L'influenza del padre e il successo letterario delle sorelle Bronte

Bronte sisters, their lives and novel

The next year Bronte’s mother, Maria Branwell, died of cancer and the ladies and their brother were grown by their aunt in an isolated village.

After their studies in Roe Head school in 1831 and their experience as tutors, each one of them published a novel in 1847: Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey.

They used pseudonyms, like many other female writers: Charlotte was Currer, Emily was Acton Bell and Anne was Ellis.

Only Jane Eyre was successful, maybe because Romantic elements such as nightmares, unknown past and origin, the presence of a Byronic hero, dark and gloomy atmosphere, unexplainable episodes are wisely mixed with Victorian themes like the orphan’s sufferings, the harshness of boarding schools, crave for independence, social class barriers and an happy ending.

These elements made the novel in line with the taste of times.

As a matter of fact, Charlotte wrote two other novels: Shirley in 1849 and Villette in 1853 but The Professor, which was her first novel but was rejected continuously, was published posthumous in 1857.

Charlotte died while pregnant with her first child in 1855 because of pneumonia while Emily died on December 1848 because of tuberculosis, one year before Anne’s death from the same illness as Emily’s.

Wuthering Heights’ narrative technique and themes

As a matter of fact, it was thought that Wuthering Heights (whose toponyms in the reality is speculated to be the ruins of Top Withens or Sunderland Hall) was written by Charlotte Bronte as her fist and not so refined novel (in the same year she published her own real novel, Jane Eyre) but then the literary quality of Wuthering Heights was reevaluated starting from intellectuals like Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Matthew Arnold and George Henry Lewes.

Nowadays it is considered the best novel among the three sister’s works and it is also compared to the Shakespearian King Lear and Victor Hugo’s literary works.

Wuthering Heights’s narrative technique is very complex: it has two narrators, the first one is an outsider, and the other one is involved in the story.
The narration isn’t in chronological time, in fact it starts from the end of the story, and there are a lot of flashbacks.

One of the most important themes of the novel is death, and it is seen as a liberation of the spirit.
The novel is based upon contrast between the families: Wuthering Heights reflects the nature of Heathcliff, heavily influenced by the local traditions; Thrushcross Grange reflects Catherine’s character, full of respect and stability. Though opposed, they are complementary.