write a brief biography of emily bronte

Emily Brontë

(1818-1848)

Who Was Emily Brontë?

Born on July 30, 1818, in Thornton, Yorkshire, England, Emily Brontë is best remembered for her 1847 novel, Wuthering Heights . She was not the only creative talent in her family—her sisters Charlotte and Anne enjoyed some literary success as well. Her father had published several works during his lifetime, too.

Emily was the fifth child of Reverend Patrick Brontë and his wife, Maria Branwell Brontë. The family moved to Haworth in April 1821. Only a few months later, Brontë's mother died of cancer; her death came nearly nine months after the birth of her sister, Anne. Her mother's sister, Elizabeth Branwell, came to live with the family to help care for the children.

At the age of 6, Emily was sent to the Clergy Daughters' School at Cowan Bridge with Charlotte and her two oldest sisters, Elizabeth and Maria. Both Elizabeth and Maria became seriously ill at school and returned home, where they died of tuberculosis in 1825. Brontë's father removed both Emily and Charlotte from the school as well.

At home in Haworth, Brontë enjoyed her quiet life. She read extensively and began to make up stories with her siblings. The surviving Brontë children, which included brother Branwell, had strong imaginations. They created tales inspired by toy soldiers given to Branwell by their father. In 1835, the shy Emily tried leaving home for school. She went with Charlotte to Miss Wooler's school in Roe Head where Charlotte worked as a teacher. But she stayed only a few months before heading back to Haworth.

Coming from a poor family, Brontë tried to find work. She became a teacher at the Law Hill School in September 1837, but she left her position the following March. Brontë and her sister Charlotte traveled to Brussels in 1842 to study, but the death of their aunt Elizabeth forced them to return home.

'Wuthering Heights'

Some of Emily's earliest known works involve a fictional world called Gondal, which she created with her sister Anne. She wrote both prose and poems about this imaginary place and its inhabitants. Emily also wrote other poems as well. Her sister Charlotte discovered some of Emily's poems and sought to publish them along with her own work and some by Anne. The three sisters used male pen names for their collection— Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell . Published in 1846, the book only sold a few copies and garnered little attention.

Again publishing as Ellis Bell, Brontë published her defining work, Wuthering Heights , in December 1847. The complex novel explores two families—the Earnshaws and the Lintons—across two generations and their stately homes, Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange. Heathcliff, an orphan taken in by the Earnshaws, is the driving force between the action in the book. He first motivated by his love for his Catherine Earnshaw, then by his desire for revenge against her for what he believed to be rejection.

Death and Legacy

At first, reviewers did not know what to make of Wuthering Heights . It was only after Brontë's death that the book developed its reputation as a literary masterwork. She died of tuberculosis on December 19, 1848, nearly two months after her brother, Branwell, succumbed to the same disease. Her sister Anne also fell ill and died of tuberculosis the following May.

Interest in Brontë's work and life remains strong today. The parsonage where Brontë spent much of her life is now a museum. The Brontë Society operates the museum and works to preserve and honor the work of the Brontë sisters.

QUICK FACTS

• Name: Emily Brontë
• Birth Year: 1818
• Birth date: July 30, 1818
• Birth City: Thornton, Yorkshire, England
• Birth Country: United Kingdom
• Gender: Female
• Best Known For: Emily Brontë is best known for authoring the novel 'Wuthering Heights.' She was the sister of Charlotte and Anne Brontë, also famous authors.
• Fiction and Poetry
• Astrological Sign: Leo
• Clergy Daughters' School at Cowan Bridge
• Death Year: 1848
• Death date: December 19, 1848
• Death City: Haworth, Yorkshire, England
• Death Country: United Kingdom

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CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: Emily Brontë Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/emily-bronte
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• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: April 22, 2021
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014

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Biography of Emily Brontë, English Novelist

19th Century Poet and Novelist

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Emily Brontë (July 30, 1818 - December 19, 1848) was an English novelist and poet. She was one of three famous writing sisters, and is best known for her novel Wuthering Heights .

Fast Facts: Emily Brontë

• Full Name : Emily Brontë
• Pen Name:  Ellis Bell
• Occupation : Author
• Born : July 30, 1818 in Thornton, England
• Died : December 19, 1848 in Haworth, England
• Parents: Patrick Brontë and Maria Blackwell Brontë
• Published Works: Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (1846), Wuthering Heights (1847)
• Quote: "I wish to be as God made me."

Brontë was the fifth of six siblings born in six years to the Rev. Patrick Brontë and his wife, Maria Branwell Brontë. Emily was born at the parsonage in Thornton, Yorkshire, where her father was serving. All six children were born before the family moved in April 1820 to where the children would live most of their lives, at the 5-room parsonage at Haworth on the moors of Yorkshire. Her father had been appointed as perpetual curate there, meaning an appointment for life: he and his family could live in the parsonage as long as he continued his work there. The father encouraged the children to spend time in nature on the moors.

Maria died the year after the youngest, Anne , was born, possibly of uterine cancer or of chronic pelvic sepsis. Maria’s older sister, Elizabeth, moved from Cornwall to help care for the children and for the parsonage. She had an income of her own.

The three eldest sisters - Maria, Elizabeth, and Charlotte - were sent to the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge, a school for the daughters of impoverished clergy. Emily joined her sisters in 1824, upon reaching the age of six. The daughter of writer Hannah Moore was also in attendance. The harsh conditions of the school were later reflected in Charlotte Brontë's novel,  Jane Eyre . Emily’s experience of the school, as the youngest of the four, was better than that of her sisters, but the conditions were still harsh and abusive.

A typhoid fever outbreak at the school led to several deaths. The next February, Maria was sent home very ill, and she died in May, probably of pulmonary tuberculosis. Then Elizabeth was sent home late in May, also ill. Patrick Brontë brought his other daughters home as well, and Elizabeth died on June 15.

Imaginary Tales and Teaching Career

When her brother Patrick was given some wooden soldiers as a gift in 1826, the siblings began to make up stories about the world that the soldiers lived in. They wrote the stories in tiny script, in books small enough for the soldiers, and also provided newspapers and poetry for the world they apparently first called Glasstown. Emily and Anne had small roles in these tales. By 1830, Emily and Anne had created a kingdom themselves, and later created another, Gondal, about 1833. This creative activity bonded the two youngest siblings, making them more independent from Charlotte and Branwell.

Brontë went with her sister Charlotte when the elder sister got a job teaching at Roe Head school in July 1835. She hated the school – her shyness and free spirit didn’t fit in. She lasted three months, and returned home, with her younger sister, Anne, taking her place. Back home, without either Charlotte or Anne, she kept to herself. Her earliest dated poem is from 1836. All the writings about Gondal from earlier or later times are now gone, aside from a 1837 reference from Charlotte to something Emily had composed about Gondal.

Brontë applied for a teaching job of her own in September of 1838. She found the work grueling, working from dawn until nearly 11 pm every day. After just six months, she returned home, quite ill again. Instead, she stayed at Haworth for three more years, taking on household duties, reading and writing, playing the piano.

Eventually, the sisters began to make plans to open a school. Emily and Charlotte went to London and then Brussels, where they attended a school for six months. They were then invited to stay on as teachers to pay their tuition; Emily taught music and Charlotte taught English. In October to their home for the funeral of their aunt Elizabeth Branwell. The four Brontë siblings received shares of their aunt’s estate, and Emily worked as a housekeeper for her father, serving in the role their aunt had taken. 

Poetry (1844-1846)

Brontë, after returning from Brussels, began to write poetry again, as well as re-organizing and revising her previous poems. In 1845, Charlotte found one of her poetry notebooks and was impressed with the quality of the poems; she, Emily, and Anne finally read each other's poetry. The three selected poems from their collections for publication, choosing to do so under male pseudonyms . The false names would share their initials: Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. They assumed that male writers would find easier publication.

The poems were published as Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell in May of 1846 with the help of the inheritance from their aunt. They did not tell their father or brother of their project. The book only initially sold two copies, but got positive reviews, which encouraged Brontë and her sisters.

Wuthering Heights (1847)

The sisters began preparing novels for publication. Emily, inspired by the Gondal stories, wrote of two generations of two families and the spiteful Heathcliff, in  Wuthering Heights .  Critics would later find it coarse, without any moral message, a highly unusual novel of its time. As with many authors, Brontë was not alive when her novel's reception shifted, but it did eventually become one of the classics of English literature.

The sisters' novels - Charlotte's Jane Eyre , Emily's Wuthering Heights , and Anne's Agnes Grey - were published as a 3-volume set, and Charlotte and Emily went to London to claim authorship, their identities then becoming public. Letters to her publisher seem to show that Brontë was working on a second novel before her death, but no trace of the manuscript has ever been found.

Wuthering Heights was more Gothic than anything her sisters had written, with stark depictions of cruelty and destructive emotions. Its characters are, for the most part, unlikeable, and they serve as vehicles for severe critiques of Victorian-era gender roles and classism, among other things. That harshness, combined with the fact that it was written by a female author, led to a harsh critical reception on grounds of both craft and, more often, morals. It also tended to be compared unfavorably with her sister Charlotte's Jane Eyre .

Brontë had begun a new novel when her brother Branwell, died in April of 1848, probably of tuberculosis. Some have speculated that the conditions at the parsonage were not so healthy, including a poor water supply and chilly, foggy weather. At her brother's funeral, Brontë apparently caught a cold.

She declined quickly as the cold turned to a lung infection and, eventually, tuberculosis, but she refused medical care until relenting in her last hours. She died in December. Then Anne began to show symptoms, though she, after Emily’s experience, did seek medical help. Charlotte and her friend Ellen Nussey took Anne to Scarborough for a better environment, but Anne died there in May of 1849, less than a month after arriving. Branwell and Emily were buried in the family vault under Haworth church, and Anne in Scarborough.

Wuthering Heights , Emily’s only known novel, has been adapted for stage, film and television, and remains a best-selling classic. Critics do not know precisely when  Wuthering Heights  was written nor how long it took to write. A few have attempted to argue that Branson Brontë, brother to the three sisters, wrote this book, but most experts disagree.

Emily Brontë is credited as one of the major sources of inspiration for  Emily Dickinson 's poetry (the other was Ralph Waldo Emerson ).

According to correspondence at the time, Emily had begun working on another novel after Wuthering Heights was published. But no trace of that novel has turned up; it may have been destroyed by Charlotte after Emily’s death.

• Frank, Katherine. A Chainless Soul: A Life of Emily Brontë. Ballantine Books, 1992.
• Gérin, Winifred.  Emily Brontë . Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971.
• Vine, Steven.  Emily Brontë . New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998.
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Biography Online

Emily Bronte Biography

Emily Bronte (July 30, 1818 — December 19, 1848) – Poet and Novelist; famous for her classic novel Wuthering Heights .

With wide-embracing love Thy Spirit animates eternal years, Pervades and broods above, Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Emily Bronte No Coward Soul Is Mine (1848)

Short Bio Of Emily Bronte

She was the fifth of six children, including Anne and Charlotte Bronte, who both became writers as well.

When Emily was six years old, the Bronte family moved to the village of Haworth, a village nestled in the windswept moors of West Yorkshire, which later inspired many of her writings:

Photo left – portrait by her brother.

A heaven so clear, an earth so calm, So sweet, so soft, so hushed an air; And, deepening still the dreamlike charm, Wild moor-sheep feeding everywhere.

Emily Bronte, A Little While, a Little While (1846) Stanza vii.

Her father was made the local curate of Haworth, and the family lived there for the remainder of their lives. The old vicarage is now a museum dedicated to the Brontes.

Shortly after moving to Howarth, Emily’s mother passed away. The girls were then sent to the Clergy Daughters’ school at Cowen Bridge. In the aftermath of her mother’s passing, this was a traumatic experience as the sisters found the school harsh and unsympathetic. This school experience was incorporated into Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre .

During a typhus epidemic, Emily lost two of her sisters (Maria and Elizabeth) to the illness; shortly afterwards Emily returned home where she was educated by her father and aunt. For a brief period, when she was 17, Emily went to Roe Head girl’s school where Charlotte was a teacher. But, due to homesickness she soon returned home.

The three Bronte sisters

The sisters hoped one day to set up their own school, though this never materialised. But, to gain experience, Emily became a teacher in Halifax in September 1838. However, she struggled to cope with the exhausting hours, and after a few months returned to Haworth. Apart from a brief stay in a girls academy in Belgium, Emily spent most of her later life in Haworth, where she concentrated on domestic tasks looking after her brother and family. Like her father, she seems to have preferred a quiet, reclusive life. As a character in her novel writes:

“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.”

Mr. Lockwood (Ch. III) – Wuthering Heights (1847)

This certainly applied to her father, who was quite reclusive and liked to dine alone in his room. Domestic life for Emily was undoubtedly made difficult by her brother, Branwell who suffered from mood swings, influenced by his alcohol and drug addictions. Branwell died in 1848, shortly before Emily.

From an early age, Emily began writing displaying a vivid imagination. Her early writings were in collaboration with her sisters and brothers about an imaginary world (Gondal saga). Very little remain from this period. She continued writing throughout her life, though it became an increasingly private affair; initially, she disliked the idea of her poems being published though she was persuaded after finding her sisters had been writing similar poems.

In 1846, the three Bronte sisters published a collection of poems under the pseudonyms Currer Bell (Charlotte), Ellis Bell (Emily) and Acton Bell (Anne). The fact they chose masculine names suggests they wanted to avoid the prejudgment of female writers. At the time, it was rare for women writers to be published.

Wuthering Heights

Frail throughout her life, Emily fell seriously sick in the autumn of 1848. Her health was undoubtedly harmed by unsanitary water which drained from the nearby churchyard. Shortly after her brother’s funeral she caught a serious cold, and refusing medical help, she died on 19 December 1848.

Personality

Emily Bronte left little writings about herself and so her character and personality remain elusive. We do know Emily was quite shy and retiring – preferring animals and nature.  One neighbour recalls Emily returning from an evening walk and her face was shining “with the divine light of happiness” She was very close to her sister Anne and other members of her close family. Due to lack of detail on her life, her poems and novels have been scrutinised for autobiographical hints.

“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.”

– Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights, character of Catherine Earnshaw (Ch. IX).

However, it is difficult to fully ascertain which poems are just imagination and which relate to part of her character. In writing a preface to the second edition of Wuthering Heights, her sister Charlotte wrote about her introverted nature.

“My sister’s disposition was not naturally gregarious; circumstances favoured and fostered her tendency to seclusion; except to go to church or take a walk on the hills, she rarely crossed the threshold of home. Though her feeling for the people round was benevolent, intercourse with them she never sought; nor, with very few exceptions, ever experienced. ” – Charlotte Bronte

Emily Bronte was a Christian and religion was an important part of her life and outlook. Her father Patrick Bronte was a vicar who gave sermons emphasising the need for people to have a “personal commitment to Christ,” and the need for each individual “to live, as well as preach, his word” (qtd. in Alexander & Smith, 2006, 123) In Wuthering Heights, she portrays a religious fanatic Joseph Earnshaw who makes his children endure long, cold sermons and memorise religious texts. Bronte is critical of this aspect of religion, but at the same time, her novel is replete with cases of spiritual renewal and people reinventing themselves to become better people, such as the transformation of Heathcliff. Emily Bronte has often been characterised as a devout Christian with her own individual approach.

“I was only going to say that heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke sobbing for joy.”

– Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights, the character of Catherine Earnshaw (Ch. IX).

Her writings have been included in the broad period of romanticism. They range from stark reminders of the harshness of life, to the potential beauty and power of love and a mystical power of nature.

‘Twas grief enough to think mankind All hollow servile insincere But worse to trust to my own mind And find the same corruption there

Emily Bronte – I Am the Only Being (1836)

Then dawns the Invisible; the Unseen its truth reveals; My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels — Its wings are almost free, its home, its harbour found; Measuring the gulf, it stoops and dares the final bound —

Emily Bronte – The Prisoner (October 1845)

Citation: Pettinger, Tejvan . “ Biography Emily Bronte ”, Oxford, UK – www.biographyonline.net . Last updated 3rd Feb 2020.

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte at Amazon. A

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A Brief Biography of Emily Bronte

By Tim Lambert

Emily Bronte was a great writer of the early 19th century. Emily was born on 30 July 1818 in Market Street in Thornton bear the rapidly growing town of Bradford in Yorkshire. Her father Patrick Bronte was a clergyman. Her mother was Maria Bronte. The couple had 6 children. Emily was their 5th child. In 1820 the Bronte family moved to the village of Haworth. Unfortunately in 1821 her mother Maria Bronte died. Her aunt came from Cornwall to look after the family.

In 1824 Emily Bronte was sent to the clergy daughter’s school in Cowan Bridge in Lancashire. However, two of her sisters, who were also at the school, Maria Bronte and Elizabeth Bronte died of tuberculosis. Emily Bronte then returned home to be cared for by her aunt. Emily was then educated at home.

In 1842 Emily was sent to Brussels with her sister Charlotte Bronte. However, they both returned home in January 1844 and Emily became a housekeeper. Meanwhile, Emily wrote poetry. A book of poems by Emily Bronte and her two sisters Charlotte and Anne was published in 1846. The famous novel by Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights was published in December 1847.

Unfortunately, Emily fell ill in November 1848. Emily Bronte died on 19 December 1848. She was only 30 years old. Emily was buried in Haworth Church on 22 December 1848.

Bronte Parsonage Museum

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Emily Jane Brontë: Poet and Novelist (1818-48)

Philip v. allingham , faculty of education, lakehead university, thunder bay, ontario.

[ Home —> Authors —> Emily Brontë —> Works —> Theme and Subject —> Image, Symbol, and Motif ]

Sealed in her art-world, the moor strategically placed for escape above the house, no domesticating and limiting mother to weaken her capacity for identification with whatever sex she chose to impersonate at a particular moment, polite society at a safe distance, and a father who seems to have selected her as an honorary boy to be trusted with fire-arms in defence of the weak, Emily Brontë's life exemplifies a rough joy in itself, its war-games, its word games and its power to extend its own structuring vision out upon the given world. [Davies, 9]

Emily Brontë was born at Thornton, Bradford, Yorkshire, and just after the birth of her sister Anne (20 April 1820), she moved with her family to Haworth, near Keighley, Yorkshire, where she spent most of her life. Today remembered chiefly as the author of the eighteenth-century romance Wuthering Heights (1847), set in her native Yorkshire, Emily Brontë was the second surviving daughter and fifth child of Cornishwoman Maria Brontë and the Ulsterman Reverend Patrick Brontë (1777-1861), "perpetual curate" (rector) of the remote village of Haworth on the Yorkshire Moors from 1820 until his death in 1861. Maria died on 15 September 1821, survived by her husband, five daughters, and a son, Branwell (1817-48). Emily and her sisters (except Anne) attended Cowan Bridge School, a Church of England clergymen's daughters' boarding school (the original of Lowood in Charlotte's Jane Eyre ). Emily spent a total of just six months there: 25 November 1824 to 1 June 1825. The eldest sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, became so ill that they had to be taken home, and died shortly after their return, the former on 6 May and the latter on 15 June 1825. From then until 1830 the surviving children remained at Haworth. From 29 July through October 1835 Emily taught at Miss Wooler's School at Roe Head, where Charlotte had taught in 1831-32.

The girls' real education, however, was at the Haworth parsonage, where they had the run of their father's books, and were thus nurtured on the Bible, Homer, Virgil, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron , Sir Walter Scott and many others. They enthusiastically read articles on current affairs, lengthy reviews and intellectual disputes in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine and The Edinburgh Review . They also ranged freely in Aesop and in the colourfully bizarre world of The Arabian Nights' Entertainments . . . . [ Cambridge Guide , 118

After service as a governess in Halifax, Yorkshire (the second half of the year 1838), in 1842 Emily accompanied her surviving sisters, Anne and Charlotte, to Brussels, where from mid-February through the beginning of November they attended the Pensionnat Héger with the goal of improving their proficiency in French in order to start their own school. Their 1844 plans for their own school, however, foundered, and the sisters were reunited at Haworth in August 1845. When in the autumn of 1845 Charlotte accidentally discovered the manuscript of Emily's Gondal verses, she initiated the publication of a volume of poems by all three sisters, who as a clergyman's daughters thought it advisable to adopt the noms des plumes Currer (Charlotte), Ellis (Emily), and Acton (Anne) Bell (probably with a pun on "Belle"). In the preface to the 1850 edition of the poems, Charlotte herself recalls the moment of discovery:

Of course, I was not surprised, knowing that she could and did write verse: I looked it over, and something more than surprise seized me, — a deep conviction that these were not common effusions, not at all like the poetry women generally write. I thought them condensed and terse, vigorous and genuine. To my ear, they had also a peculiar music — wild, melancholy, and elevating. [cited by Ian Jack, p. 359]

A year after the publication by Thomas Cautley Newby, London, of Wuthering Heights (December 1847), Emily died of tuberculosis. On 19 December 1848, she suddenly expired as she stood with one hand on the mantlepiece of the living room in the Haworth parsonage. She was just 30 years old but had already produced a romantic tragedy in novel form, written over the course of 1845-46, yet to be surpassed in the English language. As Paul Lieder points out,

Emily Brontë wrote so little in her short life that it is difficult to appraise her work with any surety. One point is generally agreed upon: that in both her prose and poetry there is, in spite of minor faults, a rare power.

In her poetry, Emily Brontë achieves a remarkable effect by the energy and sincerity, and often by the music, with which she portrays her stoicism, independence, and compassion in stanzas which in many instances are the commonplace vehicles used by mere rimers. It is as though she were brought up to feel that certain forms of verse were the patterns, and had, with dogged acceptance, poured into them her emotions with an honesty that made the outward form seem negligible. [Lieder 287-288]

Bibliography

Davies, Stevie. Emily Brontë . Key Women Writers series, ed. Sue Roe. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana U. P., 1988.

Jack, Ian. "A Chronology of Emily Brontë." Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights . The World's Classics. New York and Oxford: Oxford U. P., 1988. Pp. xxvi-xxvii.

Lieder, Paul, ed. "Emily Brontë (1818-1848)." Eminent British Poets of the Nineteenth Century, Volume Two: Tennyson to Housman . New York and London: Harper & Brothers, 1938. P. 287.

McGovern, Una, ed. Chambers Biographical Dictionary . Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap, 2003.

Ousby, Ian, ed. The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English . Cambridge: Cambridge U. P., 2003.

Created 12 August 2004

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Emily Brontë

Emily Brontë was born in Thornton, England, on July 30, 1818. She and her five siblings grew up in Haworth, where their father, the Rev. Patrick Brontë, was the church curate. Their mother died in 1821, and in 1824, Emily and three of her sisters were sent to the Clergy Daughters’ School in Lancashire. When her two oldest sisters died of tuberculosis, Emily returned to Haworth with her sister Charlotte .

After leaving school, Emily continued her studies with her two surviving sisters, Charlotte and Anne, and their brother, Branwell. With access to their father’s library, the Brontë siblings read and wrote extensively, producing a family magazine that featured their stories and poems.

In 1837, Emily became a teacher at the Law Hill School, but she left the position after several months. After teaching for a brief period at the Pension Héger in Brussels, she returned permanently to Haworth in 1842.

In 1846, Emily, Charlotte, and Anne self-published a collection of poetry under the pseudonyms Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. While The Poems of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (Aylott and Jones, 1846) reached a very limited audience, the three sisters each went on to publish novels soon after. In 1847, Emily published her sole work of fiction, Wuthering Heights (Thomas Cautley Newby), which is widely regarded as one of the great novels of the English language.

Emily Brontë died of tuberculosis on December 19, 1848. The Complete Poems of Emily Jane Brontë (Hodder and Stoughton), a posthumous collection of more than two hundred poems, was published in 1923.

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History | February 16, 2023

The Making of Emily Brontë

A new film imagines the events that inspired the notoriously private author to write “Wuthering Heights”

Michelle Mehrtens

History Correspondent

In December 1847, Emily Brontë ’s only published novel, Wuthering Heights , hurtled onto England’s literary scene, shocking the public and critics alike with its graphic depictions of violence and psychological abuse.

A reviewer from Douglas Jerrold’s Weekly Newspaper proclaimed, “The reader is … disgusted, almost sickened by details of cruelty, inhumanity, and the most diabolical hate and vengeance.” Another critic wrote, “There is not in the entire dramatis persona a single character which is not utterly hateful or thoroughly contemptible.”

One word in particular dominated these critiques: “ coarse .” Still, beneath this vitriol, a grudging admiration for the novel’s sheer power was apparent. As the Douglas Jerrold’s reviewer noted, “It is impossible to begin and not finish it; and quite as impossible to lay it aside afterwards and say nothing about it.”

More than 175 years after its publication, Wuthering Heights is a beloved literary classic . Yet the woman behind the book remains elusive, the details of her short life (she died in 1848 at age 30) shrouded in inscrutability.

Emily , a new film from actress and director Frances O’Connor , attempts to unravel some of these mysteries by exploring the events that inspired its titular character to write Wuthering Heights . A reclusive young woman, the fictionalized Emily (played by Emma Mackey of “ Sex Education ”) struggles to find her footing both within and beyond her family. While her sisters, Charlotte (Alexandra Dowling) and Anne (Amelia Gething), accept teaching positions outside of the home, Emily and their brother, Branwell (Fionn Whitehead), are left behind. Soon, Emily begins taking French lessons from her father’s assistant curate, the serious-minded William Weightman (Oliver Jackson-Cohen). The pair’s secret romance blossoms into an encounter both thrilling and tragic.

Is Emily based on a true story?

Arriving in theaters in the United States on Friday, February 17, Emily merges the drama of Wuthering Heights with shades of biographical truth. As IndieWire critic David Ehrlich writes, “Invented splashes of rebellion and romance only add to the ecstatic truth that Emily brings to its windswept tale of a stultified woman survived by her inner strength.”

O’Connor, who wrote and directed the film, read Wuthering Heights when she was 15 and instantly fell in love with it. Drawn to the rebellious nature of the characters, she appreciated that Emily herself was “a quiet rebel in a lot of ways.” While acknowledging that the movie’s blend of fact and fiction may seem “deliberately provocative” (the relationship with Weightman is particularly ahistorical ), O’Connor says she hopes her protagonist’s indomitable spirit resonates with viewers.

“I’m letting her have moments that are very truthfully biographical and moments that are kind of heightened and from my imagination, from my research,” O’Connor adds. “I love that, and I think Emily would love that, because it’s an active creative process, and that’s something she really believed in. You can feel that when you read her book. … She creates this gorgeous, Gothic, dark world, where people are violent and angry and in love and have deep emotions, and that’s very alive. And I wanted to have that same feeling in the film for the audience.”

Humble beginnings

Born in 1818, Emily was the daughter of Irish clergyman Patrick Brontë and his English wife, Maria Branwell . The fifth of six children, she spent her childhood in Haworth , a village where Patrick served as the resident parish priest.

Emily’s youth was marked by a series of tragedies. When she was 3, her mother died of cancer. A few years later, her two eldest sisters, Maria and Elizabeth , died of tuberculosis , an illness likely linked to the harsh, unsanitary living conditions they experienced at the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge. Emily and her older sister Charlotte, who later based the Lowood School in Jane Eyre on Cowan Bridge, left the boarding school after Maria’s death in May 1825 and returned to Haworth, where they spent much of their time in the company of their surviving siblings, Branwell and Anne.

Lucasta Miller , author of The Brontë Myth , says the Brontë children grew up isolated in part because of Haworth’s impoverished status. “There weren’t many other families of the Brontës’ social position with whom they could socialize,” she explains.

To combat the bleakness of their early childhood, the four siblings encouraged each other’s creative ventures, crafting stories , poems and art. Charlotte and Branwell invented a mystical realm called Angria , while Emily and Anne wrote intricate tales about an imaginary land known as Gondal .

During this time, the Brontës were deeply influenced by Romanticism and its celebrated writers, including Walter Scott, Percy Shelley and William Wordsworth. Deborah Morse , a literary scholar at the College of William and Mary and a co-editor of A Companion to the Brontës , says, “They loved the poets, both that literary movement and the impulse of that movement toward freedom, liberation [and] non-hierarchical thinking.”

A battle of wills

In the film, a prickly tension exists between Emily and Charlotte, who urges her younger sister to embrace proper feminine behavior. Unwilling to do so, Emily dashes across Haworth with loose hair and immerses herself in the fantastical realm of Gondal. Later, Charlotte chastises Emily for continuing to engage in childish fantasies, telling her not to “speak like that.” She also pushes Emily to become a teacher rather than remain idle at home. Here, two archetypes emerge: Charlotte is the prim, practical older sibling, trying to corral Emily into ladylike behavior. Emily is the wild one, frustrated by her sister’s unsolicited counseling and mundane daily routine.

The pair’s real-life relationship was a nuanced, complex sisterhood. While both Emily and Charlotte studied in Brussels in 1842, it was Charlotte who consistently sought experiences beyond Haworth, working as a teacher at Roe Head and later traveling as a governess. Emily, comparatively, struggled with anxiety and illness, seeking respite in the familiar confines of her small town.

While Charlotte left Angria behind to make way for a version of herself that better fit her reality, Emily never stopped believing in Gondal. During her brief tenure as a student at Roe Head in 1835, Emily became so homesick that she had to return to Haworth.

“Charlotte excuses this by saying that she misses the moors,” says Juliet Barker , author of The Brontës . “It’s quite obvious when you look at what’s left of Emily’s writings, it wasn’t the moors she missed. It was her Gondal and the imaginary world she’d created.”

Emily remained tethered to Gondal into adulthood. The boundaries between her daily life and her imagination were seemingly porous. As Barker notes, one of Emily’s surviving diary entries (many of which she wrote with Anne) lists the everyday events unfolding around her, mentioning that the family’s housemaid is in the kitchen before bluntly stating , “The Gondals are invading.”

“She swaps from one very commonplace thing that’s happening within the household to her imaginary world that she had created with Anne,” says Barker. “And for her, throughout her life, her imaginary world was as real to her as what was going on around her. And it had a more powerful hold over her and her imagination than anything else that she ever encountered.”

The Bell brothers

In October 1842, the Brontës’ surrogate mother, their maternal aunt Elizabeth Branwell , died unexpectedly. Charlotte and Emily, who had been studying abroad in Brussels, returned home for the funeral. But while Charlotte resumed her studies in the new year, Emily remained at Haworth, taking over as manager of the household.

While the film implies that Emily resented the drudgery of housework, the real-life author enjoyed performing domestic chores.

“Being at home, being the housekeeper, having her hands busy, cooking, cleaning, doing whatever, her brain was free,” says Barker. “And she was free to explore and think and do what she wanted and to create and live with these imaginary characters who dominated her life since childhood. And that, to me, is the key to Emily’s character.”

Back in familiar surroundings, Emily—who reached “the peak of her poetic powers” in 1844 and 1845, according to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography —started writing “hauntingly elegiac lyrics in a spare, natural style.” When Charlotte came across a book of Emily’s poems in 1845, she was struck by their rich language and intellect. Emily, however, was enraged that her sister had read her work without her permission; it was only after much discussion and disagreement that she agreed to publish a volume of poetry with Charlotte and Anne.

The sisters released their poetry collection in 1846, using the androgynous pseudonyms of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell . According to Miller, the book was a total “commercial failure.” Still, the act of publication inflamed the sisters’ ambitions. A year later, Charlotte published Jane Eyre . Two months after its release, Anne published Agnes Grey , and Emily put out Wuthering Heights .

Emily depicts the author proudly holding a copy of Wuthering Heights , with her full name printed on its cover. In truth, Emily released her novel under the same pseudonym she used for her poems, and she fiercely objected to any attempts to identify her as its author.

Of the sisters’ three novels, Jane Eyre was the most popular and well received . But Charlotte’s book was not without controversy. It, too, garnered reproach for its supposed “coarseness.”

As Miller writes in The Brontë Myth , “The ‘coarseness’ to which so many critics objected was a catch-all moralistic term which encompassed a range of elements considered unfeminine and indecorous.” Much of this critical disparagement rested on reviewers’ distaste that both Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre openly portrayed romantic desire and violence—topics considered unsuitable for modest, high-class women. The vivid nature of the Brontës’ prose, as well as their use of pseudonyms, led some contemporary critics to conclude their books could only have been written by men.

By 1848, speculation over the Bell brothers’ true identities was rampant, with one persistent rumor alleging that Currer, Ellis and Acton were all the same person. That July, Charlotte and Anne traveled to London to refute the charge (Emily stayed at home), identifying themselves to Charlotte’s publisher, George Smith , for the first time.

Shortly after the sisters’ London visit, tragedy struck the Brontë family once again. Branwell died on September 24, 1848, at age 31, likely of tuberculosis exacerbated by opium addiction and alcoholism. Emily caught a cold at his funeral but refused to seek medical treatment, even as her illness deteriorated into tuberculosis. She died on December 19, just five months before her younger sister, Anne, succumbed to the same disease at age 29.

In 1849, Charlotte, the only surviving Brontë sibling, wrote a letter describing her grief: “I could hardly let Emily go—I wanted to hold her back then—and I want her back hourly now. … Papa has now me only—the weakest—puniest—least promising of his six children—consumption has taken the whole five.”

Charlotte takes charge

In her writing, Charlotte challenged societal expectations of womanhood, creating a protagonist who spoke plainly about autonomy and self-respect. In public, however, she quietly tried to mold herself into an approved image of class and femininity. She wanted the artistic validation and respect of her chosen profession, but she shrank from readers’ attempts to classify her as a fiery, rebellious woman author. Deeply affected by the criticism aimed at Jane Eyre , Charlotte sought to establish a dignified persona that undermined lingering gossip of the Brontës’ incivility.

Determined to rehabilitate her sisters’ posthumous reputations, Charlotte published a “ Biographical Notice of Ellis and Acton Bell ” in 1850. In this statement, she reworked the duo’s image, emphasizing that both Emily and Anne were innocent, naive women who had been raised in an isolated region.

“Neither Emily nor Anne was learned,” wrote Charlotte. “They had no thought of filling their pitchers at the well-spring of other minds; they always wrote from the impulse of nature, the dictates of intuition, and from such stores of observation as their limited experience had enabled them to amass.”

This was far from an accurate representation of the Brontës’ upbringing. Well-versed in and passionate about literature, particularly Romantic poetry and novels, Emily and Anne grew up in a household that nurtured their intellectual curiosity.

“Many scholars think that Charlotte was trying to protect her sisters. And that’s what I believe,” says Morse. “I mean, she was in mourning. She’d been traumatized repeatedly. She was trying to protect her sisters, but in protecting them, she kind of sanitized their work.” As part of this publicity campaign, Charlotte suppressed the reprinting of Anne’s second novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall , and possibly destroyed the manuscript of Emily’s second novel , which was mentioned in a letter from her publisher but has never been found.

Over time, readers became fascinated by the legacy—and mystery—of the Brontës. Charlotte’s insistence that Emily was an inexperienced young woman who rarely left Haworth led observers to question how she could have written such a forceful, turbulent tale. As the years passed, every new narrative that cropped up about the sisters harbored a competing agenda.

Adding to the confusion was Charlotte’s friend Elizabeth Gaskell , an author in her own right. Soon after Charlotte’s death in 1855 at age 38, Gaskell sought to defend her companion from what she considered slanderous claims of impropriety. She threw herself into writing Charlotte’s biography, cobbling together half-truths, real-life incidents and pure fiction. While Morse “loves” Gaskell and teaches some of her books in her class, she also says that Gaskell “relied on negligent and unreliable sources.”

Repeatedly, Gaskell’s The Life of Charlotte Brontë underscored the hardships of the sisters’ youth. She described Haworth as a cold, unrelenting wasteland that left the young girls isolated and unworldly. She also highlighted the sins of the Brontë men, spotlighting Branwell’s affair with a married woman (true) and Patrick’s callous, domineering behavior (not true) to chart how the women of the family were unfairly influenced by their grim household. In the end, Gaskell positioned Charlotte—and, by extension, her sisters—as proper ladies dedicated to domesticity and grace above all else.

Who was Emily Brontë?

While Charlotte left behind diaries , letters and juvenilia , the majority of Emily’s writings no longer survive. “If you think of Charlotte, the hundreds, literally hundreds, of letters that she wrote, they give you a real insight into her mind and her way of thinking and what she was doing,” says Barker. “With Emily, you simply don’t have any of that.”

In attempting to draw parallels between key moments in Wuthering Heights and its author’s life, Emily perpetuates myths that have followed the Brontës for the better part of the past two centuries. Notably, two relationships serve as the film’s centerpiece: Emily’s devoted friendship with her brother, Branwell, and a fictional romance between Emily and Weightman. While some critics have interpreted the shy author and the brooding assistant curate as stand-ins for Cathy and Heathcliff, the ill-fated lovers of Wuthering Heights , O’Connor approached the narrative from a different angle: Her Branwell and Emily allude to the novel’s central characters, while Weightman represents Cathy’s future husband, Edgar.

Cathy’s quest to achieve independence from Heathcliff mirrors Emily’s dynamic with her brother. “[She wanted] to be released from him so she [could] individuate and become her true self,” O’Connor says, “and that’s in the book, too.” Like Gaskell and many others, the director links Branwell’s allegedly chaotic persona to the eventual construction of Emily’s magnum opus.

Simultaneously, the film similarly leans into the idea that an all-encompassing, doomed love intensely colored Emily’s creative expression.

While Weightman was a real person (and “a notorious flirt” who attracted the attention of both Anne and Charlotte, according to Barker), nothing suggests he and Emily engaged in a romantic courtship, much less a torrid affair. Emily never married , and there’s no evidence she participated in any kind of romantic entanglement. Weightman, meanwhile, devoted his life to his religious work and caring for the poor. He died of cholera in 1842 at age 26.

“He was a pious young man,” says Miller. “I mean, [he was] really not a Byronic hero who’s going up and having wild sex on the moors in an abandoned cottage.”

To this day, Emily Brontë intrigues and obfuscates. Poetically, it is her writing that speaks above all else. Though she and Charlotte viewed their burgeoning careers differently, both ultimately wanted the meaningful weight of their fiction to supersede any interest in their personal lives.

On her deathbed, Emily asked to be taken upstairs so she could look out the window at the moors. “It still makes my heart ache,” says Morse. “I’m so invested in them. … My students are, too. They cry. The Brontë class , you know, people have to bring Kleenex.”

Morse quotes a passage from Wuthering Heights :

“Nelly, do you never dream queer dreams?” [Cathy] said, suddenly, after some minutes’ reflection. “Yes, now and then,” I answered. “And so do I. 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 color of my mind.”

Morse pauses. “You know, my students always say, ‘Can you read that one more time?’”

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Michelle Mehrtens | READ MORE

Michelle Mehrtens is a media production coordinator for Smithsonian Enterprises, as well as a freelance writer and founder of Meesh Says Things , a pop culture website dedicated to film and television. She is a former media intern at the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage and a graduate of Stanford University’s MFA program in documentary film. 

emilybrontë.com

Novelist, Poet, Wanderer, Rebel, Enigma

Emily Jane Brontë was the born on Thursday 30th July 1818 at 72-74 Market Street, Thornton in Bradford, England in what is today known as the Brontë Birthplace. The second youngest of six children of the reverend Patrick Brontë from Imdel, County Down and his wife Maria Branwell, originally from Penzance, Cornwall.

A couple of months after the birth of their last child, Anne, in January 1820, and with two young servant sisters, Nancy & Sarah Garrs, helping Patrick and Maria with their large brood, the family moved some six miles across the moors to the parsonage at Haworth where Patrick became the perpetual curate of St Michael and All Angels’ Church, a position he would hold until his death in June 1861.

Those early times in their new home on the edge of the moor would have been frought with almost unbearable pain and ulimately heartbreak when Maria, who had been suffering a longstanding terminal illness with either uterine cancer or sepsis, died in mid September 1821 when Emily was only three years old. The maternal heart of the family had been ripped away from the young Brontë children and would leave a deep and lasting scar on them all. The eldest daughter, Maria, named after her mother, and by all accounts a girl possessed of a great intellect and sensibility far beyond her seven years, took on the role of surrogate mother to her younger siblings. Patrick, in his grief, was aided by his sister in law, the children’s aunt, Elizabeth Branwell, who in early 1821 had travelled the 400 miles from her native Penzance to nurse her ailing sister in Yorkshire. She would end up remaining at the parsonage for the rest of her life.

Time moved on and by November 1824 young Emily was due to attend the same school as her elder sisters, the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge. The lasting impact for all of the children who were unfortunate enough to be taught here, would hold many consequences. For the two eldest, Maria and Elizabeth, the unsanitary and brutal conditions would eventually cost them their lives when they both contracted tuberculosis following a severe typhoid outbreak that swept the school in early 1825. Maria fell ill first and was taken home to the parsonage by Patrick in February, she died from the disease on 6th May 1825 aged 11. At the end of May Elizabeth began to show that she to was ailing with the same symptoms and Patrick urgently took her back to the parsonage. Seeing his second daughter rapidly go down hill having only just buried his eldest caused great panic in Patrick and both Charlotte and Emily were quickly removed from the school never to return. Elizabeth sadly passed away on the 15th June aged 10 years and the young family was further decimated.

With the loss of their mother and then their two eldest sisters in quick succession, these early tragedies served to strengthen the bond between the remaining siblings, Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne. The children were home-schooled by their father and aunt and therefore segregated from their peers, their isolated location on the edge of the moors further removed them from the general population of Haworth as well. This lack of outside contact and the fact that they has access to various books usually not permitted to be read by children, like texts by Byron and Shakespeare, stirred their young creatives imaginations. Great imaginary worlds were created including Glass Town, initiated by Charlotte and Branwell, and later Emily and Anne broke away from this and created Gondal. Emily in particular spent most of the rest of her life writing about this fantasy world.

In 1831 Charlotte attended Roe Head School in Mirfield, run by headmistress Margaret Wooler. Miss Wooler would go on to become a close friend of Charlotte’s and even gave her away at her wedding. Following a return home the following year she went back again in July 1835 this time in a capacity as a teacher, bringing young Emily along as a pupil. Emily’s time at Roe Head was brief and fraught with debilitating feelings of homesickness that eventually meant she left the school and returned to the sanctuary of the parsonage. Anne took her place in October of that year. Emily’s difficulty in remaining away from home would surface again in September of 1838 when she briefly became a teacher at Miss Patchett’s Law Hill School in Halifax. The working hours were brutal and even more so on someone of Emily’s disposition, Charlotte wrote that Emily had to endure “…hard labour from six in the morning until near eleven at night, with only one half-hour of exercise between – this is slavery, I fear she will never stand it.” She was right, Emily’s health broke and in April 1839 Emily quit her position, leaving and famously remarking that she preferred the school dog to the pupils!

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Emily Bronte

Emily bronte’s life.

A female English poet and novelist, Emily Bronte was born on July 30, 1818 in Thornton, Yorkshire in England. Her family moved eight miles away to Haworth in 1824, where her father, Patrick Bronte, worked as a perpetual curate. Her mother, Maria Bronte, died when Emily was just three.

Following the death of their mother, the responsibility of bringing up the six Bronte children fell upon their father, who sent Emily’s three elder sisters, Elizabeth, Charlotte and Maria, to Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge. The girls faced mistreatment in the school, which Charlotte described in her novel “ Jane Eyre . ” Emily also attended the same school for a short period of time, but Elizabeth and Maria soon caught typhus there. As Maria was already suffering from tuberculosis, she succumbed to typhus and consequently died. The remaining sisters left the school, but Elizabeth also died shortly after that.

The surviving three Bronte sisters and their brother Patrick Barnwell got mentoring at home from their aunt Elizabeth Barnwell and their father. Despite previous hard times at school, and the tragic deaths of her sisters and mother, this mentoring and tutoring boosted Emily’s literary talent. While they were not studying with their aunt or father, the children would create imaginary worlds, and write stories about their toy soldiers in these worlds.

When Emily turned 13, she and her younger sister Anne began writing poems about Gondal, an imaginary island in the North Pacific. Some of her Gondal poems written between 1841 and 1845 survived. Emily later joined the Law Hill School in Halifax as a junior teacher, where she was accustomed to working 17 hours a day. Her health thus deteriorated during this time, and she left the school in 1839. In 1842, Charlotte and Emily went to Brussels, and attended a girls’ academy to perfect their German and French. In 1845, Charlotte insisted that Emily publish the “ Gondal Poems ” that she’d saved in her notebooks. Emily refused at first but later agreed when Charlotte revealed that she, too, had written poems about Gondal. Charlotte, Emily, and Anne published a joint volume of poetry in 1846 called “Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell.”

Emily published her masterpiece “ Wuthering Heights ” in 1847. Sadly, she would never know the fame that her novel achieved. Emily’s health deteriorated further, which she attributed to unhygienic conditions and water contamination from the nearby graveyard of a church. She rejected any medical help, saying she would not allow a “poisoning doctor” near her. Eventually, Emily became seriously ill, and died on December 19, 1848.

Emily Bronte’s Works

Charlotte, Emily, and Anne jointly published their first collection of poems, which gained praise from critics, though only sold two copies at first. Each sister chose a pen name; Emily was Ellis Bell, Charlotte was Currer, and Anne was Acton. Emily and Anne contributed 21 poems to the volume, while Charlotte included 20 poems. A reviewer from The Athenaeum commended the work of Ellis Bell for its musical power , while another critic appreciated “the presence of more genius than it was supposed this utilitarian age had devoted to the loftier exercises of the intellect.”

Emily Bronte published her novel “ Wuthering Heights ” as two volumes in 1847. Initially it received mixed reviews from critics due to its innovative structure based on doomed love, social commentary and mystery . It was condemned for depiction of immoral passion, but later the novel became a classic.

Emily Bronte’s Style and Popular Poems

The writing style of Emily Bronte was figurative and self-effacing interspersed with poetic prose . Emily was famous for romantic poetic style because she explored the themes of nature, solitude, romanticism , religion, loss, death, revenge and class. Her popular poems include “ Faith and Despondency,” “Anticipation,” “ Fall, Leaves, Fall ,” “A Little While, A Little While,” “Me Thinks this Heart,” “A Little Budding Rose,” “ Remembrance ,” “A Day Dream,” “A Death-Scene,” “Come, Walk with Me,” “Encouragement,” “At Castle Wood,” “The Philosopher,” “Stars,” “Plead for Me” and “Interrogation.”

More About Bronte

Emily had a religious upbringing, which her writing style reflects. Since her father was an evangelical minister, his teachings influenced her poetry, but her symbols also reflect the Victorian skepticism. The Bronte sisters were called “Romantic Rebels”, for they made use of an unusual romantic style in their writings.

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Victorian Era

From Georgian to Edwardian

Emily Bronte and her Writing Style

Emily Bronte and her Writing Style: The Bronte sisters, namely Elizabeth, Emily, and Anne, are famous for their contribution to English literature. Emily Bronte was an English poet and novelist. Her full name was Emily Jane Bronte . She is famous for the only novel she had written during her lifetime, Wuthering Heights.

The novel is now considered one of the classics of English literature. She had also authored some beautiful poems through her career. Emily was originally the fifth of the six Bronte siblings, but two of the eldest died at a young age due to serious ailments. Emily wrote under the pen name of Ellis Bell.

Table of Contents

Early Life of Emily Bronte 

Emily Bronte was quite different from the other Victorian girls. She was born on July 30, 1818, in Thorton near Bradford. Her father was Patrick Bronte, who was Irish. Her mother was named Maria Branwell Bronte, who died of cancer when Emily was aged only 3 years old. The siblings were named in the order – Maria, Elizabeth, Charlotte, Patrick, Emily, and Anne.

Not only the ladies in the family, Emily’s father Reverend Patrick Bronte had several published works. Even her brother Patrick Branwell had an interest in literature in his early days and loved playings with words along with their sister. She died on December 19, 1848, from tuberculosis.

Emily Bronte and Her Writing Style

Emily was very shy and hardly had any contact with the outside world. She was very close to her siblings. She had started writing from a very young age that had started around childish games devised by the Bronte siblings. But the poems written by Emily during this age was never published and is supposedly lost.

Emily and Anne are known to have written about a fictional island named Gondal at a young age, developed characters and enacted them. These writings were not preserved and most of them were lost, leaving a few. Wuthering Heights is supposed to be inspired by the work of her brother named The Life of Alexander Percy.

The Personality of Emily Bronte 

Emily Bronte had always been much of a mysterious figure. There has never been much information about her due to her reclusive nature and her love for solidity. Charlotte Bronte , her surviving elder sister, had been the source of most of the information about her.

But the descriptions of Emily in the words of Charlotte was somewhat shady and did not disclose fully the personality of Emily. Emily was also known to be quite fond of animals. Her love of the moors is actually hinted in her work Wuthering Heights, it is the only novel she ever wrote.

Writing Style – Wuthering Heights

The novel Wuthering Heights was not initially accepted by the publishers. They seemed to misjudge the potential of the author. The critics were puzzled by the new ideas that Emily had involved in the novel. When the book was first published by Thomas Cautley Newby in 1847 as two volumes of a 3 volume series,

Including Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte, the authors were mentioned as Ellis and Acton Bell. The public did not know about Emily before her death. It was only in 1950 that her name came to light on the title page of an edited commercial edition.

Emily had written a lot of poems before Wuthering Heights and her style was surely quite lyrical. Her love for nature can be found in the lead characters, Heathcliff and Catherine. Bronte had even varied the narration of the novel depending on the character who is narrating, Nelly Dean or Lockwood.

Emily Bronte also describes the human nature of being opinionated through Nelly’s narration. Nelly feels powerful given the chance to narration by Bronte. The deep meaning of each word used by Emily can be seen even in the last sentence of the novel.

Poetry by Emily Bronte 

  The only poems that were published during the lifetime of Emily Bronte made a slim volume. It was published along with the ones written by her sister and titled as Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell.

Only two copies were sold and received three reviews, which were positive for Emily. Nearly two hundred poems were collected by C. W. Hatfield and published in The Complete Poems of Emily Jane Bronte in 1941. Bronte had reached the heights of her poetry before she died at an immature age.

Her poems were described as having a fine quaint style. They were also described to be having the wings destined to fly high, but these were not quite realized due to her sudden death from tuberculosis at an age of 30.

More Info On-  Maria Branwell ,  Aubrey Beardsley ,  Patrick Branwell Bronte ,  Charlotte Bronte, and Jane Eyre

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The Influences and Background of Emily Bronte

05.19.2023 // By Tome Tailor

Emily Brontë, born on July 30, 1818, in Yorkshire, England, was a talented and enigmatic author best known for her singular novel, Wuthering Heights . Though Emily Brontë lived a relatively short life — she died at age 30 — her literary legacy has endured in part due to the mysterious and dark elements present in her work. However, the factors that shaped her creative mind, including the influences and background that informed her writing, are just as fascinating.

The Brontë Family: Creative Geniuses or Eccentric Outcasts?

Emily Brontë was the second youngest in a family of six children. Her father Patrick Brontë, an Irish clergyman, and her mother Maria Branwell, who hailed from a prosperous family, moved to the remote village of Haworth in 1824, where Patrick became the town’s parson.

Emily’s mother passed away in 1821, leaving her husband and their six children to navigate life on their own. Despite facing financial difficulties, Patrick Brontë managed to obtain a decent education for his children. He further stoked their intellectual curiosity by allowing them access to literary resources, including periodicals, newspapers, and a rich library of books.

As the siblings grew up, they became avid readers, developing a love for Romantic authors such as Sir Walter Scott, Lord Byron, and John Keats. Literature brought the siblings closer together and fostered a strong sense of shared imagination, characterized by their creation of elaborate imaginary worlds known as Glasstown, Gondal, and Angria.

Emily and her younger sister Anne worked closely together on the development of Gondal, a fantasy world complete with vivid landscapes, intricate politics, and dramatic adventure. Their joint storytelling experience deeply influenced Emily’s later work.

Literary and Cultural Influences in Emily Brontë’s Work

Aside from her family’s intellectual environment, various elements of the Romantic movement sweeping through Europe in the early 19th century shaped Brontë’s writing style. Among the central ideals of Romanticism were a reverence for natural beauty, individualism, and the primacy of emotion over reason. In Wuthering Heights , these themes are evident in the descriptions of the wild and windswept Yorkshire moors, as well as the work’s feverish emotional intensity.

Emily Brontë’s interest in the gothic genre is also evident in her novel. Popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries, gothic fiction focused on sublime natural landscapes, supernatural occurrences, and haunting atmosphere. In Wuthering Heights , elements such as the ghost of Catherine Earnshaw, Gothic architecture, and themes of imprisonment and revenge reveal Brontë’s fascination with the genre.

Furthermore, the state of Victorian England in Emily Brontë’s time played a significant role in shaping her work. Like her fellow female author contemporaries, including her sisters Charlotte (author of Jane Eyre and Anne ( The Tenant of Wildfell Hall &i=stripbooks&tag=tometailor-20), Emily Brontë was acutely aware of the gendered limitations of her society. Such awareness may have contributed to her characterization of strong-willed women in her work.

Emily Brontë’s Writing, Reception, and Legacy

Despite her short life and limited published works, Emily Brontë has become a celebrated figure in English literature. Wuthering Heights , published under the pen name Ellis Bell in 1847, was initially met with mixed reviews; some readers were captivated by its intensity and originality, while others found its themes and characters distasteful.

Regardless of mixed opinions, Wuthering Heights has become a staple in the literary canon. Emily Brontë’s writing is renowned for its psychological depth and vivid exploration of human emotion. Her work remains an enduring source of inspiration for contemporary authors, who continue to draw upon and adapt her haunting stories.

If you have not yet experienced the dark and compelling world of Emily Brontë’s writing, now is the time to dive into her literary masterpiece:

Read or listen to “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontë

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• The Timeless Appeal of Wuthering Heights

Looking for Something Else?

Emily Brontë Facts 📝

Emily Brontë lived only thirty years, yet her literary creativity within this short span has lasted more than a century.

Article written by Victor Onuorah

Degree in Journalism from University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

For today’s readers, ‘ Wuthering Heights ,’ and perhaps a few of her popular poems, such as ‘ Lines,’ is what they might know about her or relate with. However, there are several interesting facts about the talented Emily Brontë that many don’t know yet. This article will reveal ten personal facts about our author. 

She was the fifth child of the Brontë Children

Emily Brontë was the fifth child of Patrick and Maria Branwell Brontë. Emily was born in Thornton, Yorkshire, along with her older siblings, who included Elizabeth, Maria, and Charlotte: her only brother, Branwell, and the last child of the house, Anne. During their childhood, the Brontë family stayed very close to each other, creating and building story characters and fictional worlds, using play toys and objects their father got them. Emily Brontë may not have come from a rich family, but her childhood was one filled with happy memories spent with her loved ones. 

Her father was a published Anglican pastor 

Emily’s father, Patrick, was an Irish native who lived most of his life in England, serving as a pastor of the Anglican Church. He was also an esteemed author of books, having published several books himself during his hay days. It’s likely the Brontë children – Emily, Charlotte, and Anne – all inherited their father’s creative writing and storytelling talents. 

She lost her mother at two years old

After the birth of Anne, the sixth and last child, Maria fell sick and died barely a year after her delivery. Emily was only two years old at the time. Because the Brontë children were all young and their father, Patrick, couldn’t possibly take care of them by himself, Elizabeth, one of Emily’s aunts, moved in to take care of them – seeking to replace the vacuum left by Mrs. Brontë.

She didn’t have much education

Emily Brontë, as a child, was sharp, intelligent, and quick to learn, but in terms of the amount of education, she got, well, not so much. At six-year, she got enrolled in a girl’s missionary school along with her sisters but was later withdrawn after her two elder siblings, Elizabeth and Maria, fell ill and died from it. Emily had a few comebacks here and there, the most notable being her travel overseas to Brussels with Charlotte, where she studied and worked for a brief period before returning home.

She lived in Brussels for a short time

As a young adult, Emily sought a chance to better educate herself and, at the same time, work. Based on this, she and Charlotte took a trip to Brussels to further their education. During this time, Emily worked a short time doing menial lady jobs but also used the opportunity to study. However, their stay in Brussels was cut short when she and her sister heard words about the passing of their aunt, Elizabeth. Both would then come home to England, never to return to Brussels again.

Her pen name was Ellis Bell

When Emily started putting out her works, she did so under the false name ‘ Ellis Bell .’ She went by this name on her maiden publication – which was a collection of poems co-authored by her sisters Charlotte and Anne, both of who also used pen names. This was the case with her only novel ‘ Wuthering Heights ,’ which also had the name ‘ Ellis Bell ’ as the book’s author. It was later, after she had passed away, that Charlotte revealed their real names. Their name change came to circumvent the no-good stereotype women of their era get for literary works.

She published and co-authored an anthology with two of her sisters

Emily was a very talented writer of poems who wrote a lot of them, and by the time she was in her twenties, she already had a large catalog of poems. However, she didn’t know she was that good, nor did she think her write-ups were print-worthy, so she kept them hidden and to herself. It was only after Charlotte discovered them and praised her for them that she started thinking that they might be good after all. Poems combined with those of Charlotte and Anne were published as a single collection. 

She was a better poet than her sisters

As far as the Brontë sisters went, Emily was considered the one with superior ability to craft poetic prose, and consistently too. Charlotte was the one known to have been more blessed with a talent in novel writing. And how her book, ‘ Jane Eyre ,’ became an instant success after its publication was proof of that. 

Wuthering Heights was her only novel

Emily Brontë lived until 30, and in this short time produced several poem collections and other literary pieces. For novels, ‘ Wuthering Heights ’ was the only one she could manage before her death, and although the book’s reception from the onset was not encouraging even for the author, there’s a good chance the world would have seen other great books yet from the pen of Emily Brontë had she lived for much longer. 

She died a year after her book’s publication at the age of 30

After publishing her book, ‘ Wuthering Heights ’ in 1847, she passed away from tuberculosis the following year, having not lived to witness the turnaround success of her book. It is suggested she got infected by the disease while tending to her sick brother, Branwell, who sadly later passed away before she did. Following her death, Charlotte revealed to the world that Ellis Bell was Emily Brontë, admitting she was a better writer than herself. 

Why did Emily Brontë die so young?

Dying at only 30 years old, Emily Brontë no doubt lived a short life, no thanks to ill health. But, despite that, the author, through her writing, lives on, and even after a hundred years of her passing, her works are still read due to their timeless relevance. 

How successful was ‘ Wuthering Heights ’ after it was released?

‘ Wuthering Heights ’ was a huge flop upon publication, as it only managed to sell around eight copies or less.

Why did Emily Brontë author her works under the pseudonym ‘ Ellis Bell ’?

The decision to have a pen name came following fears that the Brontë sisters’ works might not be taken seriously by society if it knew they were written by women, as there were existing toxic stereotypes against women at the time. 

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About Victor Onuorah

Victor is as much a prolific writer as he is an avid reader. With a degree in Journalism, he goes around scouring literary storehouses and archives; picking up, dusting the dirt off, and leaving clean even the most crooked pieces of literature all with the skill of analysis.

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Emily Bronte Biography and Work

Table of Contents

Emily Bronte (1818-1848) was an English novelist and poet, best known for her novel Wuthering Heights. Despite her short life and limited literary output, Bronte’s work continues to captivate readers and inspire writers to this day.

Early Life and Education

Emily Bronte was born on July 30, 1818, in Thornton, West Yorkshire, England, the fifth of six children. Her father, Patrick Bronte, was a clergyman and her mother, Maria Branwell, died when Emily was just three years old. Emily and her siblings were educated at home, with a strong emphasis on literature and the arts. They were also encouraged to develop their own creativity, and Emily began writing poetry and stories at a young age.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- In 1824, the Bronte family moved to Haworth, a small village on the Yorkshire moors, where Patrick Bronte had been appointed the parish priest. Emily and her siblings spent much of their childhood exploring the rugged landscape and imagining stories and characters to inhabit it.

Also Read:-

• William Golding Biography and Work
• Kazuo Ishiguro Biography and Work
• James Joyce’s Biography and Work
• Gabriel Garcia Biography and Works

Literary Career

Emily Bronte’s literary career began in earnest in 1845, when she and her sisters Charlotte and Anne published a collection of their poems under the pseudonyms Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. The collection, entitled Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, received mixed reviews but was a modest commercial success.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- However, it was Emily’s novel Wuthering Heights, published the following year, that would secure her place in literary history. The novel, which tells the story of the passionate and destructive relationship between the orphaned Heathcliff and the headstrong Catherine Earnshaw, was unlike anything that had been written before. Its dark and brooding atmosphere, complex characters, and nonlinear narrative structure were a departure from the more traditional novels of the time.

Wuthering Heights was met with mixed reviews upon its publication, with some critics finding its characters and themes too disturbing for polite society. However, the novel’s reputation grew over time, and it is now considered a masterpiece of English literature.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- Bronte’s other writings include a few short stories and poems, many of which were published posthumously. Her second novel, a fragment entitled “Ashes to Ashes,” was never completed.

Personal Life and Death

Emily Bronte was a notoriously private person, and little is known about her personal life beyond what can be gleaned from her writings. She lived most of her life in Haworth, rarely leaving the village except for a brief period as a teacher in Halifax. She was known to be fiercely independent and had a reputation for being somewhat reclusive.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- In 1847, Emily’s brother Branwell died of tuberculosis, followed shortly thereafter by her sister Anne. Emily’s own health began to deteriorate, and she died of tuberculosis on December 19, 1848, at the age of 30. She was buried in the family vault in Haworth, alongside her sisters Anne and Charlotte.

Emily Bronte’s literary legacy has endured long after her death. Wuthering Heights remains one of the most beloved and influential novels in the English language, and has been adapted numerous times for film, television, and the stage. Its complex characters, vivid descriptions of the Yorkshire landscape, and themes of love, revenge, and redemption continue to captivate readers and inspire writers.

Bronte’s poetry, though less well-known than her novel, is also highly regarded by critics and readers alike. Her poems often explore the same themes as her prose, including nature, love, and death, and showcase her unique poetic voice.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- In addition to her literary achievements, Emily Bronte has also become a symbol of the Romantic ideal of the artist as a passionate and independent individual.

Theme and Style

Emily Bronte’s writing is characterized by its intense passion, vivid descriptions of the natural world, and exploration of themes such as love, death, and the human psyche. Her writing style is often characterized as gothic or romantic, with a focus on intense emotions and the supernatural.

One of the central themes of Bronte’s work is the destructive power of love. In Wuthering Heights, the passionate and destructive relationship between Heathcliff and Catherine is at the heart of the novel. Their love for each other is all-consuming, but ultimately leads to tragedy and despair. Bronte’s exploration of love is complex, showing both its beauty and its destructive potential.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- Another theme that runs throughout Bronte’s work is the connection between humans and nature. Bronte’s descriptions of the Yorkshire moors in Wuthering Heights are highly evocative, and serve as a backdrop for the novel’s themes of love, revenge, and redemption. In her poetry, Bronte often celebrates the beauty of the natural world, while also recognizing its power to inspire fear and awe.

Death is also a recurring theme in Bronte’s work. Many of her poems deal with the subject of mortality, often in a highly emotional and personal way. In Wuthering Heights, death is a constant presence, with characters dying young and unexpectedly, and the novel’s supernatural elements hinting at the possibility of an afterlife.

Bronte’s writing style is characterized by its intense emotion and vivid imagery. Her prose is highly descriptive, often bordering on the poetic, and her characters are complex and multi-layered. Bronte is also known for her use of symbolism and allegory, with objects and events often carrying deeper meaning.

Emily Bronte Biography and Work:- Overall, Emily Bronte’s work is characterized by its intense emotional power, its celebration of the natural world, and its exploration of complex themes such as love, death, and the human psyche. Her writing style is highly evocative and poetic, and has inspired generations of readers and writers alike.

Kazuo Ishiguro and Emily Bronte are renowned writers who have made significant contributions to literature. Ishiguro’s exploration of themes such as memory, identity, and the human condition have earned him critical acclaim and numerous awards. His writing style is characterized by its understated elegance and complex characterizations, which have left a lasting impact on contemporary literature.

Similarly, Emily Bronte’s works are marked by their intense emotional power, vivid imagery, and complex themes such as love, death, and the connection between humans and nature. Her writing style is highly poetic and gothic, and her exploration of the destructive power of love has influenced generations of readers and writers.

Both Ishiguro and Bronte have made significant contributions to literature, and their works continue to resonate with readers today. Their exploration of complex themes and emotions, as well as their evocative writing styles, have left a lasting legacy in the literary world.

Q. Who was Emily Bronte?

Ans. Emily Bronte was an English novelist and poet, born in 1818 in Thornton, Yorkshire, England. She is best known for her novel, “Wuthering Heights,” which is considered a classic of English literature.

Q. What is Emily Bronte’s most famous work?

Ans. Emily Bronte’s most famous work is “Wuthering Heights,” which was published in 1847. It is a gothic novel that tells the story of the passionate and destructive relationship between Heathcliff and Catherine.

Q. What inspired Emily Bronte to write “Wuthering Heights”?

Ans. There is no definitive answer to this question, but it is believed that Emily Bronte was inspired by her own experiences growing up in the Yorkshire moors, as well as by the works of other gothic writers such as Ann Radcliffe.

Q. What is Emily Bronte’s writing style?

Ans. Emily Bronte’s writing style is characterized by its intense emotion, vivid imagery, and gothic elements. Her prose is often poetic, and her characters are complex and multi-layered.

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