Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights - Not a Romance Novel

Wuthering Heights - Not a Romance Novel

Emily Brontë, author of Wuthering Heights, grew up in isolation on the desolate moors of Yorkshire, knowing very few people outside of her family. In the book, Brontë contradicts the typical form of writing at the time, the romance, and instead composed a subtle attack on romanticism by having no real heroes or villians, just perceivable characters, and an added bit of a Gothic sense to the whole thing. Brontë accomplishes this by presenting us with the anti-romantic personalities of Heathcliff and Edgar, main characters who are brutal and immoral monsters, who eventually die in the end.

The novel's generally tedious atmosphere hardly creates a parallel to the typical romance where everything is laid out nice and neat and "near-perfect" to the reader, but rather takes place on the barren grasslands of England, where dreary weather and something else are present. Emily Brontë's utilization of the character Heathcliff contradicts the impression of romance. Heathcliff's pessimism and self-absorbtion is evident when he says, "Linton would be nothing, nor Hindley, nor all the dreams that ever I dreamt. Two words would comprehend my future - death and hell" (147, Brontë). Heathcliff never reveals any "charm" like a romantic hero would, instead, he is abussive to everyone, " . The character Heathcliff is definitely not a romantic hero.

Edgar is also a very unromantic character. He really doesn't care what his love wants and becomes jealous and arrogant when he suggests that, "The kitchen [be] a more suitable place for [Heathcliff]" (96). Edgar hates the idea of Heathcliff being happy so he practically disallows Catherine from seeing him.

Brontë's creation of a bleak mix of bad weather and a setting of barrenness in the story do not fit the romantic guidelines. This point is brought to attention early in the novel when Lockwood thinks that Wuthering Heights is, "So completely removed from the stir of society. A perfect misanthropist's heaven" (1). Here, she is describing what characters think of the country side, "Yesterday afternoon set in misty and cold. I had half a mind to spend it by my study fire instead of wading through heath and mud to Wuthering Heights" (14). Here again the country side is described, " there was no moon and everything beneath lay in misty darkness" (125).