A scandalous novel by a clergyman's daughter
Emily Brontë was a clergyman’s
daughter. She grew up in a remote part of England, in Howarth, a tiny village
in Yorkshire. She didn’t like to travel.
When she left home she became ill. She never married and she died at the age of
30 having published her only novel and some poetry.
Wuthering Heights was one
of the most shocking novel in English literature. When it was first published
in 1847, it created a firestorm of protest. It was called “one of the most repellent book ever published”. One critic said it
should be burnt. The protest only settle down when the second edition came out
and the author was revealed to be the daughter of a parson from west-Yorkshire.
How had a parson’s daughter created such a threat to civilized society as Heathcliff, a hero driven by
sexual passion and vengeance and, instead of a proper Victorian heroine, she gave the world a married woman who runs
around on the moor in her nightgown with her lover. The reading public was
shocked. Shocked. But the novel has never been out of print and has had many
film adaptations.
