Wuthering Heights (Classic Library)

Published a year before her death, Emily Bronte's (1818-1848), Wuthering Heights, set in the yorkshire moors, is a story of exceptional emotional and imaginative force.Heathcliff, a stray of unknown parentage, is picked up by Mr Earnshaw from the streets of Liverpool and brought to the heights to be reared with his children. After Mr Earnshaw 's death, his son Hindley bullies and humiliates Heathcliff, who has found a soulmate in Catherine who shares with him his ferocious and passionate nature. Catherine's reluctance to marry him forces Heathcliff to leave the house and to return three years later, having mysteriously become quite rich. Heathcliff, however is set upon to destroy the familly. This he does, first by marrying Linton's (Catherine's husband) sister and cruely ill- treating her, then by betraying his ferocious passion for Catherine, who dies in the process of giving birth to a child, Cathy's father, Edgar, vainly tries to prevent. After Edgar's death, Heathcliff forces the marriage, but young Linton soon dies. Cathy is now an unwilling prisoner at the Heights, but she befriends Hareton. Hindley's son, whome she tries to educate. Heathcliff's passion for revenge has, however, burnt itself out, and all that he wants now is death, which will unite him with his first love, Catherine