Wuthering Heights: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, Criticism (Norton Critical Edition) [Paperback]

Emily Bronte (Author), William M. Sale (Editor), Richard J. Dunn (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0393957608 | ISBN-13: 978-0393957600 | Publication Date: April 1990 | Edition: 3rd

The text used in this edition is a collation of both the 1847 and 1850 editions of the novel. This book also includes the 17 poems by Charlotte Bronte which Emily selected for the 1850 edition to introduce her sister to the public as a poet. Also included are selections from Emily's diary and some contemporary reviews of the novel. Five critical essays appear: two pieces by A.Stuart Daley examine the significance of nature and chronology in the novel, and Carol Jacobs, Nancy Armstrong and J.Hillis Miller examine the problems of genre and critical reputation which continue to surround this novel.

Product Details

• Paperback: 396 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 3rd edition (April 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393957608
• ISBN-13: 978-0393957600
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 4.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #850,345 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A timeless story of love, June 24, 2000

By 

C. M. Chen (CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Wuthering Heights: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, Criticism (Norton Critical Edition) (Paperback)

Wuthering Heights is the dramatic tale of an otherworldly love that can find no place in proper British society. Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff are both children of Nature who revel in their own brand of freedom on the Moors. Society intervenes in the form of the Lintons who embody all that is proper and whose allure, in the form of material wealth, is too tempting for Catherine to resist.

This is a novel about trying to strike a balance. Heathcliff and Catherine find that their love cannot survive in a world that is dictated by rules and which would have them repress their passionate natures. Catherine seeks a union with society but can never be completely happy with Edgar because Heathcliff is her other half, not just her soulmate.

There were moments in this novel where I felt Heathcliff was unnecessarily cruel, but keeping in mind the ambiguity of his origins, I also found it impossible not to sympathize with him. I also felt that it was, perhaps, his inability to let go of Catherine that made it even harder for them both to forge separate existences for themselves with their respective Linton spouses.

Heathcliff's tenacious resentment does not limit itself to Edgar and Isabella. Indeed, his bitter resentment of the Lintons extends to the next generation as they are left to pick up the pieces of two shattered families and to begin again with the promise of a far more moderate and circumspect union between the Earnshaws and the Lintons.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars not quite the 1847 text (and the 4th muddles that further)., May 12, 2003

By 

Jordi Vilalta Lopez (Barcelona (Spain)) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Wuthering Heights: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, Criticism (Norton Critical Edition) (Paperback)

OK, it's still one of the best editions available (the 3rd edition, I mean), especially if you don't need non-dialectal notes (there are almost none). A very useful selection of early critical reviews, an intelligent anthology of Emily's verse (and that's very important), and a good selection of good, modern critical essays. Who may want more?
I, for one, want notes.

As far as the text itself is concerned, it WAS a rather good edition that looks very much as if one takes the second, Charlotte's 1850 "improved" edition and drops it into a 1847 paragraphing and -to a certain extent- punctuation mould. It's not at all -as one reviewer says- Emily's words, but these with almost one third of Charlotte's ones and other "improvements", as is clearly stated in the Textual Commentary by Sale Jr. So far, this is not a big problem in itself, although we get 'door' instead of 'floor' at the beginning of Chapter 2.

Fourth edition comes with an improved anthology of reviews and of Emily's poetry, and much improved notes (although still on the scarce side), including full and right glosses of the dialect tirades. The text -claims let aside- is the same of the 3rd ed (eclectic, as scholars say) slightly improved as far as punctuation goes, but the Textual Commentary has by now disappeared, and that's a pity. Perhaps it doesn't matter that much, but it isn't -as wrongly stated- the 1847 text.

4.0 out of 5 stars " Wuthering Heights " was a depiction of Bronte's life., December 12, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Wuthering Heights: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, Criticism (Norton Critical Edition) (Paperback)

I have recently done a research project on Emily Bronte; the time period, and her life in conjunction with the novel Wuthering Heights. I view Wuthering Heights as a wonderful publication, though not conforming to the Victorian literature of the time. Emily Bronte's characters, Heathcliff, and Catherine Earnshaw were both cold-shouldered to the rest of the world. The selfish nature of the both, made it impossible for love and true happiness to be found.