte and her older sisters, Maria and Elizabeth Bronte, enrolled in the Cowan Bridge Clergy Daughters’ School and obtained their education. Soon after Charlotte’s younger sister, Emily, joined them at the school, Maria and Elizabeth became very ill. Charlotte’s father, Patrick Bronte, requested for Maria and Elizabeth to be sent home to be taken care of. Charlotte and Emily were left to attend Cowan Bridge alone; however, this did not last long because they were soon requested home by their father as well. In the following year, Elizabeth and Maria both died of consumption. The death of these two beloved sisters took a toll on the Bronte family causing the remaining siblings to cling together for support and become best friends. Charlotte, her brother Branwell, Emily, and youngest sister Anne began to write epic stories and poems together, often set in the realm of the Kingdom of Gondal. This was the beginning of the legacy to be left by Charlotte Bronte. (Gerin, 169)
Emily Bronte was born July 30, 1818 in Thornton, Yorkshire, England. At the time when Emily was born there were a lot of changes going on in society: such as the Treaty between the U.S. and the U.K. that established the boundary between U.S. and British North America. Emily was the fifth child of Patrick Bronte and Maria Branwell. Among her siblings were: Maria and Elizabeth born in 1815, Charlotte in 1816, Patrick was in 1817, and Anne was last in 1819. After Anne was born the family moved to the village of Haworth in February 1820, although described as an unhealthy place riddled with disease, Patrick had no choice because he was appointed Clergymen. A few months after they had moved to Haworth the family found out that Mrs. Bronte was falling ill from cancer, and in September 1821 Maria Branwell passed away. Patrick Bronte became even more secluded than usual, so the children were left all on their own to look out for each other. Patrick had set very strict rules for the children including what they were allowed to wear and even eat. In the spring of 1824, the children had gotten whooping cough and measles. Patrick Bronte thought that if they had a “change of air” they would recover faster, so he started looking for a school.
Reef, Catherine. The Bronte Sisters: The Brief Lives of Charlotte, Emily, and Anne. New York:
The Romantic period had a formative experience on the Brontes. In order to examine this formative experience, we must suppose first that the Bronte sisters had been exposed to many Dark-romantic/Gothic writings that had shaped their world-views and influenced their literary products. We will need to take a look, thus, at some of the Gothic-romantic works which certainly could have impacted the different ways in which the Bronte sisters chiseled their literary characters and created their fictional worlds.
When a child is born into this unpredictable world, led by a Fate that depends well on what and how one plays their lives, they are usually taken care of by the one and only guardian blessed with the soul inside them: their mothers. Granted, that some may not have wished to be one so early, they were given to do so; with supposed adoring hearts and unbound love and careful nurturing, the role of a Mother in a child's life is important - not belittling a Father's, of course - and no matter how different one mother treats their child compared to another, their love is something a child will never forget. Yet, sadly, Brontë herself never had the chance to experience such a thing like most - if not other - children had. Her kindhearted mother, Maria Branwell, passed away from cancer at the young age of thirty-eight in September, 1821 (Online-lit.) leaving her six children and husband, Patrick Brontë, in a lost state. Withal, Charlotte's father worked hard for their peaceful - albeit isolated - life as a curator in Thornton, their hometown, but later moved on to Haworth and was appointed Reverend. Being born in Victorian times and has fair - or even more in-dept...
Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is deemed a complex novel, with its wide ranging themes of love, betrayal, suffering and imprisonment. It contains all the elements of a Gothic novel in nature but with the added ingredient of realism, but it is not just this blending of Gothic with realism that makes the novel so multifaceted, it is also Brontë’s use of multiple narrators that adds to the complexities of this novel. And it is the resulting effect of the different narrative voices in Wuthering Heights that this essay seeks to discuss.
Charlotte Brontë was born on April 21 in Thornton, Yorkshire, England in 1816. She was the third of six children of Reverend Patrick Brontë and Maria Branwell Brontë. She grew up in a “strict Anglican home with her four sisters, Maria, Elizabeth, Anne and Emily and brother, Patrick” (Charlotte Bronte: Brief Biography). Rev. Brontë was a “poor Irishman who became the parish clergyman in the family’s hometown” (Brontë Sisters). Charlotte as well as her sisters went to many different schools. In 1824, the four eldest attended the “Clergy Daughters School at Cowan Bridge” (Charlotte Bronte: Brief Biography). In 1831, Charlotte studied at “Roe’s Head”, but left in a year (The Brontë Sisters). Brontë then taught at the Wooler school and was a governess for three years starting in 1835. In 1842, Brontë and her sister Emily traveled to Brussels to attend school “at the La Maison d’Education Les Jeunes Demoiselles” in the hopes of one day opening their own school at Haworth, which was never accomplished (Authors & Artists for Young Adults).
Brontë, Emily. Wuthering Heights. 1847. Ed. Richard J. Dunn. 4th ed. New York: Norton, 2003.
Emily Bronte’s education started at the age of six where she was sent to Clergy Daughters’ School. She was eventually sent of out this school when a case of tuberculosis came out and had killed two of her siblings. Living in Haworth, England, Bronte still enjoyed her young years in the quiet town. To keep her education alive, she went to Mrs. Wooler’s School in 1835. She became a teacher in 1837 at a law school, and then later studied Brussels in 1842.
Charlotte Bronte’s novel Jane Eyre, is not a book that can easily be viewed through one critical theory. However, by knowing the historical background of when Bronte developed her novel, readers are able to understand Jane Eyre on a deeper level. The Victorian era was a time of change, and what authors like Charlotte Bronte did was help increase the change by shedding light into problems in Victorian society. Jane Eyre touches on many of the issues in Victorian society like feminist issues, class struggles, and the relationship between Britain and its colonies. Not only can readers see how much society has changed, but also the similarities. By understanding the novel at a historical level, readers can understand the novel through the lense
Brontë, Emily, Fritz Eichenberg, and Bruce Rogers. Wuthering Heights. New York: Random House, 1943. Print.
Seichepine, Marielle. "Childhood And Innocence In Wuthering Heights." Bronte Studies 29.3 (2004): 209-215. Academic Search Complete. Web. 13 Feb. 2014.
Bronte's Use of Language and Setting in Wuthering Heights Between pages 15 and 18 there are identifiable ways in which 'Bronte' uses 'language and setting' to establish the characters and create a distinguishable atmosphere. In this essay, themes, genres and styles will be discussed to show how 'Bronte' establishes the characters; there will also be a discussion of the 'gothic' elements which Wuthering Heights contains. Many people would argue that the style of 'Wuthering Heights' is peculiar and complex, the power of Wuthering Heights owes much to its complex narrative structure and to the device of having two conventional people relate a very unconventional tale. Bronte importantly introduces the element of 'the supernatural' into chapter 3 which is an important technique as it grips the reader. Lockwood has come into contact with the ghost of Cathy, who died 18 years before, Some might argue that she is a product of Lockwood's imagination, and it is clear that Bronte has presented these facts in this way so that the reader can make up their own mind on the subject.