EXCERPTS FROM REVIEWS FOUND IN
BRONTË'S DESK
After Emily Brontë's death, these five reviews
were
found in her desk; four are published here.
Anonymous, Examiner, January
1848
This is a strange book. It is not without evidences of
considerable power: but, as a whole, it is wild, confused, disjointed,
and improbable; and the people who make up the drama, which is tragic
enough in its consequences, are savages ruder than those who lived
before the days of Homer. With the exception of Heathcliff, the story
is confined to the family of Earnshaw, who intermarry with the Lintons;
and the scene of their exploits is a rude old-fashioned house, at the
top of one of the high moors or fells in the north of England. Whoever
has traversed the bleak heights of Hartside or
Cross Fell, on his road from Westmoreland to the dales of Yorkshire,
and
has been welcomed there by the winds and rain on a 'gusty day,' will
know
how to estimate the comforts of Wuthering Heights in wintry weather....
If this book be, as we apprehend it is, the first work
of the author, we hope that he will produce a second,–giving himself
more
time in its composition than in the present case, developing his
incidents
more carefully, eschewing exaggeration and obscurity, and looking
steadily
at human life, under all its moods, for those pictures of the passions
that
he may desire to sketch for our public benefit. It may be well also to
be
sparing of certain oaths and phrases, which do not materially
contribute
to any character, and are by no means to be reckoned among the
evidences
of a writer's genius. We detest the affectation and effeminate frippery
which
is but too frequent in the modern novel, and willingly trust ourselves
with
an author who goes at once fearlessly into the moors and desolate
places,
for his heroes; but we must at the same time stipulate with him that he
shall
not drag into light all that he discovers, of coarse and loathsome, in
his
wanderings, but simply so much good and ill as he may find necessary to
elucidate
his history–so much only as may be interwoven inextricably with the
persons
whom he professes to paint. It is the province of an artist to modify
and
in some cases refine what he beholds in the ordinary world. There never
was
a man whose daily life (that is to say, all his deeds and sayings,
entire
and without exception) constituted fit materials for a book of fiction.
Anonymous, Douglas Jerrold's Weekly
Newspaper, January 15, 1848
Wuthering Heights is a strange sort of
book,–baffling all regular criticism; yet, it is impossible to begin
and not finish it; and quite as impossible to lay it aside afterwards
and say nothing about
it. In the midst of the reader's perplexity the ideas predominant in
his
mind concerning this book are likely to be–brutal cruelty, and
semi-savage
love. What may be the moral which the author wishes the reader to
deduce
from his work, it is difficult to say; and we refrain from assigning
any,
because to speak honestly, we have discovered none but mere glimpses of
hidden
morals or secondary meanings. There seems to us great power in this
book
but a purposeless power, which we feel a great desire to see turned to
better
account. We are quite confident that the writer of Wuthering Heights
wants but the practised skill to make a great artist; perhaps, a great
dramatic
artist. His qualities are, at present, excessive; a far more promising
fault,
let it be remembered, than if they were deficient. He may tone down,
whereas
the weak and inefficient writer, however carefully he may write by rule
and
line, will never work up his productions to the point of beauty in art.
In
Wuthering Heights the reader is shocked, disgusted, almost sickened by
details
of cruelty, inhumanity, and the most diabolical hate and vengeance, and
anon
come passages of powerful testimony to the supreme power of love–even
over
demons in the human form. The women in the book are of a strange
fiendish-angelic
nature, tantalizing, and terrible, and the men are indescribable out of
the
book itself. Yet, towards the close of the story occurs the following
pretty, soft picture, which comes like the rainbow after a storm....
We strongly recommend all our readers who love novelty
to get this story, for we can promise them that they never have read
anything like it before. It is very puzzling and very interesting, and
if we had
space we would willingly devote a little more time to the analysis of
this
remarkable story, but we must leave it to our readers to decide what
sort
of book it is.
Anonymous, Atlas, January
22,1848
Wuthering Heights is a strange, inartistic story.
There are evidences in every chapter of a sort of rugged power–an
unconscious
strength–which the possessor seems never to think of turning to the
best
advantage. The general effect is inexpressibly painful. We know nothing
in
the whole range of our fictitious literature which presents such
shocking
pictures of the worst forms of humanity. Jane Eyre is a book
which
affects the reader to tears; it touches the most hidden sources of
emotion. Wuthering Heights casts a gloom over the mind not
easily
to be dispelled. it does not soften; it harasses, it extenterates....
There
are passages in it which remind us of the Nowlans of the late
John
Banim but of all pre-existent works the one which it most recalls to
our
memory is the History of Mathew Wald . It has not, however,
the unity and concentration of that fiction; but is a sprawling story,
carrying
us, with no mitigation of anguish, through two generations of
sufferers–though
one presiding evil genius sheds a grim shadow over the whole, and
imparts
a singleness of malignity to the somewhat disjointed tale. A more
natural
story we do not remember to have read. Inconceivable as are the
combinations
of human degradation which are here to be found moving within the
circle
of a few miles, the vraisemblance is so admirably preserved;
there
is so much truth in what we may call the costumery (not
applying the word in its narrow acceptation)–the general mounting of
the
entire piece–that we readily identify the scenes and personages of the
fiction;
and when we lay aside the book it is some time before we can persuade
ourselves
that we have held nothing more than imaginary intercourse with the
ideal
creations of the brain. The reality of unreality has never been so
aptly
illustrated as in the scenes of almost savage life which Ellis Bell has
brought
so vividly before us.
The book sadly wants relief. A few glimpses of sunshine
would have increased the reality of the picture and given strength
rather
than weakness to the whole. There is not in the entire dramatis
persona, a single character which is not utterly hateful or
thoroughly contemptible. If you do not detest the person, you despise
him; and if you do not despise him, you detest him with your whole
heart. Hindley, the brutal, degraded sot, strong in the desire to work
all mischief, but impotent in his degradation; Linton Heathcliff, the
miserable, drivelling coward, in whom we see selfishness in its most
abject form; and Heathcliff himself, the presiding evil genius of the
piece, the tyrant father of an imbecile son, a creature in whom
every evil passion seems to have reached a gigantic excess–form a group
of deformities such as we have rarely seen gathered together on the
same
canvas. The author seems to have designed to throw some redeeming
touches
into the character of the brutal Heathcliff, by portraying him as one
faithful
to the idol of his boyhood–loving to the very last–long, long after
death
had divided them, the unhappy girl who had cheered and brightened up
the
early days of his wretched life. Here is the touch of nature which
makes
the whole world kin–but it fails of the intended effect. There is a
selfishness–a
ferocity in the love of Heathcliff, which scarcely suffer it, in spite
of
its rugged constancy, to relieve the darker parts of his nature. Even
the
female characters excite something of loathing and much of contempt.
Beautiful
and loveable in their childhood, they all, to use a vulgar expression,
'turn
out badly.' Catherine the elder–wayward, impatient,
impulsive–sacrifices
herself and her lover to the pitiful ambition of becoming the wife of a
gentleman
of station. Hence her own misery–her early death–and something of the
brutal
wickedness of Heathcliff's character and conduct; though we cannot
persuade
ourselves that even a happy love would have tamed down the natural
ferocity
of the tiger. Catherine the younger is more sinned against than
sinning,
and in spite of her grave moral defects, we have some hope of her at
the
last....
...We are not quite sure that the next new novel will
not efface it, but Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights are
not things to be forgotten. The work of Currer Bell is a great
performance; that
of Ellis Bell is only a promise, but it is a colossal one.
This is a work of great ability, and contains many
chapters, to the production of which talent of no common order
has contributed. At the same time, the materials which the
author has placed at his own disposal have been but few. In
the resources of his own mind, and in his own manifestly vivid
perceptions of the peculiarities of character in short, in
his knowledge of human nature–has he found them all. An antiquated
farm-house, a neighbouring residence of a somewhat more pretending
description, together with their respective inmates, amounting
to some half a dozen souls in each, constitute the material
and the personal components of one of the most interesting stories we
have read for many a long day. The comfortable cheerfulness of the one
abode, and the cheerless discomfort of the other–the
latter being less the result of a cold and bleak situation,
old and damp rooms, and (if we may use the term) of a sort
of 'haunted house' appearance, than of the strange and mysterious
character of its inhabitants–the loves and marriages, separations
and hatreds, hopes and disappointments, of two or three generations
of the gentle occupants of the one establishment, and the ruder
tenants of the other, are brought before us at a moment with
a tenderness, at another with a fearfulness, which appeals to our
sympathies with the truest tones of the voice of nature; and it is
quite impossible to read the book–and this is no slight testimony to
the merits of a work of the kind–without feeling that,
if placed in the same position as any one of the characters
in any page of it, the chances would be twenty to one in favour
of our conduct in that position being precisely such as the
author has assigned to the personages he has introduced into
his domestic drama. But we must at once impose upon ourselves a
task–and we confess it is a hard one–we must abstain (from a regard to
the space at our disposal) from yielding to the temptation by which we
are beset to enter into that minute description of the plot of this
very dramatic production to which such a
work has an undoubted claim. It is not every day that so good
a novel makes its appearance; and to give its contents in detail
would be depriving many a reader of half the delight he would
experience from the perusal of the work itself. To its pages
we must refer him, then; there will he have ample opportunity
of sympathising,–if he has one touch of nature that 'makes
the whole world kin'–with the feelings of childhood, youth,
manhood, and age, and all the emotions and passions which agitate the
restless bosom of humanity. May he derive from it the delight we have
ourselves experienced, and be equally grateful to its
author for the genuine pleasure he has afforded him.
Brontë: Table of Contents
October 13, 2011
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