Emily Brontë

Life & Legacy

Emily Jane Brontë (, commonly ; 30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English writer best known for her 1847 novel Wuthering Heights. She also co-authored a book of poetry with her sisters Charlotte and Anne entitled Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell.
Emily was the fifth of six Brontë siblings, four of whom survived into adulthood. Her mother, Maria Branwell, died when she was three, leaving the children in the care of their aunt, Elizabeth Branwell. Apart from brief intervals at school, Emily was mostly taught at home by her father, Patrick Brontë, who was the curate of Haworth. She was very close to her siblings, especially her younger sister Anne, and together they wrote books and journals depicting imaginary worlds named Glass Town, Angria and Gondal. She was described by her sister Charlotte as solitary, strong-willed and nonconforming, with a keen love of nature and animals.
Apart from a brief period at school, and another as a student and teacher in Brussels with her sister Charlotte, Emily spent most of her life at home in Haworth, helping the family servant with chores, playing the piano and teaching herself from books.
Her work was originally published under the pen name Ellis Bell. It was not generally admired at the time, and many critics felt that the characters in Wuthering Heights were coarse and immoral. In spite of this, the novel is considered a classic of English literature. Emily Brontë died in 1848, aged 30, a year after the novel's publication.