Author Guide · Lisanne Swart

Books Written by Emily Brontë (In Order)

Emily Brontë published exactly one novel in her lifetime, and it happens to be one of the most read books in the English language. What surprises most people is how small her actual output was: one shared poetry collection, one novel, and a much larger body of poems that only became public after her death. This page covers all three, in the order they came into the world, with what each one actually is and isn’t.

By Lisanne Swart · 3 books · 1846–1941 · Updated August 2026

Why trust this list: Every detail below is checked against publication record rather than assumed from memory. Curated by Lisanne Swart, who reads and writes about each subject individually rather than generating lists algorithmically.

The short answer

She wrote one novel, not several

Wuthering Heights (1847) is her only novel. There is no second Emily Brontë novel, published or lost — despite what some fan theories claim.

Most of her poetry was published after she died

She wrote almost 200 poems, but only shared 21 of them publicly during her lifetime, as Ellis Bell.

01
1846

Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton BellJoint collection

Emily, Charlotte, and Anne Brontë self-published this shared volume of verse in May 1846, paying roughly £50 out of their own pocket. Emily contributed 21 poems under the name Ellis Bell. Only two copies sold, but the few reviewers who noticed it — including one in The Athenæum — singled out Ellis’s poems as the strongest in the book, praising a “fine, quaint spirit” years before anyone knew Ellis was a woman. You can find modern editions that pair this collection with Wuthering Heights, such as this one from bol.com or Bookshop.org.

02
1847

Wuthering HeightsHer only novel

Brontë began Wuthering Heights in 1845 and spent more than a year trying to find a publisher before it appeared in December 1847, again as Ellis Bell. Set on the Yorkshire moors, it follows Heathcliff, a foundling raised by the Earnshaw family, and the destructive, generation-spanning revenge he takes after losing Catherine Earnshaw to a more respectable marriage. Early reviewers were largely baffled or repelled by its brutality; it took decades, and Charlotte’s 1850 posthumous edition crediting Emily by name, for the novel to be read as the singular work it’s now considered. It remains in print in dozens of editions — you can find current ones through Waterstones, amazon.nl, or as an audiobook via Audible.nl.

03
1941

The Complete Poems of Emily Jane BröntePosthumous, ed. C.W. Hatfield

Brontë wrote close to 200 poems in her lifetime, most of them tied to Gondal, an imaginary world she and Anne invented as children and kept writing about into adulthood; almost none of the Gondal prose survived, but many of the poems did. Charlotte’s heavy-handed 1850 revisions of Emily’s unpublished poems delayed an accurate edition for decades, and it wasn’t until 1941 that scholar C.W. Hatfield assembled and restored the full body of work from surviving manuscripts, which had been scattered after being sold off in 1895. It’s the closest thing that exists to Emily Brontë’s complete poetic output, and the edition most literary scholars cite today — used and out-of-print copies turn up occasionally via Bookshop.org.

Frequently asked questions about Emily Brontë’s books

How many books did Emily Brontë write?
Emily Brontë published one novel, Wuthering Heights (1847), and contributed 21 poems to a shared collection, Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (1846), with her sisters Charlotte and Anne. A much larger collection of her poetry, nearly 200 poems, was assembled and published posthumously in 1941.
Did Emily Brontë write a second novel?
No. Despite persistent rumors and fan speculation over the years, there is no evidence Emily Brontë wrote, started, or lost a second novel. Wuthering Heights remains her only known work of fiction.
What pen name did Emily Brontë use?
Emily published as Ellis Bell, a name chosen to be ambiguous about gender rather than explicitly male, alongside her sisters Charlotte (Currer Bell) and Anne (Acton Bell). Her real identity as Ellis Bell wasn’t confirmed publicly until after her death in 1848.
What order should I read Emily Brontë’s work in?
Chronologically: start with the 1846 Poems collection for a sense of her early voice, then Wuthering Heights (1847), and finish with The Complete Poems of Emily Jane Brontë (1941) for the poetry she never got to share publicly during her lifetime.
Is Wuthering Heights based on a true story?
No confirmed real-life romance inspired it. Some biographers have speculated about a local curate, but Brontë scholars generally treat this as fictionalized biography rather than documented fact, and by all contemporary accounts she never had a known romantic relationship.
When did Emily Brontë write Wuthering Heights?
Emily Brontë wrote Wuthering Heights between 1845 and 1846, working on it alongside her sisters’ novels. It was published in December 1847, when she was 29.
How old was Emily Brontë when she wrote Wuthering Heights?
Emily Brontë was around 27 when she began writing Wuthering Heights in 1845, and 29 when it was published in December 1847. She died just over a year later, at 30.
Why did Emily Brontë only write one novel?
She died of tuberculosis in December 1848, roughly a year after Wuthering Heights was published, so she simply ran out of time rather than choosing to stop. There’s no evidence she abandoned or set aside a second novel.
How many poems did Emily Brontë write?
Emily Brontë wrote close to 200 poems in her lifetime, most tied to Gondal, an imaginary world she invented with her sister Anne. She shared only 21 of them publicly, in the 1846 Poems collection; the rest were assembled and published posthumously in 1941.
How did Emily Brontë die?
Emily Brontë died of tuberculosis on December 19, 1848, at her family’s home in Haworth, Yorkshire, roughly a year after Wuthering Heights was published. She was 30.
Who is Emily Brontë?
Emily Brontë (1818–1848) was an English novelist and poet, one of three literary Brontë sisters. She is best known for her only novel, Wuthering Heights, published in 1847 under the pen name Ellis Bell.
Are Emily and Charlotte Brontë related?
Yes, Emily and Charlotte Brontë were sisters. Charlotte, the author of Jane Eyre, was two years older than Emily; their younger sister Anne also published as a novelist, and all three initially wrote under male-sounding pen names: Currer (Charlotte), Ellis (Emily), and Acton (Anne) Bell.
Where was Emily Brontë born, and where did she live?
Emily Brontë was born on July 30, 1818, in Thornton, Yorkshire. In 1820 her family moved to the parsonage in Haworth, on the edge of the Yorkshire moors, where she lived for most of her life and where she died in 1848.
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