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Emily Brontë

Born

in Thornton, West Riding of Yorkshire, England

July 30, 1818

Died

December 19, 1848

Genre

Fiction, Poetry

Influences

Charlotte Brontë, Anne Brontë, Shakespeare, Mary Shelley, John Milton, ...more

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Emily Brontë was an English novelist and poet whose singular contribution to literature, Wuthering Heights, is now celebrated as one of the most powerful and original novels in the English language. Born into the remarkable Brontë family on 30 July 1818 in Thornton, Yorkshire, she was the fifth of six children of Maria Branwell and Patrick Brontë, an Irish clergyman. Her early life was marked by both intellectual curiosity and profound loss. After the death of her mother in 1821 and the subsequent deaths of her two eldest sisters in 1825, Emily and her surviving siblings— Charlotte, Anne, and Branwell—were raised in relative seclusion in the moorland village of Haworth, where their imaginations flourished in a household shaped by books, Emily Brontë was an English novelist and poet whose singular contribution to literature, Wuthering Heights, is now celebrated as one of the most powerful and original novels in the English language. Born into the remarkable Brontë family on 30 July 1818 in Thornton, Yorkshire, she was the fifth of six children of Maria Branwell and Patrick Brontë, an Irish clergyman. Her early life was marked by both intellectual curiosity and profound loss. After the death of her mother in 1821 and the subsequent deaths of her two eldest sisters in 1825, Emily and her surviving siblings— Charlotte, Anne, and Branwell—were raised in relative seclusion in the moorland village of Haworth, where their imaginations flourished in a household shaped by books, storytelling, and emotional intensity.
The Brontë children created elaborate fictional worlds, notably Angria and later Gondal, which served as an outlet for their creative energies. Emily, in particular, gravitated toward Gondal, a mysterious, windswept imaginary land she developed with her sister Anne. Her early poetry, much of it steeped in the mythology and characters of Gondal, demonstrated a remarkable lyrical force and emotional depth. These poems remained private until discovered by Charlotte in 1845, after which Emily reluctantly agreed to publish them in the 1846 collection Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, using the pseudonym Ellis Bell to conceal her gender. Though the volume sold few copies, critics identified Emily’s poems as the strongest in the collection, lauding her for their music, power, and visionary quality.
Emily was intensely private and reclusive by nature. She briefly attended schools in Cowan Bridge and Roe Head but was plagued by homesickness and preferred the solitude of the Yorkshire moors, which inspired much of her work. She worked briefly as a teacher but found the demands of the profession exhausting. She also studied in Brussels with Charlotte in 1842, but again found herself alienated and yearning for home. Throughout her life, Emily remained closely bonded with her siblings, particularly Anne, and with the landscape of Haworth, where she drew on the raw, untamed beauty of the moors for both her poetry and her fiction.
Her only novel, Wuthering Heights, was published in 1847, a year after the poetry collection, under her pseudonym Ellis Bell. Initially met with a mixture of admiration and shock, the novel’s structure, emotional intensity, and portrayal of violent passion and moral ambiguity stood in stark contrast to the conventions of Victorian fiction. Many readers, unable to reconcile its power with the expected gentility of a woman writer, assumed it had been written by a man. The novel tells the story of Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw—two characters driven by obsessive love, cruelty, and vengeance—and explores themes of nature, the supernatural, and the destructive power of unresolved emotion. Though controversial at the time, Wuthering Heights is now considered a landmark in English literature, acclaimed for its originality, psychological insight, and poetic vision.
Emily's personality has been the subject of much speculation, shaped in part by her sister Charlotte’s later writings and by Victorian biographies that often sought to romanticize or domesticate her character. While some accounts depict her as intensely shy and austere, others highlight her fierce independence, deep empathy with animals, and profound inner life. She is remembered as a solitary figure, closely attuned to the rhythms of the natural world, with a quiet but formidable intellect and a passion for truth and freedom. Her dog, Keeper, was a constant companion and, according to many, a window into her capacity for fierce, loyal love.
Emily Brontë died of tuberculosis on 19 December 1848 at the age of thirty, just a year after the publication of her novel. Her early death, following those of her brother Branwell and soon to ...more

Combine Editions
Emily Brontë’s books

Average rating: 3.91 · 2,118,418 ratings · 95,689 reviews · 1,450 distinct works • Similar authors

	Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë, Pauline Nestor (Editor/Introduction), Lucasta Miller (Preface) 3.90 avg rating — 2,074,899 ratings — published 1847 — 1845 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Brontë Sisters: Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre 4.33 avg rating — 11,188 ratings — published 1847 — 105 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Night is Darkening Round Me 3.85 avg rating — 4,492 ratings — published 1846 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Complete Poems by Emily Brontë, C.W. Hatfield (Editor), Irene Taylor (Foreword by) 4.17 avg rating — 3,645 ratings — published 1846 — 52 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Wuthering Heights, Agnès Grey & Villette by Emily Brontë, Charlotte Brontë, Anne Brontë 4.01 avg rating — 3,383 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Best Poems of the Brontë Sisters by Emily Brontë, Anne Brontë, Charlotte Brontë 4.05 avg rating — 882 ratings — published 1846 — 10 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	مرتفعات ويذرنج - الجزء الأول by Emily Brontë, إيميلي برونتي, حلمي مراد (ترجمة) 3.85 avg rating — 512 ratings — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Bronte: Poems by Emily Brontë, Peter Washington (Editor) 4.12 avg rating — 421 ratings — published 1996 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Wuthering Heights and Poems 4.07 avg rating — 305 ratings — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Wuthering Heights 3.67 avg rating — 335 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Emily Brontë…

Series by Emily Brontë

Wuthering Heights (3 volumes) (3 books)
by

Emily Brontë,

حلمي مراد (ترجمة),

إيميلي برونتي

3.91 avg rating — 811 ratings

Wuthering Heights (2 volumes) (2 books)
by

Emily Brontë

3.70 avg rating — 20 ratings

Wuthering Heights (6 volumes) (6 books)
by

Emily Brontë

0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings

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Polls

What book would you like to read for our February 2023 Group Read? The theme is Purple.

The Color Purple by Alice Walker
Historical Fiction, Modern Classic

38 votes 21.0%

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
Classic

32 votes 17.7%

Violeta by Isabel Allende
Historical Fiction, Magical Realism

23 votes 12.7%

Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Africa, Historical Fiction

19 votes 10.5%

The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket
Children, Fantasy, Young Adult

16 votes 8.8%

The Lilac Girls of Ravensbrück by Martha Hall Kelly
Historical Fiction

16 votes 8.8%

Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line by Deepa Anappara
Mystery, Contemporary, Thriller

15 votes 8.3%

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton
Young Adult, Fantasy, Magical Realism

12 votes 6.6%

Spells for Lost Things by Jenna Evans Welch
Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance

6 votes 3.3%

Invisible Wounds by Tom Milton
Fiction, PTSD

4 votes 2.2%

181 total votes

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Emily Brontë’s Followers (13,630)

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