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Emily Brontë Quotes

1818–1848 England

Emily Jane Brontë (30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English novelist and poet who was the sister of Charlotte and Anne Brontë, known as the Brontë sisters. Her only novel, Wuthering Heights, was first published under the pseudonym Ellis Bell.

England
Authors
Novelists
Poets

Also known as: Brontë, Emily, Emily Bronte, Currer Bell, Ellis Bell

Random Emily Brontë quote

26 quotes

Love is like the wild rose-briar;
Friendship like the holly-tree.
The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms,
But which will bloom most constantly?

For that mist may break when the sun is high
And this soul forget its sorrow
And the rose ray of the closing day
May promise a brighter morrow.

I've dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they've gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind.

Yes, as my swift days near their goal
'Tis all that I implore
In life and death a chainless soul
With courage to endure.

I’ll walk where my own nature would be leading:
It vexes me to choose another guide.

But, child of dust, the fragrant flowers,
The bright blue flowers and velvet sod,
Were strange conductors to the bowers
Thy daring footsteps must have trod.

Should there be danger of such an event — should he be the cause of adding a single more trouble to her existence — Why, I think, I shall be justified in going to extremes!

Wuthering Heights (1847)

What use is it to slumber here:
Though the heart be sad and weary?
What use is it to slumber here
Though the day rise dark and dreary?

Still, as I mused, the naked room,
The alien firelight died away;
And from the midst of cheerless gloom
I passed to bright, unclouded day.

I am the only being whose doom
No tongue would ask, no eye would mourn;
I never caused a thought of gloom
A smile of joy since I was born
In secret pleasure — secret tears
This changeful life has slipped away
As friendless after eighteen years
As lone as on my natal day.

A heaven so clear, an earth so calm,
So sweet, so soft, so hushed an air;
And, deepening still the dreamlike charm,
Wild moor-sheep feeding everywhere.

Cold in the earth—and fifteen wild Decembers,
From those brown hills, have melted into spring:
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers
After such years of change and suffering!

He comes with western winds, with evening's wandering airs,
With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars;
Winds take a pensive tone and stars a tender fire
And visions rise and change which kills me with desire.

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,
While the world's tide is bearing me along;
Other desires and other hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!

Cold in the earth—and the deep snow piled above thee,
Far, far, removed, cold in the dreary grave!
Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,
Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?

Shall Earth no more inspire thee,
Thou lonely dreamer now?
Since passion may not fire thee
Shall Nature cease to bow?
Thy mind is ever moving
In regions dark to thee;
Recall its useless roving —
Come back and dwell with me —

But when the days of golden dreams had perished,
And even Despair was powerless to destroy;
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,
Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy.

The night is darkening round me,
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me
And I cannot, cannot go.
The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow,
And the storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.
Clouds beyond clouds above me,
Wastes beyond wastes below;
But nothing drear can move me—
I will not, cannot go.

I've watched thee every hour —
I know my mighty sway —
I know my magic power
To drive thy griefs away —

When weary with the long day's care,
And earthly change from pain to pain,
And lost and ready to despair,
Thy kind voice calls me back again:
Oh, my true friend! I am not lone,
While thou canst speak with such a tone!

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Emily Brontë (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.