Wuthering Heights is the only published novel by Emily Brontë, written between October 1845 and June 1846[1] and published in July of the following year. It was not printed until December 1847, after the success of her sister Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane Eyre, under the pseudonym Ellis Bell. A posthumous second edition was edited by Charlotte in 1850.
The title of the novel comes from the Yorkshire manor on the moors of the story. The narrative centres on the all-encompassing, passionate, but ultimately doomed love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff, and how this unresolved passion eventually destroys them and the people around them.
Today considered a classic of English literature, Wuthering Heights met with mixed reviews and controversy when it first appeared, mainly because of the narrative's stark depiction of mental and physical cruelty. Although Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre was generally considered the best of the Brontë sisters' works during most of the nineteenth century, many subsequent critics of Wuthering Heights argued that it was a superior achievement. Wuthering Heights has also given rise to many adaptations and inspired works, including films, radio, television dramatisations, a musical by Bernard J. Taylor, a ballet, three operas (respectively by Bernard Herrmann, Carlisle Floyd, and Frédéric Chaslin), a role-playing game, and the 1978 chart topping song by Kate Bush.
