Emily Brontë - The Strange One - Biographical Documentary

Emily Brontë is the least well known of the Brontë sisters. She died at the age of 30, having published one major work – Wuthering Heights - a strange, rambling gothic masterpiece that puzzled and dismayed critics at the time, who were troubled by its moral ambiguity.
Like her novel, Emily was also regarded as strange - solitary, uncompromising, uninterested in small talk or social conventions and either painfully shy or bluntly antisocial.
In this video I draw upon my 30 years' experience in psychiatry to explore the life and inner world of Emily Brontë trying to work out whether her strangeness was just the eccentricity of creative genius or something else – an autistic spectrum disorder perhaps.

Discovering more for yourself

Copyright Disclaimer
The primary purpose of this video is educational. I have tried to use material in the public domain or with Creative Commons Non-attribution licences wherever possible. Where attribution is required, I have listed this below. I believe that any copyright material used falls under the remit of Fair Use, but if any content owners would like to dispute this, I will not hesitate to immediately remove that content. It is not my intention to infringe on content ownership in any way. If you happen to find your art or images in the video, please let me know and I will be glad to credit you.

References
Fuentenebro de Diego, F., and Valiente Ots, C. (2014). Nostalgia: a conceptual history. History of Psychiatry, 25(4), 404-411.
Giordano, G. (2020). The contribution of Freud’s theories to the literary analysis of two Victorian novels: Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre. International Journal of English and Literature, 11(2), 29-34.
Girçek, N. (2010) Narcissistic Personality Disorders in the Nineteenth-Century English Novel. Istanbul University Thesis. MA Thesis, Dalhousie University
Hasan, G. (2018). Defence Mechanism of the Main Characters In “Wuthering Heights” By Emily Brontë: Psychological Approach. Holistics, 10(20).
Hirtle, K. (2011). Uncanny or Marvelous?: The Fantastic and Somatoform Disorders in Wuthering Heights and Villette.
Hope, E. (1886) Queens of Literature of the Victorian Era. Walter Scott, London.
Kanner, L. (1943) Autistic disturbances of affective contact. Nervous Child, 2(3), 217-250.
Levy, E. P. (1996). The Psychology of Loneliness in" Wuthering Heights". Studies in the Novel, 28(2), 158-177.
Stoneman, P. (1992). Feminist criticism of "Wuthering Heights". Critical Survey, 147-153.

Images
Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons
Wellcome Foundation
British Library
The Brontë Museum
The Brussels Brontë Group
Other images and video samples Fair Use

Music via Wikimedia Commons
Decline by Kevin MacLeod CC4.0
Argonne by Zachariah Hickman CC0
No.4 Piano Journey Esther Abrami CC0

Video produced by Graeme Yorston and Ewelina De Leon

[professorgraemeyorston]

There is a huge amount of information on the Brontës but less on the elusive Emily. Many of the biographies about her are out of print, but Romer Wilson’s Life and Private History of Emily is well worth a read.

[BigDog]

Listening to this as a 60-something woman without a single friend, but with almost two dozen published novels set in a world rich with life and love and intense friendship, I think you've got Emily Bronte spot on. I wrote my thesis on her in university, so she's always been a favourite of mine. Even as a child, my inner life was richer than my real one. Real people always seem to disappoint me. My characters never do.

[martahernandez]

Emily understood people better than the average person. Her portrayal of the tortured characters in Wuthering Heights is brilliant. Only a highly sensitive and observant person of the human condition could write as analytically as she did with an abundance of depth and melancholy.

[julieolson]

As a severely abused young child, I could relate to "Wuthering Heights" very well. It was always presented as a love story, but the novel was much more about hate. A hate so large and consuming as to not be of this world. Yet, Heathcliff survives it. He survives, but he doesn't live. I think some people are much more aware of the the spiritual realities of existence than others, and it makes them open to labels of mental illness.

[pennydreadful]

I do not think she is the least well known of the Bronte sisters, I think Anne is. Emily's book is in my opinion the greatest Bronte novel

[devikakaul]

Emily Bronte is my favourite writer. I think one of the reasons I loved Wuthering heights was because the sheer wild nature of her characters made me realise that I understood her. I always regarded her characters as a correct description of my spirit and soul. It is interesting to know that Emily Bronte had a shy nature and social anxiety. I have the same inability to mix with people. I prefer Nature and my animals to human company.

[ronilev]

As a lifelong Bronte enthusiast I think this interpretation of Emily makes a lot of sense and in no way detracts from the greatness of her achievement.

[janesgems]

Emily wrote a book that was way ahead of its time, dealing with such topics as racism, the brutality of the class system and also how a lifetime of abuse can damage a person...to say nothing of the destructive power of hate and revenge. Incredible piece of work.

[gulandamfarhat]

I am so fascinated with Emily's character. She was so truly unique. Her only novel "The Wuthering Hieghts" is my huge favourite. Her life history saddens me so much and I cannot help wondering and thinking what a flowering and flourishing genius she might have proven to be had she been allowed to live a full life. My heart goes out to the Bronte sisters and Emily is my favourite among them. She was truly a one of a kind. May she always rest in peace. If I ever pay a visit to the UK, I would love to visit the Bronte museum.

[Kimonwatersedge]

hi. your description of Emily was so uncanny. you could have been describing me! I am 64 yr old female and just been diagnosed with ASD. I can totally relate. Can do a great job if left alone to quietly do it but don’t ask what I did at the weekend…. or to go out socialising. Also home sickness for me was/is real thing even starting primary school I was 4 1/2 and the school told my mother to take me home until I was 5 as the crying and wanting to go home disrupted the class too much. Home is a safe place. I have no friends, loathe any visitors coming unannounced to my home and to this day prefer animals and the elements to people. Having masked all my life to fit in I take my hat off to Emily Brontë for living her authentic self when allowed to.
great video. thank you for sharing. regards.

I think that she was sensitive from the beginning, and going to such harsh and abusive places as those schools made her retreat. It's possible that not only weakened her health (as it happened with the other sisters) but also broke her emotionally. Bullying and abuse can leave deep incurable scars and in a world where this is not recognised as an issue... well, the chances to heal are close to none. Plus they were very isolated, so all she knew was either horrible schools or her home. I don't think she was in the spectrum and this was inevitable. She could have been different if circumstances have been different. Still shy & gentle, but possibly more sociable and easy.

[melenatorr]

Almost immediately, I would say that Anne is far less well-known and read than Emily. In fact, until fairly recently, Anne was almost an afterthought of the three sisters, her writing under-appreciated; her character misunderstood as weak; her style disregarded as stilted and pale compared to her sisters'.

Maria and Elizabeth Bronte first attended Crofton school, but it was too expensive, which was why they were registered at Cowan Bridge in 1824. Charlotte and Emily both joined two months later, not years. All four were at the school for less than a year. Also, I should say that Aunt Branwell had paid several long visits to the family helping out with the growing number of children and that she was at Haworth when her sister died. She stayed on at Haworth for the rest of her life, and if she complained about the weather, she was also a conscientious guardian for her sister's children. Her reputation has suffered. No one is perfect, but the unwholesomeness of her religious outlook has been greatly exaggerated and we should remember that she financed Charlotte and Emily's education in Brussels.

I would add, in addition, that "Wuthering Heights" is not a rambling novel, but is very carefully structured in what's been called "Chinese Box" fashion: we approach the story and characters through a double veil of narration given to us by Nelly and Lockwood. We never meet Heathcliff or Cathy on their own terms but always through the words and perspective of people not equipped to understand them. For me, this is an invitation and a challenge from Emily to her readers.

[AnnaLee]

You don't have to be "on the spectrum" of a mental disorder, to be completely annoyed by shallow conversation, "small talk" or idle chatter. That's normal for highly intelligent people, or for highly sensitive people. Intelligence or sensitivity are not illnesses and disorders, the are SUPER POWERS. But we need to flock with birds of a feather, or we all end up frustrated and exhausted.

[MJ-tgwv]

Interesting that I should stumble upon this, just as I am rereading this novel. I read it in my teens and enjoyed, a dramatic and well written novel. Reading it now, in my sixties, and I am struck by its brutality, and graphic descriptions of cruelty and its impact. Amazingly perceptive.

[maxalberts]

A close reading of WUTHERING HEIGHTS reveals what modern psychologists would describe as a "chaotic and enmeshed" family system. The brilliant novel could almost read as a therapist's notes about a dysfunctional clan, each member with his or her own emotionally paralyzed stake in the game, with no one willing to let go and bring the facade down around everyone's ears.

[everybodyyogastudio]

Despite the sadness, i really love this story. This was a strong family that really loved eachother. Such a modern family too! These women lived how they wanted and seem more free then the average person was. Wow, thank you!

[gretchenzwicker]

Very interesting..in my experience, people who are true artists, are different..how could she write a book like Wuthering Heights and not know relationships or understand them? She was a blessed soul. Truly gifted. It was such a different world then, a time when life was hard but simple..sensitivity and imagination were more acute..I’m glad I found your Channel😊

[cinemaocd]

My son has ASD and watching him go through his teen years has definitely reminded more than once of the over the top characters in Wuthering Heights. For example, Heathcliff's reaction to Cathy's death where he smashes his face into a tree stump, I've seen something like that in two contexts: extreme grief of a friend when he found out his father was dead and an autistic tantrum. My son still plays with lego figures, making elaborate worlds and stories for them, well past the age that it is considered "normal." When he gets really stressed sometimes I hear him swishing through his lego bins to calm himself. I can't help but think of Emily at 20 still playing pretend with her sister at an outing to York. If she was ASD going to York might have been very stressful/overstimulating and needing to relax and play pretend might have helped her cope...

[sashadence]

I find it odd that a psychiatrist wouldn't have paid more attention to the fact that the Bronte sisters lost their mother so young. While this might not have had anything to do with her insularity or willfulness it surely affected the children powerfully. Plus the fact that the four younger children spent so much time alone (b/c Haworth was isolated) and hours upon hours in their fantasy worlds. While Charlotte and Anne were clearly somewhat more sociable they were hardly extroverts. Moreover, the Yorkshire temperament in general is famed for being unsociable. I think another compelling explanation for Emily's insularity is her strong ties to an unconventional set of beliefs in the spiritual world which was both based in a strong faith and also departed from a rigid adherence to religion. her novel, divided as it seems to be in two complementary parts, reads in many ways like an OT and NT version of that faith. The OT, or narrative describes I think very accurately the Paradise Lost like character of a broken love/jealousy/sibling rivalry and primitive passions of motherless children (Heathcliff's a vagrant child). The New Testament version with the next generation of Hareton and the young Cathy describes the power of forgiveness to undo much of that harm. Given the family's rootedness in their faith, Emily's strong understanding of what it actually means rather than the conventional pious sermons of the time is compelling and is psychologically arresting even for people who have no religious background but perhaps intuitively understand both Biblical truth and human nature. Her novel reads like a greek tragedy. It posesses that kind of primal awareness of what it is to be human and the more-than-human. For me, to splice her into the big blue book is kind of reductive. Seems to me psychologists/psychiatrists these days are more into fitting people into these diagnoses than they are into the power of the unconscious but I guess this is understandable given that since there are serious disorders that if diagnosed, can, to some degree anyway, be treated. By any measure, as Charlotte wrote, "stronger than a man, simpler than a child, her nature stood alone." I think she understood her best.

[ceilconstante]

Being on the spectrum myself, I completely understand where Emily was coming from. I don't like Nicey-nice small talk. I'd definitely rather walk in nature or explore a topic of interest. We also have a lot going on in our minds to explore and definitely live in our own world. Most comfortable companionship is with family but a lot of alone quiet time is mandatory. Also, I prefer my simple way of unfussy dressing and don't care what others think.
I did extremely well with a long career in massage. I understand at a more profound level what needs to be done and why. I feel very deeply and cared about doing my very best for each and every client. I'd chat and listen before a session and remained quiet during. I could sense if someone's mind was active and would apply techniques to help still their minds. People came back!
I highly recommend watching a YT video of what it's like for an autistic person walking down the street vs a neurotypical person. Things most people don't even notice like a faint clock ticking can be maddening. Florescent lights exhaust me. I sense the perpetual flickering, they make noise and are to bright. Loud and abrasive people are also exhausting. I have to agree it's Neuro diversity. Everyone thinks and experiences the world differently. We're all cut out to do different types of careers.