English Department x IWS Collaboration: Support Group For Victims Of Emerald Fennell’s “‘Wuthering Heights’”

Last Friday, a new movie came to town. Not to Williamstown, but to most towns. And despite the age of the source material, yes, it is fair to call this movie “new.” After all, Emily Brontë called it Wuthering Heights, not “Wuthering Heights.”

We could write ten articles about this horrible excuse for an adaptation. We could write about the uninformed casting, the grotesque production design, or the screenplay that must have just said “CREATIVE LIBERTY” on every single page. We could complain to professors until they have to physically kick us out of their offices…and perhaps that is what inspired this latest campus collaboration. 

We attended the inaugural meeting of the “English x IWS ‘“Wuthering Heights”’ Support Group”  — purely for journalistic purposes…not because we needed emotional support….no….no other reason…definitely not so we could pay for dinner at the Barn and write it off in the name of important RSO business (who do you think we are, the debating union?). 

“She could have called it anything else,” said Reed Aloughtt ‘26. “She could have come up with a fake Victorian romance movie and left Emily Brontë alone. How many times do you think she’s turned in her grave?”

“Do you want to go dig it up and check?” said Gull A. Bull ‘28. There was nary a jovial expression on their face.

“Umm, it was a joke?”

“I don’t think of Wuthering Heights as a joke,” said Bull.

“Neither do I. I think of ‘“Wuthering Heights”’ as a joke.”

“So you’re saying that you,” Bull said slowly, “and I quote, ‘think of Wuthering Heights as a joke?”

“Did you even hear me? I said that I ‘think of “‘“Wuthering Heights”’” as a joke.’”

We at the Haybale finally had enough and removed ourselves from the situation. Clearly, there wasn’t anything left for us to share. Wiped: emotionally, mentally, figuratively. Tired from horrible support; tired from our consumption of this horrible media. Perhaps, like our woman of honor, Emily Brontë, we too will die from our own consumption.