Emily+Brontë

Born on July 30, 1818 at 74 Market Street, Thornton, Bradford, Yorkshire, England, Emily Jane Brontë was the fourth daughter and fifth child born to the Brontë family (Merriman). Her father, Reverend Patrick Brontë moved from Ireland to Weatherfield, in Essex, to teach Sunday school (Liukkonen). Eventually, he met and married Maria Branwell of Penzance in 1812. After a couple of years, they started their family, having six children, one nearly every year: Maria (1814-1825), Elizabeth (1815-1825), Charlotte (1816-1855), Patrick aka “Branwell” (1817-1848), Emily (1818-1848), and Anne (1820-1849). The same year that Anne was born, the family moved to Haworth where Reverend Brontë would serve as a rector and chairman of the parish committee. A year later, Maria Branwell was diagnosed with cancer and died shortly thereafter on September 15, 1820, when Emily was only three. Not long after, their Aunt Elizabeth Branwell moved in with them to aid in keeping the house.
 * Personal Life & Education: **

In 1824, Emily and her older sisters were sent to attend boarding school at the Clergy Daughter’s School at Cowan Bridge. The girls only remained at the school for six months (November 25, 1824 - June 1, 1825) as they suffered from a harsh regime, the cold, and poor food quality (Haworth Village). Unfortunately during this time, both Maria and Elizabeth fell ill and soon died from tuberculosis.

After the deaths of their sisters, Charlotte and Emily returned home to their father who spent most of his time alone, working in his study. His love for poetry was well known, as he had several books of prose and verse published; he also spent time writing to local newspapers. Since their father was preoccupied most of the time, the children were often left to their own devices and they soon discovered writing as a creative outlet. The first major project that the children began working on was the creation of their imaginary world called “Angria”. However, Charlotte and Branwell pretty much controlled this project, leaving Emily and Anne with little say. Eventually Emily and Anne created a rival world to “Angria” known as “Gondal”. The children spent a large portion of time penning histories for their kingdoms and developing characters to populate them. Emily and Anne continued writing stories and poems about “Gondal” into the 1840’s; unfortunately few of these stories survived (Haworth Village).

In July 1835, Emily enrolled at Miss Wooler’s School at Roe Head, where Charlotte was teaching at the time (Merriman). However, she became homesick and then quickly fell ill. She returned home, ending her enrollment after just three months. She remained at home for another three years before taking up service as a governess at Law Hill Hall in Halifax, West Yorkshire. She continued working there until 1842 when she left to travel with Charlotte and Anne to Brussels, Belgium where they began studying French, German and literature under the tutelage of Constantin Heger at the Pensionnat Heger. They immersed themselves in their studies in the hopes that they would be able to open their own school someday. Emily returned home from Brussels when her Aunt Branwell passed away. She remained at Haworth with her father in order to help him maintain the household. In 1845, Charlotte and Anne returned home after giving up on their dream of opening a school.


 * Literary Works: **

In September 1845, Charlotte discovered Emily’s poems and convinced her to contribute to the sisters' collaborated book of poetry. The book was published in May 1846 under the pseudonyms Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (Thormahlen), with Emily contributing twenty-one poems such as "No Coward Soul is Mine", and "The Night is Darkening round Me".Only two copies of the book were sold, but this didn’t discourage Emily from writing, as she began working on Wuthering Heights, which was published a year later in December 1847 by Thomas Cautley Newby, that would not become popular until after her death in 1848.

 //Inside cover page of the first volume of the Wuthering Heights in 1847. (Image provided through Wikimedia Commons and added by User ElinorD)//


 * Death & Acknowledgements: **

Around this time the Brontë family was having difficulty as Branwell became addicted to alcohol and opium, and they had to spend time dealing with his depression and mad ravings (Merriman). He died in November 1848, and it was at his funeral that Emily caught a terrible cold. As she fell into poor health, she began having difficulty breathing and chest pains. She died shortly after from tuberculosis on December 19, 1848 in the afternoon at 2:00pm (Haworth Village), being put to rest in the Church of Saint Michael and All Angels in Haworth, West Yorkshire, England with the rest of her family. (Merriman) A few years later, in December 1850, a new addition of Wuthering Heights was published with a selection of poems and a preface written by Charlotte. -- PNW, UVIC ENGL 386/Spring 2016


 * Works Cited: **

“Brontë, Emily Jane (1818-1848)”. [] (Accessed January 20, 2016).

Haworth Village. “Biography – Emily Brontë.” [|www.haworth-village.org.uk/brontes/emily/emily.asp] (accessed March 11, 2012).

McGinnis, Robert. Wuthering Heights. 1926. []. (Accessed January 20, 2016).

Merriman, C.D. “Emily Brontë.” [|www.online-literature.com/bronte/] (accessed March 11, 2012).

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 130%;">Thormahlen, Marianne. "The Brontë Pseudonyms: A Woman's Image - The Writer and Her Public". [] (Accessed January 20, 2016).

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 130%;">For further information on Emily Bronte, see Philip V. Allingham, “Emily Brontë: Poet and Novelist (1818-48).” [|www.victorianweb.org/authors/bronte/ebronte/bio.html] (accessed March 12, 2012).