The Complete Novels of Charlotte & Emily Brontë

I knew nothing about it going in and assumed I was in for a sort of [b:Pride & Prejudice|1885|Pride and Prejudice|Jane Austen|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1320399351s/1885.jpg|3060926] rom-com... “Heathcliff” sounded like the name you’d give a sort of romance novel cover guy.

Nope nope nope. Imagine Hannibal Lecter directing the cast of Rocky Horror Picture Show to turn the camp down to 2 and do the play in the style of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf... at gunpoint.

“Cut!” Lecter slams his cognac down on the table in front of him, almost hard enough to shatter the glass. “Heathcliff, Martha, relax. You're almost there: a soupçon more Übermensch and less verklempt, capiche?” Heathcliff and Martha stand completely still, silent, staring at Lecter’s casually rocking pistol with wide eyes. “Riff Raff! What did I tell you: this scene needs more dead puppies. More! Dead! Puppies!” Riff Raff hurriedly limps off to the puppy vat, stage right.

Normally I reserve a one star rating for books that I gave up on. Books I couldn't finish. This is the exception to the rule. I did manage to finish it, but it was a mighty struggle. The only reason I did finish it was because I wanted to see if Heathcliff died horribly like I wanted him to since very near the beginning.

I cannot for the life of me understand why people consider this 'romance.' There's nothing romantic about any of this. None of these characters actually really love each other, save perhaps Hindley and his wife and she was a minor character who was killed off very quickly.

Heathcliff is considered the great romantic hero, who loves so passionately it still controls his actions decades after Catherine has died.

Except... I never saw even the slightest hint of this in the copy that I read, so I don't know if I've been given one that was different from everybody elses. What I saw was an abusive psychopath with a stalker's obsession and no regard for the consequences of his actions or other people's feelings or well-being. Through his actions, Heathcliff killed just about everybody who died in this book.

I found his supposed change of heart near the end, the 'oh I don't care about that anymore, it's no longer important to me', very unbelievable, because it happens so suddenly and with no explanation or trigger whatsoever and causes him to eventually just lay down and die. There's no remorse in it at all, mind. He just stops caring. Took him long enough! But seriously, the man just laid down and died. What really offends me was that he died happy.

It strikes me that perhaps Brontë realised she might have gone a little bit too far with her endeavours to make Heathcliff as unpleasant as possible and chose to attempt to salvage it this way rather than bothering with a complete rewrite.

This story, even with the same general plot, could have been greatly improved if there were some redeeming qualities about the characters, but there aren't. Not one. Not any of them. None of them care about anybody but themselves.

I can't remember the last time I read a book where I actively hated every single character in it.