Wuthering Heights pdf Summary, Characters, Themes, Quotes

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte is an 1847 novel initially published under her pen name Ellis Bell. It concerns two families of the landed gentry living on the West Yorkshire moors, the Earnshaws and the Lintons, and their turbulent relationships with Earnshaw’s foster son, Heathcliff. The novel was influenced by Romanticism and Gothic fiction. Wuthering Heights is now considered a classic of English literature, but contemporaneous reviews were polarised. It was controversial for its depictions of mental and physical cruelty, and for its challenges to Victorian morality and religious and societal values. Wuthering Heights was accepted by publisher Thomas Newby along with Anne Brontë’s Agnes Grey before the success of their sister Charlotte’s novel Jane Eyre, but they were published later. Charlotte edited a second edition of Wuthering Heights after Emily’s death which was published in 1850.  It has inspired an array of adaptations across several media, including English singer-songwriter Kate Bush’s song of the same name. in this article, you will be able to download Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte pdf as well do the following:

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Wuthering Heights Summary

Lockwood, the new tenant of Thrushcross Grange, situated on the bleak Yorkshire moors, is forced to seek shelter one night at Wuthering Heights, the home of his landlord. There he discovers the history of the tempestuous events that took place years before. What unfolds is the tale of the intense love between the gypsy foundling Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw. Catherine, forced to choose between passionate, tortured Heathcliff and gentle, well-bred Edgar Linton, surrendered to the expectations of her class. As Heathcliff’s bitterness and vengeance at his betrayal is visited upon the next generation, their innocent heirs must struggle to escape the legacy of the past. Wuthering Heights is a wild, passionate story of the intense and almost demonic love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff, a foundling adopted by Catherine’s father. After Mr Earnshaw’s death, Heathcliff is bullied and humiliated by Catherine’s brother Hindley and wrongly believing that his love for Catherine is not reciprocated, leaves Wuthering Heights, only to return years later as a wealthy and polished man. He proceeds to exact a terrible revenge for his former miseries. The action of the story is chaotic and unremittingly violent, but the accomplished handling of a complex structure, the evocative descriptions of the lonely moorland setting and the poetic grandeur of vision combine to make this unique novel a masterpiece of English literature.

Wuthering Heights Author – Emily Bronte

Emily Jane Brontë (/ˈbrɒnti/, commonly /ˈbrɒnteɪ/; 30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English novelist and poet who is best known for her only novel, Wuthering Heights, now considered a classic of English literature. Emily was the third eldest of the four surviving Brontë siblings, between the youngest Anne and her brother Branwell. She wrote under the pen name Ellis Bell. Along with her sisters, Charlotte and Anne, is one of the most significant literary figures of the 19th century. She wrote just one strikingly innovative novel but was also a gifted and intense poet.

Wuthering heights pdf Book Information (Amazon)

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

Wuthering Heights pdf Themes

Gothic Literature and the Supernatural

From beginning to end, Wuthering Heights is a novel full of ghosts and spirits. Dead characters refuse to leave the living alone, and the living accept that the deceased find ways of coming back to haunt them. In a departure from traditional Gothic tales, these hauntings are sometimes welcome. Heathcliff, for instance, repeatedly seeks out visitations from the ghost of his beloved Catherine. He even digs up her grave in order to be closer to her. Brontë uses otherworldly figures to emphasize the ferocity of Heathcliff’s and Catherine’s love; their connection is so powerful that even death can’t stop it.

Love and Passion

Wuthering Heights explores a variety of kinds of love. Loves on display in the novel include Heathcliff and Catherine’s all-consuming passion for each other, which while noble in its purity is also terribly destructive. In contract, the love between Catherine and Edgar is proper and civilized rather than passionate. Theirs is a love of peace and comfort, a socially acceptable love, but it can’t stand in the way of Heathcliff and Catherine’s more profound (and more violent) connection. The love between Cathy and Linton is a grotesque exaggeration of that between Catherine and Edgar. While Catherine always seems just a bit too strong for Edgar, Cathy and Linton’s love is founded on Linton’s weakness—Linton gets Cathy to love him by playing on her desire to protect and mother him. Finally, there’s the love between Cathy and Hareton, which seems to balance the traits of the other loves on display. They have the passion of Catherine and Heathcliff without the destructiveness, and the gentleness shared by Edgar and Catherine without the dullness or inequality in power.

Revenge and Repetition

Nearly all of the action in Wuthering Heights results from one or another character’s desire for revenge. The result are cycles of revenge that seem to endlessly repeat. Hindley takes revenge on Heathcliff for taking his place at Wuthering Heights by denying him an education, and in the process separates Heathcliff and Catherine. Heathcliff then takes revenge upon Hindley by, first, dispossessing Hindley of Wuthering Heights and by denying an education to Hareton, Hindley’s son. Heathcliff also seeks revenge on Edgar for marrying Catherine by marrying Cathy to Linton. Yet while Heathcliff’s revenge is effective, it seems to bring him little joy. Late in the novel, Cathy sees this, and tells Heathcliff that her revenge on him, no matter how miserable he makes her, is to know that he, Heathcliff, is more miserable. And it is instructive that only when Heathcliff loses his desire for revenge is he able to finally reconnect with Catherine in death, and to allow Cathy and Hareton, who are so similar to Heathcliff and Catherine, to find love and marry.

Nature and Civilization

Pitting nature against civilization, Emily Brontë promotes the Romantic idea that the sublime—the awe-inspiring, almost frightening, beauty of nature—is superior to man-made culture. She makes this point by correlating many of the characters with one side or the other and then squaring them off against each other. For instance, Heathcliff, whose origins are unknown and who roams the moors, is definitely on the nature side, while his rival, the studious Edgar Linton, is in the civilized camp. Other pairings include Hareton Earnshaw vs. Linton Earnshaw; Catherine vs. Isabella; and Hareton vs. Cathy. In all of these cases, Brontë makes one character a bit wild (perhaps by showing them in tune with animals and/or the outdoors and/or their emotions), while portraying the other as somewhat reserved and often prissy or fussy. But nothing is black and white in Wuthering Heights. Many of the characters exhibit traits from both sides. While Brontë argues that nature is somehow purer, she also lauds civilization, particularly in terms of education. Hareton Earnshaw personifies this combination of nature and civilization: Brontë associates the young orphan with nature (he is a coarse, awkward farm boy) as well as civilization (inspired by his desire for young Cathy, he learns how to read). This mixture of down-to-earth passion and book-centered education make him, arguably, the most sympathetic character in the book.

Masculinity and Femininity

Written when gender roles were far more rigid and defined than they are now, Wuthering Heights examines stereotypes of masculinity and femininity. Emily Brontë constantly contrasts masculinity and femininity, but not all of the comparisons are simple; sometimes boys act like girls and girls act like boys. Edgar Linton and Linton Heathcliff, for instance, are men, but Brontë frequently describes them as having the looks and attributes of women. Likewise, Catherine Earnshaw has many masculine characteristics; even though she is outrageously beautiful, she loves rough, outdoor play and can hold her own in any fight. She is a complex mix of hyper-feminine grace and loveliness and ultra-masculine anger and recklessness. 

Heathcliff, with his physical and mental toughness, has no such ambiguities—he is exaggeratedly masculine and scorns his wife Isabella for her overblown femininity. Emily Brontë seems to favor masculinity over femininity, even in her women. In general, she portrays weak, delicate characters with contempt, while she treats strong and rugged characters like Heathcliff, both Catherines, and Hareton, with compassion and admiration, despite their flaws. Understanding the importance of class in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain is essential to understanding Wuthering Heights. Generally, at the time, people were born into a class and stayed there: if your parents were rich and respected (like Edgar’s), you would be, too; if your parents were servants (like Nelly Dean’s), you probably would be too. Social mobility—the idea that you can change your class status (usually for the better)—was not commonplace. In Brontë’s novel, however, class distinctions are constantly changing, much to the confusion of the characters. There are two primary examples of this: Heathcliff and Hareton. Because no one knows anything about Heathcliff’s background, they all treat him differently. Mr. Earnshaw adopts him and treats him like a son, but the snobby Lintons refuse to socialize with him. When he disappears for a few years and comes back rich, the characters struggle even more over how to approach him—he now has money and land, but many of them still consider him a farm boy. Likewise, Hareton has a hard time gaining respect. The son of Hindley, Hareton should be the heir to Wuthering Heights. With land and standing, he ought to be a gentleman. However, Heathcliff refuses to educate him, and everyone else mostly ignores him, so his manners (a very important indicator of class status) are rough and gruff. Only when young Cathy helps educate him does he achieve the class standing to which he was born.

Wuthering Heights Quotes by Emily Bronte

“Be with me always—take any form—drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!”

“In my soul and in my heart, I’m convinced I’m wrong!”

“Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He’s always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being.”

“I’m tired of being enclosed here. I’m wearying to escape into that glorious world, and to be always there: not seeing it dimly through tears, and yearning for it through the walls of an aching heart: but really with it, and in it.”

“My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary.”

“‘Are you possessed with a devil,’ he pursued, savagely, ‘to talk in that manner to me when you are dying? Do you reflect that all those words will be branded in my memory, and eating deeper eternally after you have left me?‘”

“You shouldn’t lie till ten. There’s the very prime of the morning gone long before that time. A person who has not done one-half his day’s work by ten o’clock, runs a chance of leaving the other half undone.”

“Only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! . . . It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!”

“You loved me—then what right had you to leave me?”

“I’m now quite cured of seeking pleasure in society, be it country or town. A sensible man ought to find sufficient company in himself.”

“If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger.”

“I’ve dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas: they’ve gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind. And this is one: I’m going to tell it—but take care not to smile at any part of it.”

″‘He’s not a human being,’ she retorted; ‘and he has no claim on my charity. I gave him my heart, and he took and pinched it to death, and flung it back to me. People feel with their hearts, Ellen: and since he has destroyed mine, I have not power to feel for him.‘”

“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.”

“I have not broken your heart—you have broken it; and in breaking it, you have broken mine. So much the worse for me that I am strong.”

“Treachery and violence are spears pointed at both ends; they wound those who resort to them worse than their enemies.”

“I have to remind myself to breathe—almost to remind my heart to beat!”

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Wuthering Heights Reviews

Customer reviews on barnesandnoble for Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

Wuthering Heights
3 out of 5 stars.a year ago  
Very Detailed!

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, is truly good but it got confusing at times. It’s basically like a romance,suspenseful type of novel. The 2 families which was the Earnshaws and the Lintons could’ve been normal families, if the love triangle didn’t become such a dangerous thing. I also thought that it would be more easier to read if all the characters got tell their side of the stories instead of Nelly the made was telling it all. When Heathcliff disappeared out of nowhere it surprised me. But the man wanted love from Catherine,she didn’t want him which was sad. Was interesting how Emily brought some characters in the novel to show just how love can be desperate and dangerous. Wuthering Heights pulls in you and surprises you with many things throughout the story. If your someone who love to read something suspenseful,romance this book if for you.

Annathebooklover
Singapore, SG
5 out of 5 stars
2 years ago  
This Book Is Like The Epitome Of Excellent Writing

I absolutely fell in love with this book. I brought it around with me everywhere and read it anywhere! This is a great book, you must read this if you love stories like To Kill A Mockingbird, Pride and Prejudice, The Cather in the Rye!

Hollypie
5 out of 5 stars.7 years ago  
Oh How I Love This Book. It’s Been A Favorite Of Mine For Years

Oh how I love this book. It’s been a favorite of mine for years but this edition is especially loved. I’ve read through mine about five times in the two years that I’ve had it. It’s really held up well. It’s comfortable to read. That is not true of many of the leatherbound series books. Some are so large and cumbersome and/or with tiny type. I still love them and I have collected about 10 of them so far and plan to buy more but this one is my favorite. If you have never read a novel by one of the Bronte sisters, I suggest to start with this one. Jane Eyre is twice as long anyway so you’ll be through this one quicker. This is a book that you not only read for the plot but the writing itself.

ClassicGentleman
2 out of 5 stars.10 years ago  
I Had To Read This Book For School. Now Admittedly When You Forc

I had to read this book for school. Now admittedly when you force someone to read a book, that person’s views might be altered, but I have been forced to read other books, such as the Old Man and the Sea, and have enjoyed thoroughlly. I see this book as an 1800’s version of 50 shades of Grey. If this book was a movie, it would be a chick flick. It is really just a woman who pines for someone who loves her, but is unattainable, and generically there is someone the main protagonost is attached to that does not love her. This story has alot of unnessicary words and chapters, which makes for a very boring read.

Addicted_book_reader17
5 out of 5 stars.11 years ago  
Truly Fell In Love All Over Again

Even though I watched the Wuthering Heights movie before I read the book, I completely fell in love with the story all over again after reading the book. The characters are exceptional and the plot is one to remember for a life time.

a-beautiful-little-fool
5 out of 5 stars
11 years ago  
I Had Forgotten How Great This Was…

Read this for fun in high school and was asked to read it with a friend recently. Wow, this novel is so good. I became completely engrossed in it which I haven’t done with a book in a long time. Literally could not put it done. High drama, wonderfully written and truly a classic for the ages. And these leatherbound books Barnes & Noble does are gorgeous, I am addicted.

americanrebel2010
5 out of 5 stars
11 years ago  
True Love Never Dies!

This is such a good book! I have read and re-read the novel numerous times and it just gets better and better everytime. The characters are so unforgettable, as is the plot. It brought back fond memories of my years in high school, when I first read the novel. The joys and the sorrows that the characters experience throughout the course of the novel was something that I could relate to.

Customer reviews on Amazon for Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

tqwert1
5.0 out of 5 stars Wow, not at all what I expected, incredibly powerful
Reviewed in the United States on June 1, 2020
Verified Purchase

I had this book sitting on my shelf unread for over 30 years after picking it up at a giveaway at some point in high school. I’d always just lumped it in my mind with the likes of Pride and Prejudice, or Little Women, or Downton Abbey as being a sort of frivolous story of the inconsequental romances of British aristocrats and so probably not worth the time to actually read. After a recent move, though, I’ve commited to not putting any book back on one of my bookshelves until I’ve actually read it, so I’m going through and either reading through or sampling and throwing out a box of long unread books. Wuthering Heights so far has been the standout positive surprise in this process, and it’s now getting reshelved on the book shelf I reserve for the very best books I own.

The violent, sadistic, emotional, often irrational behavior of the characters in this book is what stands out. It’s relentless from start to finish. Heathcliff is a terrible person all through, driven by revenge and hatred against everyone around him, and Emily Bronte’s dedication to never reforming him or sanding off the rough edges is admirable. At first I thought maybe the terrible treatment he received at times as a child and his humorously brusk behavior towards the sometimes silly Lockwood early in the book might make him somewhat sympathetic. But then he gets into beating his wife, kidnapping and beating his daughter in law and stealing all her possessions, basically torturing his son and leaving him to die, et al., darker and darker. Catherine Earnshaw is almost as bad in a way, and just about everyone else (younger Cathy, Isabella, Edgar, Hindley, Hareton, Joseph) is basically awful at their core to some extent with the exception of the terrific Nelly Dean (and even she makes some terrible decisions that accelerate the evil, selfish behavior of Heathcliff and others). My favorite author is Dostoevsky, and the constant heightened sense of passionate struggle and storms of emotion and tendency to violent outbursts of characters in Wuthering Heights kind of reminded me of him, but it’s of a very different, more primal sort here than Dostoevsky’s characters being more often animated by ideas or existential philosophical distress of some sort.

Happy Shopper
5.0 out of 5 stars A timeless classic
Reviewed in the United States on April 25, 2017
Verified Purchase

A timeless classic. I read this book a long time ago and decided to read it again. Enjoyed it even more as a more mature women. 🙂 It’s a sad story that makes you feel sorry for many of the characters but it’s a good escape back to a time and place so different from where we are now.

Linda
5.0 out of 5 stars Wuthering Heights
Reviewed in the United States on October 30, 2019
Verified Purchase

There aren’t enough words to convey how beautiful this book is. My favorite novel in a beautiful new “Seasons Edition Winter Collection” I purchased “Wuthering Heights and Pride and Prejudice” for myself, I purchased “Little Women and “Pride and Prejudice” for friends for Christmas. They’ll make wonderful Christmas gifts.

Kindle Customer Richard E. Moore
4.0 out of 5 stars Briarcliff Must Die
Reviewed in the United States on August 23, 2018
Verified Purchase

Never in my recollection have i ever wanted to step into the pages of a book that I was reading so that I could murder the protagonist of the novel. Heathcliff”a cruelty toward all of the other characters in this book made me want the main characters to rise up and inflict as much physical and psychological pain upon him as he had inflicted upon him. The true irony of this character was that he ultimately achieved his position of wealth and power because of the kindness and benevolence of another character who picked him up as a street urchin and brought him home with him and introduced him to a life of wealth, luxury, comfort and education that he would never experienced had he not been the recent of such kindness from a total stranger, But alas, I was not to see anyone give Heathcliff the type of painful and inhumane death that he so richly deserved. The end of this book showed that right would prevail in the end, but I did not get the level of satisfaction that I would have experienced had i been the author rather than Emily Bronte.

Alonso C             
4.0 out of 5 stars Nature and ghost, but I am not sure about romance!
Reviewed in the United States on December 14, 2020
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This novel is one of the most known romances of Western culture, but it is not for the pure romance but for the possessive, violent and vengeful nature of their affair. Now, the level of drama of the novel makes it such a ride! I have forgotten how dramatic and passionate these novels can be. You start reading it and you get excited, then you move into a stagnant stage of the novel, and then you hit the climax and descent into a mind blowing ending. Emily Brontë uses natural elements in such a magnificent way that I am dumbstruck. The fact that Catherine and Heathcliff end up together because they drove each other into madness and into death is simply poetic. Rain, the moors, snow, winds, and tempest were always surrounding the couple in turning points and in emotional states. The moor which is the bed that gave birth to their sterile love became the land that they will haunt forever in eternity. Classic might be dense and difficult to digest, but once you push through further, there are the best books ever.

Desiree Valenzuela
3.0 out of 5 stars Good book about horrible people
Reviewed in the United States on September 21, 2018
Verified Purchase

The author had a real gift for describing people, places, and events. Her use of language is quite good. That said, this is a story about toxic people who make the Kardashians and the Trumps look like the Brady Bunch. The housekeeper Mrs Dean is the single remotely decent human being in the whole story. I’m glad I read this, if only to see what all the fuss was about. But I doubt that I’ll read it again.

Nandhini(Books and Bliss)
5.0 out of 5 stars The classic love story
Reviewed in India on May 8, 2019
Verified Purchase

I bought this book for a really good price.. This edition particularly is very cheap. But the font could be little small. But it is completely a readable font. The book was in good condition with no damages.
Moving on to the book… It is the best book written by Emily Bronte… It is even more popular than Jane Eyre which was written by her sister. It is a love story and what I love about this book is this beautiful setting. If you have read the book already you would know what am talking about. It also have some gothic elements and if you want to read this book then I would ask you to read in the Fall season…  because you will just have the best time of your life reading it.

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