Buddy Reading Wuthering Heights
Before Emerald Fennell convinces anyone that Catherine is blonde and in her thirties
Last week, my social media was full of reposts of Margot Robbie in a big white wedding dress; a behind the scenes still from Emerald Fennell’s upcoming Wuthering Heights movie. And, along with almost everyone reposting, I have feelings about it. Mostly, I just want to re-read the book.
Yes, it’s out of season (although, it technically *is* Autumn in Australia); yes, I’ve read it more than once before; yes, there are new books on my tbr waiting for me to read. But, Wuthering Heights is great, and maybe it’s due another go.
Emily Brontë’s only novel, published in 1847 under the pseudonym “Ellis Bell” (each of the Brontë sisters had a more masculine-sounding pen-name; Ellis for Emily, Currer for Charlotte, and Acton for Anne), sees two families — the Earnshaws and the Lintons — living on the moors of West Yorkshire. It’s a Romantic (capital R, it’s definitely not “romantic”) Gothic novel, with a confusingly entwined family tree (everyone has the same names), a foster-son with a mysterious background, a love story that’s not about love, a love story that is about love, and bookending by a character who gets very involved in everyone’s lives after the fact.
If you fancy reading along, there’ll be a post here each Sunday in May, some links you can go away to read, watch, or listen to, and comments will be open for discussion on the sections we’re reading.
May 4 — Chapters 1 to 9
May 11 — Chapters 10 to 16
May 18 — Chapters 17 to 25
May 25 — Chapters 26 to 34