Sunday Scribblings - 3/14/10

The book that changed everything

In my junior year of high school, I took a class on British Literature so I could have my English class for the year.  I was expecting to read long, boring stories full of uptight, aristocratic ladies and gentlemen who sat around drinking tea and gossiping about who proposed marriage to whom and going fox hunting.  That's what I was expecting, but not what I found.

What I found was the first novel we read, Wuthering Heights.

Now here's a story!  Yes, there's romance, but there's also harsh, unforgiving environments and people who are unrefined, passionate and even violent.  Wuthering Heights isn't boring at all, and I really enjoyed it.  It was that book that taught me that old literature doesn't have to be sleep-inducing.  It's still one of my favorite novels.

I'm really glad that my class didn't start out with Emily Bronte's sister's novel Jane Eyre.  That one I'm not such a fan of, although it does have its moments.