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Windward Heights
The renowned Caribbean novelist puts a new spin on Emily Bronte+a5's Wuthering Heights, resetting the story in Cuba with Creole characters.
348 pages, Hardcover
First published August 1, 1999
41 people are currently reading
1716 people want to read
About the author
Maryse Condé
100 books902 followersMaryse Condé was a Guadeloupean, French language author of historical fiction, best known for her novel Segu. Maryse Condé was born as Maryse Boucolon at Pointe-à-Pitre, Guadeloupe, the youngest of eight children. In 1953, her parents sent her to study at Lycée Fénelon and Sorbonne in Paris, where she majored in English. In 1959, she married Mamadou Condé, an Guinean actor. After graduating, she taught in Guinea, Ghana, and Senegal. In 1981, she divorced, but the following year married Richard Philcox, English language translator of most of her novels.
Condé's novels explore racial, gender, and cultural issues in a variety of historical eras and locales, including the Salem witch trials in I, Tituba: Black Witch of Salem and the 19th century Bambara Empire of Mali in Segu.
In addition to her writings, Condé had a distinguished academic career. In 2004 she retired from Columbia University as Professor Emeritus of French. She had previously taught at the University of California, Berkeley, UCLA, the Sorbonne, The University of Virginia, and the University of Nanterre.
In March 2007, Condé was the keynote speaker at Franklin College Switzerland's Caribbean Unbound III conference, in Lugano, Switzerland.
Condé's novels explore racial, gender, and cultural issues in a variety of historical eras and locales, including the Salem witch trials in I, Tituba: Black Witch of Salem and the 19th century Bambara Empire of Mali in Segu.
In addition to her writings, Condé had a distinguished academic career. In 2004 she retired from Columbia University as Professor Emeritus of French. She had previously taught at the University of California, Berkeley, UCLA, the Sorbonne, The University of Virginia, and the University of Nanterre.
In March 2007, Condé was the keynote speaker at Franklin College Switzerland's Caribbean Unbound III conference, in Lugano, Switzerland.
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August 16, 2019
Windward Heights
is a retelling of Wuthering Heights, set in the Caribbean just after the abolition of slavery in the late 19th and early 20th century. In Maryse Condé’s hands the classic gothic tragedy becomes more politically charged, taking in decades of turbulent history and social change in Guadeloupe, Cuba and surrounding islands.
While there has been much debate over Heathcliff’s ethnicity in Emily Brontë’s original novel, here Condé replaces subtext with explication. Her Cathy is mixed race, and light-skinned, Razyé (the Heathcliff of the story) is a dark-skinned black man, the de Linsseuil family (standing in for the Lintons) are white Creoles. The entanglements between them, and the generation that follows, are a minefield of social transgressions. Condé explores both the public scandals and internalised racism in a way that is not exactly subtle, but its strength lies in showing the myriad of forms this can take; how complicated and individuated the politics of race can be.
Chapters of third-person narration are interspersed with first-person POVs from an assortment of characters. Most of these voices come from the oppressed underclasses, mainly servants (these side-characters are even more interesting and memorable than the protagonists). It’s as if Condé was not content with one Nelly Dean and so splintered her into a dozen different people, in order to better tell the history of the islands from a range of inhabitants. As a post-colonial reclaiming of historical voices this works well.
The book is not without weaknesses. Its melodrama can at times be lurid and overblown (possibly to be expected, given the source material). The technique of reframing events through multiple viewpoints adds complexity but it also creates repetition and slows the pace at key moments, robbing the story of some narrative drive. And the translation lacks polish, in my opinion (nb. it was translated by Condé’s husband).
The passion/obsession of the central characters is dimmed compared to Brontë’s version; merely a catalyst for events rather than the book’s beating heart, and is de-centred in favour of culture and politics. For instance, Razyé exploits simmering racial tensions and socialist uprisings in order to prosecute his grudge against the de Linsseuils, and he explores santeria in his grief over Cathy’s death. Where Wuthering Heights is personal, almost claustrophobic, Windward Heights is social, polyphonic and sweeping. And I think I enjoyed it all the more because of this. It’s a compelling read and just as worthy of attention as the more well-known Brontë reboot, Wide Sargasso Sea. 3.5 stars.
While there has been much debate over Heathcliff’s ethnicity in Emily Brontë’s original novel, here Condé replaces subtext with explication. Her Cathy is mixed race, and light-skinned, Razyé (the Heathcliff of the story) is a dark-skinned black man, the de Linsseuil family (standing in for the Lintons) are white Creoles. The entanglements between them, and the generation that follows, are a minefield of social transgressions. Condé explores both the public scandals and internalised racism in a way that is not exactly subtle, but its strength lies in showing the myriad of forms this can take; how complicated and individuated the politics of race can be.
Chapters of third-person narration are interspersed with first-person POVs from an assortment of characters. Most of these voices come from the oppressed underclasses, mainly servants (these side-characters are even more interesting and memorable than the protagonists). It’s as if Condé was not content with one Nelly Dean and so splintered her into a dozen different people, in order to better tell the history of the islands from a range of inhabitants. As a post-colonial reclaiming of historical voices this works well.
The book is not without weaknesses. Its melodrama can at times be lurid and overblown (possibly to be expected, given the source material). The technique of reframing events through multiple viewpoints adds complexity but it also creates repetition and slows the pace at key moments, robbing the story of some narrative drive. And the translation lacks polish, in my opinion (nb. it was translated by Condé’s husband).
The passion/obsession of the central characters is dimmed compared to Brontë’s version; merely a catalyst for events rather than the book’s beating heart, and is de-centred in favour of culture and politics. For instance, Razyé exploits simmering racial tensions and socialist uprisings in order to prosecute his grudge against the de Linsseuils, and he explores santeria in his grief over Cathy’s death. Where Wuthering Heights is personal, almost claustrophobic, Windward Heights is social, polyphonic and sweeping. And I think I enjoyed it all the more because of this. It’s a compelling read and just as worthy of attention as the more well-known Brontë reboot, Wide Sargasso Sea. 3.5 stars.
July 18, 2022
A professor of French Caribbean literature at Columbia University and a prize-winning author whose novels (including I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem and Segu) draw upon African and Caribbean history, Condé sets her latest offering – a complex reworking of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights – at the turn of the 19th century, a period of socialist organizing and social unrest in the Caribbean.
Windward Heights (La Migration des Coeurs) opens in Cuba, shortly after the death of the revolutionary José Marti. Razyé, a young man who, as a foundling, was named for the Razyé, or heath, on which he was discovered in Guadeloupe, has decided to return there and exact revenge from Aymeric de Linsseuil, the rich Creole who married Razyé’s beloved Catherine Gagneur, the daughter of the man who raised Razyé. He achieves vengeance by marrying Aymeric’s youngest sister, Irmine, but only after impregnating Catherine, who dies giving birth to their daughter, Cathy.
Describing a social and political moment far more complex than Brontë’s, Condé introduces a host of first-person narrations by servants, fishwives and hired hands, which are the most winning passages in the novel. Condé clearly knows how to weave a large and beautiful tapestry of diverse characters, as she has shown in her previous books, so it’s no surprise that all characters and setting of Windward Heights come to life through the page.
In a 2016 interview with Françoise Pfaff, Condé explains the title of her novel: “I saw in this title (La Migration des Coeurs) a way of expressing that history was repeating itself; there was a first generation with Cathy who was loved by Razyé and by Linsseuil, and a second generation with Cathy II, her daughter, loved by Razyé II.” In the same interview, Maryse Condé emphasizes the Caribbean dimension of her inspiration: “I saw that a West Indian woman, Jean Rhys, has written a book – Wide Sargasso Sea – a reimagination of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. From that, I better understood my passion for Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights.”
The parallels to Wuthering Heights are crystal clear: In Condé’s version, Heathcliff appears as Razyé, an angry and often brutal Black man. When Cathy, the “mulatto” daughter of the man who adopted him, spurns his love to enter “the world of whiteness” through marriage to a Creole plantation owner, Razyé’s fury erupts, just as Heathcliff’s did more than a century earlier.
Razyé represents an amoral (and at times immoral) force of destruction. Neither colonial nor revolutionary, he burns poor villages in Cuba for the Spanish army during the War for Cuban Independence as readily as he joins the socialists in burning sugarcane fields in post-abolition Guadeloupe. In his personal life, he beats and ignores his children, abuses his wife, and gains his fortune by ruining others—rich plantation owners and struggling up-and-coming leftist politicians alike—at the card table; in short, he dedicates his life to toppling what others have built, without seeming to care about building anything of his own to replace it. Nor is he personally exempt from the decline of entropy, as he finishes his life at a relatively young age, thoroughly depleted. After years of failed attempts to contact his dear departed Cathy, he finds himself “fatigué de trainer [s]on corps partout où [il va.]”
Part of Condé’s achievement in this book is that she evokes this personal vengeance amid the wider social and racial conflagrations that were blowing across the Antilles at the time. She explores and deepens the relationships of domination, whether social or racial, the obstacles to social mobility and a Caribbean society racially divided and impregnated with racist prejudices, installed by the dissemination of slave and colonialist ideologies. Through the interactions between her Black, mixed-race and white characters, Condé exposes mentalities shaped by racism that have become ordinary, particularly the internalization of stigmatizing representations by the people who are its victims.
In addition, she gives a voice to the “invisible”: women and children. Condé’s view from the lower depths of society finds its most eloquent embodiment, finally, in several women whose hopes, like the island, go up in smoke. Cathy’s daughter, who will suffer the consequences of her mother’s choices, reflects: “What is love? A bonfire of fluttering leaves that you light in the evening and in the morning is nothing more than a heap of ashes.”
Personally, I really enjoyed the book and how easy it was to get immersed in its atmosphere. However, I have to admit that reading it in French proved to be quite the chore, so I will probably opt for an English or German translation should I ever reread this book.
Windward Heights (La Migration des Coeurs) opens in Cuba, shortly after the death of the revolutionary José Marti. Razyé, a young man who, as a foundling, was named for the Razyé, or heath, on which he was discovered in Guadeloupe, has decided to return there and exact revenge from Aymeric de Linsseuil, the rich Creole who married Razyé’s beloved Catherine Gagneur, the daughter of the man who raised Razyé. He achieves vengeance by marrying Aymeric’s youngest sister, Irmine, but only after impregnating Catherine, who dies giving birth to their daughter, Cathy.
Only the departed remain handsome and desired forever.Stricken by grief for his beloved Cathy and full of loathing for the people he blames for their separation and death, Razyé lives on, trying to learn the arts of Santéria – Africn diasporic religion that developed in Cuba in the late 19th century – so that he might resurrect Catherine and become wealthy in the process. He passes on his hatred of America to his first born, the so-called Razyé II. Eventually, Cathy and Razyé II meet and fall in love, but the scars left by one generation are borne by the next, and the two cannot achieve happiness.
Describing a social and political moment far more complex than Brontë’s, Condé introduces a host of first-person narrations by servants, fishwives and hired hands, which are the most winning passages in the novel. Condé clearly knows how to weave a large and beautiful tapestry of diverse characters, as she has shown in her previous books, so it’s no surprise that all characters and setting of Windward Heights come to life through the page.
In a 2016 interview with Françoise Pfaff, Condé explains the title of her novel: “I saw in this title (La Migration des Coeurs) a way of expressing that history was repeating itself; there was a first generation with Cathy who was loved by Razyé and by Linsseuil, and a second generation with Cathy II, her daughter, loved by Razyé II.” In the same interview, Maryse Condé emphasizes the Caribbean dimension of her inspiration: “I saw that a West Indian woman, Jean Rhys, has written a book – Wide Sargasso Sea – a reimagination of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. From that, I better understood my passion for Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights.”
The parallels to Wuthering Heights are crystal clear: In Condé’s version, Heathcliff appears as Razyé, an angry and often brutal Black man. When Cathy, the “mulatto” daughter of the man who adopted him, spurns his love to enter “the world of whiteness” through marriage to a Creole plantation owner, Razyé’s fury erupts, just as Heathcliff’s did more than a century earlier.
Razyé represents an amoral (and at times immoral) force of destruction. Neither colonial nor revolutionary, he burns poor villages in Cuba for the Spanish army during the War for Cuban Independence as readily as he joins the socialists in burning sugarcane fields in post-abolition Guadeloupe. In his personal life, he beats and ignores his children, abuses his wife, and gains his fortune by ruining others—rich plantation owners and struggling up-and-coming leftist politicians alike—at the card table; in short, he dedicates his life to toppling what others have built, without seeming to care about building anything of his own to replace it. Nor is he personally exempt from the decline of entropy, as he finishes his life at a relatively young age, thoroughly depleted. After years of failed attempts to contact his dear departed Cathy, he finds himself “fatigué de trainer [s]on corps partout où [il va.]”
Part of Condé’s achievement in this book is that she evokes this personal vengeance amid the wider social and racial conflagrations that were blowing across the Antilles at the time. She explores and deepens the relationships of domination, whether social or racial, the obstacles to social mobility and a Caribbean society racially divided and impregnated with racist prejudices, installed by the dissemination of slave and colonialist ideologies. Through the interactions between her Black, mixed-race and white characters, Condé exposes mentalities shaped by racism that have become ordinary, particularly the internalization of stigmatizing representations by the people who are its victims.
In addition, she gives a voice to the “invisible”: women and children. Condé’s view from the lower depths of society finds its most eloquent embodiment, finally, in several women whose hopes, like the island, go up in smoke. Cathy’s daughter, who will suffer the consequences of her mother’s choices, reflects: “What is love? A bonfire of fluttering leaves that you light in the evening and in the morning is nothing more than a heap of ashes.”
Personally, I really enjoyed the book and how easy it was to get immersed in its atmosphere. However, I have to admit that reading it in French proved to be quite the chore, so I will probably opt for an English or German translation should I ever reread this book.
August 16, 2019
3.5 rounded up
I was quite pleased when I stumbled on this retelling of Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. I had read Maryse Conde while in college and enjoyed the richness of her writing and the many layered meanings I was able to pull from her stories. Here she has refashioned this classic story into one that not only deals with the cost of revenge but the generational curse of slavery and racism.
I was quite pleased when I stumbled on this retelling of Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. I had read Maryse Conde while in college and enjoyed the richness of her writing and the many layered meanings I was able to pull from her stories. Here she has refashioned this classic story into one that not only deals with the cost of revenge but the generational curse of slavery and racism.
January 23, 2020
Update: January 23, 2019.
Emily Brontë wrote of violent, obsessive passion mired in the classism, sexism, xenophobia, and addiction in an English village backwater, contained in a favoured servant’s tongue. The slip to a tenant’s mean, self-involved mental energy served as no boon, no invigorative jolt to proceedings. If Wuthering Heights is the wind’s dull roar Windward Heights is the source.
In an inversion of this ordered system–the original and the retelling–Condé saw the dark moor and formed a Caribbean cosmos in 19th century Spanish Cuba, British Dominica and primarily in the French Guadeloupe islands: from Papaye nestled in the volcanic hillside to the arid soil and wind beaten razyés at Grand-Fonds-les-Mangles. Amongst this varied terrain Condé voiced a multitude: Nelly, Catherine, Razyé (the Heathcliff), his wife Irmine, her brother Catherine’s husband, their children, several named servants, politicians, and friends.
The basic story remains the same. Hubert Gagneur, “a tallow-coloured mulatto”, one day brought home a “little black boy or Indian half-caste”, and the story continues. What Brontë slyly hinted at Condé states baldly and in the loaded language of the time. Pretty much everything Wuthering Heights hinted at Windward saturates in technicolour: racism, classism, white feminism, misogynoir, sex, toxic masculinity, homosexuality, and even a few glances at genderqueerness.
I don’t know why we don’t hear and read more about this novel. It is glorious, messy, shocking, and explosive, with a narrative that strode beyond its predecessor’s confines into new spheres. If you considered historical fiction to be a soft genre meant to neatly carry you through specific highlights as you cry and tut tut at humanity’s cruelty before it ended with the usual bromides about love, family, and the resilient human spirit, drink the tea before you start this book. I don’t want you to mess up your copy.
Bookstagram | Twitter
4.5 ⭐
You know the drill by now. Need to think about my written response. It basically blew Wuthering Heights out of the water, sky high. Don't even mention them in the same sentence unless it's to genuflect in front of Windward's messy (it is messy, I have questions) greatness.
Emily Brontë wrote of violent, obsessive passion mired in the classism, sexism, xenophobia, and addiction in an English village backwater, contained in a favoured servant’s tongue. The slip to a tenant’s mean, self-involved mental energy served as no boon, no invigorative jolt to proceedings. If Wuthering Heights is the wind’s dull roar Windward Heights is the source.
In an inversion of this ordered system–the original and the retelling–Condé saw the dark moor and formed a Caribbean cosmos in 19th century Spanish Cuba, British Dominica and primarily in the French Guadeloupe islands: from Papaye nestled in the volcanic hillside to the arid soil and wind beaten razyés at Grand-Fonds-les-Mangles. Amongst this varied terrain Condé voiced a multitude: Nelly, Catherine, Razyé (the Heathcliff), his wife Irmine, her brother Catherine’s husband, their children, several named servants, politicians, and friends.
The basic story remains the same. Hubert Gagneur, “a tallow-coloured mulatto”, one day brought home a “little black boy or Indian half-caste”, and the story continues. What Brontë slyly hinted at Condé states baldly and in the loaded language of the time. Pretty much everything Wuthering Heights hinted at Windward saturates in technicolour: racism, classism, white feminism, misogynoir, sex, toxic masculinity, homosexuality, and even a few glances at genderqueerness.
I don’t know why we don’t hear and read more about this novel. It is glorious, messy, shocking, and explosive, with a narrative that strode beyond its predecessor’s confines into new spheres. If you considered historical fiction to be a soft genre meant to neatly carry you through specific highlights as you cry and tut tut at humanity’s cruelty before it ended with the usual bromides about love, family, and the resilient human spirit, drink the tea before you start this book. I don’t want you to mess up your copy.
Bookstagram | Twitter
4.5 ⭐
You know the drill by now. Need to think about my written response. It basically blew Wuthering Heights out of the water, sky high. Don't even mention them in the same sentence unless it's to genuflect in front of Windward's messy (it is messy, I have questions) greatness.
December 19, 2019
Windward Heights (translated from French) by Guadeloupean author Maryse Condé is a retelling of Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. It feels wrong even calling it a retelling because Condé truly made this her own.
If Wuthering Heights was a dried fruit pit left in the cold to decay and wither, Windward Heights is the first bite of a ripe mango on a blistering day.
I truly felt transported every time I picked up this novel. Windward is set in the Caribbean in 19th century shortly after the abolition of slavery. We witness the intense relationship between Cathy and Razyé and all of the horror that follows as Razyé enacts revenge everywhere he goes through sheer force and growing political power. Condé does not follow Brontës subtle hints at race and class, instead we are plunged headfirst into racial disparity and blustering, unsettling passages of time in a slowly changing society.
As I’ve hinted, Windward Heights is very different from Wuthering Heights. (DECOLONIZED AF 👏🏽. Ahem, pls excuse my outburst.) Though they both follow a similar (at times) story line that is often theatrically dramatic and focus on the relationship of two troubled lovers, Windward chose to only highlight this tryst briefly and instead delves more into racism, religion, politics and stories told by oppressed narrators which I think made for an all-encompassing read although love and what binds us is still a recurring theme.
“What is love? A bonfire of fluttering leaves that you light in the evening and in the morning is nothing more than a heap of ashes.''
I am so impressed by Condé’s writing and I highly recommend this. It’s quite an intense read and for that reason I did make progress quite slowly.
If Wuthering Heights was a dried fruit pit left in the cold to decay and wither, Windward Heights is the first bite of a ripe mango on a blistering day.
I truly felt transported every time I picked up this novel. Windward is set in the Caribbean in 19th century shortly after the abolition of slavery. We witness the intense relationship between Cathy and Razyé and all of the horror that follows as Razyé enacts revenge everywhere he goes through sheer force and growing political power. Condé does not follow Brontës subtle hints at race and class, instead we are plunged headfirst into racial disparity and blustering, unsettling passages of time in a slowly changing society.
As I’ve hinted, Windward Heights is very different from Wuthering Heights. (DECOLONIZED AF 👏🏽. Ahem, pls excuse my outburst.) Though they both follow a similar (at times) story line that is often theatrically dramatic and focus on the relationship of two troubled lovers, Windward chose to only highlight this tryst briefly and instead delves more into racism, religion, politics and stories told by oppressed narrators which I think made for an all-encompassing read although love and what binds us is still a recurring theme.
“What is love? A bonfire of fluttering leaves that you light in the evening and in the morning is nothing more than a heap of ashes.''
I am so impressed by Condé’s writing and I highly recommend this. It’s quite an intense read and for that reason I did make progress quite slowly.
July 30, 2025
Komplexer als Wuthering Heights und mal wieder keine Charaktere die man mag aber SEHR viel Raum zum Analysieren also denke mal jz kann man die Hausarbeit fetzen
July 2, 2021
Magnificent. A masterpiece.
'Only the departed remain handsome and desired forever.'
Condé is masterful. The depth of description in her prose and the passion of her dialogue, set against the backdrop of islands still yoked to the hierarchy of colonialism even while fighting for freedom and autonomy heightened and made this read resonant.
I adore an author who is so attuned and aware of the space from which she writes and represents, which translates to rich cultural context and portrayal. Condé does this in the first few chapters of this lush novel.
The threads of desire, love, hate, revenge, socio-economic, and political change rage through this novel, making it addictive, instructive, and complex. Condé writes with mastery, unveiling and coiling the tethers of her characters and their situations to the times in which they live.
Such attention to detail with respect to the changing landscape of Guadeloupe as Slavery is abolished and new ways of working and interacting must now be adapted and adjusted to. The racial tensions that never go away, the observance of old ways and rituals makes the prose vibrate with nuance and tension.
The contour and social hierarchies of the island also play a huge part in the foundation of the story and Condé writes the colourism, familial expectations and desires, birth of political socialism, neglect, obsession, and unhealthy attachments sharply and without apology. Her style is heady with history and social significance.
Condé renders her characters with such rawness, that one can feel their desperation to escape a destiny that seems to have been carved out for them because of their birth, skin colour, and name; the reader is pulled along as they claw their way to a freedom that they are able to grasp.
'Only the departed remain handsome and desired forever.'
Condé is masterful. The depth of description in her prose and the passion of her dialogue, set against the backdrop of islands still yoked to the hierarchy of colonialism even while fighting for freedom and autonomy heightened and made this read resonant.
I adore an author who is so attuned and aware of the space from which she writes and represents, which translates to rich cultural context and portrayal. Condé does this in the first few chapters of this lush novel.
The threads of desire, love, hate, revenge, socio-economic, and political change rage through this novel, making it addictive, instructive, and complex. Condé writes with mastery, unveiling and coiling the tethers of her characters and their situations to the times in which they live.
Such attention to detail with respect to the changing landscape of Guadeloupe as Slavery is abolished and new ways of working and interacting must now be adapted and adjusted to. The racial tensions that never go away, the observance of old ways and rituals makes the prose vibrate with nuance and tension.
The contour and social hierarchies of the island also play a huge part in the foundation of the story and Condé writes the colourism, familial expectations and desires, birth of political socialism, neglect, obsession, and unhealthy attachments sharply and without apology. Her style is heady with history and social significance.
Condé renders her characters with such rawness, that one can feel their desperation to escape a destiny that seems to have been carved out for them because of their birth, skin colour, and name; the reader is pulled along as they claw their way to a freedom that they are able to grasp.
August 22, 2015
I thought I would love this book, but I remained somewhat disappointed after I finished it. If you're thirsty for Guadeloupean literature, Windward Heights is a novel that will quench it. I wanted to read a book rich in French Caribbean culture, and, in that sense, Windward Heights was a satisfying read.
Windward Heights is a Caribbean retelling of Wuthering Heights. However, while the novel is rich in Guadeloupean culture and history, the main plot offers no surprises if you're familiar with Emily Brönte's novel.
I think an issue with this novel is that it is too ambitious. Not only is the story of Razyé and Cathy, but also the story of Guadeloupe. It is definitely interesting to learn about all those facts, but I wish the only focus had been the story of Razyé and Cathy. There are too many characters in the book, whose only purpose is to give context to the novel, and, by the middle of the book, this becomes a bit tiresome, regardless of the interesting facts they have to tell. Simone Schwarz-Bart's novel "The Bridge of Beyond" is more effective in telling a story through the history of Guadeloupe.
Finally, dialogues are scarce, which makes the novel almost 350 pages of narration. Don't get me wrong, Maryse Condé uses beautiful language and it never feels like reading a history book, but I am not fond of so much narration.
Again, Windward Heights is a novel worth reading, but I prefer "Crossing the Mangrove", also by Maryse Condé, which keeps you guessing and in suspense from beginning to end, and it's also set in Guadeloupe.
Windward Heights is a Caribbean retelling of Wuthering Heights. However, while the novel is rich in Guadeloupean culture and history, the main plot offers no surprises if you're familiar with Emily Brönte's novel.
I think an issue with this novel is that it is too ambitious. Not only is the story of Razyé and Cathy, but also the story of Guadeloupe. It is definitely interesting to learn about all those facts, but I wish the only focus had been the story of Razyé and Cathy. There are too many characters in the book, whose only purpose is to give context to the novel, and, by the middle of the book, this becomes a bit tiresome, regardless of the interesting facts they have to tell. Simone Schwarz-Bart's novel "The Bridge of Beyond" is more effective in telling a story through the history of Guadeloupe.
Finally, dialogues are scarce, which makes the novel almost 350 pages of narration. Don't get me wrong, Maryse Condé uses beautiful language and it never feels like reading a history book, but I am not fond of so much narration.
Again, Windward Heights is a novel worth reading, but I prefer "Crossing the Mangrove", also by Maryse Condé, which keeps you guessing and in suspense from beginning to end, and it's also set in Guadeloupe.
January 4, 2021
I think I may have found my new favourite genre; postcolonial literature. This retelling of Wuthering Heights is set against the backdrop of mainly Guadeloupe and Cuba, and themes of race and class are so explicitly prevalent in the novel that it only added to the suffering that Rayzé (Heathcliff) had been subject to and added fuel to the revenge he wanted to inflict. And what revenge it was - not to mention the accidental consequences that his and Cathy's love would cause in generations to come. This was at times shocking, uncomfortable and heartbreaking but my heart went out to the characters in a way that Emily Brontë's never did. Maryse Condé's writing is stunning, and her descriptions of the setting alone made me fall in love with the novel even more and the multiple perspectives added to the richness of the story. I can't wait to read more of her works.
September 9, 2025
No m’ha desagradat però m’ha costat molt separar-lo de Cims borrascosos 🥲
April 13, 2024
I started reading this novel soon Condé died early this month, despite the fact that I had put aside another of her books (Crossing the Mangrove) and that it is said to be a retelling of Wuthering Heights (which I haven’t read).
This novel worked for me, especially because of the translation and the various first-person narratives (the third-person narrative is also very well done). It’s clear that Richard Philcox used the freedom his wife gave him to write a beautiful piece of work (he translated Mangrove, as well).
The only negatives for me were the novel’s length and the fact that the plot increasingly takes over. The last fifty pages were mostly a chore for me. This is certainly a novel that is better read over as short a period as possible, to keep in the emotional (although not Gothic) mood and to keep all the characters straight.
This novel worked for me, especially because of the translation and the various first-person narratives (the third-person narrative is also very well done). It’s clear that Richard Philcox used the freedom his wife gave him to write a beautiful piece of work (he translated Mangrove, as well).
The only negatives for me were the novel’s length and the fact that the plot increasingly takes over. The last fifty pages were mostly a chore for me. This is certainly a novel that is better read over as short a period as possible, to keep in the emotional (although not Gothic) mood and to keep all the characters straight.
September 14, 2007
A lyrical retelling of Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. I reread Wuthering Heights before I began it, which has made it fun to compare. It has the same general storyline but author Maryse Conde inserts her own themes of economic and racial disparities to the original novel's doomed love tragedy.
Like all of Conde's books that I have read so far, this is set in the Caribbean (on the islands of Guadeloupe and Cuba, in this case) and translated from the French. One more note- I am listening to this on tape, rather than reading it, and because it is translated from the French, I am finding it fun to listen to all of the French names, places, and phrases that are left in the original language.
Like all of Conde's books that I have read so far, this is set in the Caribbean (on the islands of Guadeloupe and Cuba, in this case) and translated from the French. One more note- I am listening to this on tape, rather than reading it, and because it is translated from the French, I am finding it fun to listen to all of the French names, places, and phrases that are left in the original language.
December 26, 2021
Ce livre de Maryse Condé, (auteure guadeloupéenne) s’inspire largement du roman d’Emily Brontë Les Hauts des Hurlevents. La migration des cœurs transpose le personnage de Heathcliff en Rayzé, le fils adoptif dont on ne connaît pas les origines mais qui est Noir. Dans sa version, Condé se concentre sur les questions coloniales et de classes. La question de la mixité et de la couleur de la peau des personages sont centrales. Les tensions entre mulâtres, blancs, noirs descendant d’esclaves sont rapportés à travers de multiples voix, servantes, exploiteurs de plantation de cannes à sucre, sorcières et sorciers, mères et enfants. La fin laisse soupçonner un cas d’inceste. Le texte est truffé d’expressions créoles avec un grand soucis pour la description du monde végétal.
April 27, 2024
Aquest llibre és un homenatge a Wuthering Heights, la qual cosa prova que hi ha una tradició literària femenina: hi ha escriptores que han obert camí, les hi ha que en recullen el testimoni. Maryse Condé reescriu aquesta trepidant història gòtica d'amors maleïts i de fantasmes que no descansen mai per emfatitzar-ne els components de raça, classe i gènere que ja estaven en l'original. Ja no estem als "moors" anglesos, sinó a l'illa de Guadalupe, i una polifonia de veus criolles, moltes d'elles de mabos (dides), serventes o veus de gents senzilles, ens expliquen la història del personatges. També hi ha una veu omniscient que ens interpreta els Heathcliffs (Razyés) o les Cathys. La història de l'esclavitud sencera passa per aquestes pàgines, el racisme és el gran protagonista, però per sobre d'això, la veu més ofegada és la de les Cathys, que en aquesta novel·la pateixen la triple condemna del gènere, la raça i la classe, i que, com sempre, són castigades per trencar les convencions.
Un llibre que t'atrapa i no pots deixar.
Un llibre que t'atrapa i no pots deixar.
June 13, 2024
Una versió preciosa de Cims Borrascosos ambientat a les illes antillanes de Guadalupe, Marie-Galante i Dominica. La mateixa història familiar atravessada per les diferències de raça i classe i com aquestes condicionen la relació entre familiars i també amb ells mateixos. És una història trista i amb un punt de desolació: és possible canviar el nostre destí social? Interessant com l'odi de raça i de classe condicionen els destins dels protagonistes.
M'ha semblat especialment bonica la manera de narrar a través dels personatges i destaquen molt aquells protsgonitzats per les criades dels protagonistes. Una manera bella i real de retratar la realitat que és evidentment complexa.
Sincerament, moltes ganes de club de lectura per poder-ho comentar.
M'ha semblat especialment bonica la manera de narrar a través dels personatges i destaquen molt aquells protsgonitzats per les criades dels protagonistes. Una manera bella i real de retratar la realitat que és evidentment complexa.
Sincerament, moltes ganes de club de lectura per poder-ho comentar.
September 21, 2020
An interesting, sexual, dark, in some ways dirty and elegant read that was both engaging, confusing, long, and perhaps a bit painful. I admit, I much prefer Windward Heights to that of its boring british counterpart for which it is almost a parody of, Wuthering Heights. The story is interesting, enticing and commentates on the Carribean, racism, discrimination, slavery, religion and stereotypes, and it does so almost effortlessly. I would recommend it to anyone interested in African American Literature, or more specifically Creole literature.
December 28, 2024
There is a LOT to unpack in this book. Windward Heights is the Guadeloupan writer Maryse Conde's version of Wuthering Heights set in Guadeloupe. The original story maps extremely well into Conde's narrative of extreme love and revenge. Many of the same class tensions are at play, but Conde adds the multiple layers of racial identity and prejudice that make up Guadeloupe's social strata of white, multiracial, black, and Indian population. Added to that, the story is set in the immediate aftermath of emancipation on Guadeloupe, and there is plenty of scope for anger, revolt, and vengeance. Conde has skillfully translated Emily Bronte's story into its own tale of Guadeloupe's history.
July 20, 2023
It started off great but then went downhill after the first 150 pages. I really thought it was going to be a great read, but oh, how disappointing.
September 24, 2024
Maryse Condé té una prosa preciosa i una forma d'explicar i ambientar les seves històries en el seu context brutal. No obstant, aquesta novel·la m'ha semblat una mica massa recarregada en aquest sentit.
Pel que fa a la història, tan cruel, despietada i salvatge, no pot deixar indiferent a ningú. Una història d'amor, desamor i venjança que trascendeix les generacions de dos homes lligats pel desig d'una única dona.
Pel que fa a la història, tan cruel, despietada i salvatge, no pot deixar indiferent a ningú. Una història d'amor, desamor i venjança que trascendeix les generacions de dos homes lligats pel desig d'una única dona.
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May 3, 2025Boekenclub #9
April 9, 2025
Condé’sLa migration des coeurs is an “homage” (in the words of the author; the publisher’s description calls it a “free variation”) to Wuthering Heights, set on the island of Guadeloupe just before1900 – the explosion of the Maine in Havana Harbor takes place as Rayzé (Creole for “heath”) is returning to L’Engoulvent (Wuthering Heights) – so about a hundred years later than Bronte’s novel, which is set in northern England around 1800.
When I first read Wuthering Heights, some fifty years ago, I read it very superficially, just as a story. When I re-read it last month, I realized that it actually had much more depth, although I admit it is not one of my favorite classic novels. Condé’s novel copies the superficial aspects and leaves out the depth and the mystery. On the other hand, it adds a very different social and political content.
In Wuthering Heights, there are two mysteries connected with Heathcliff: his origins, and the period when he leaves the Heights and returns wealthy. La migration des coeurs, in contrast, begins with the missing period, with Rayzé in Cuba, making his fortune in a Chinese laundry business and trying to become a Santeria sorcerer, thus showing an interest in ghosts before the death of Catherine. (We are told later that Rayzé and Catherine’s favorite place as children was the local cemetery.) There is a particular historical setting: the deaths of José Marti and Antonio Maceo are mentioned, and people are speculating about the reason why the Maine is in the harbor. I thought that perhaps the Spanish American War would play a role in the book, but it never returns to it. To be honest, I was already put off from the novel by these first two chapters. In the third chapter, Rayzé leaves his Cuban mistress and decides to return to Guadeloupe to “get revenge”, although we have no idea for what and the decision just seems as arbitrary to the reader as to his mistress. In fact, much in the novel is not really motivated, relying on the reader’s memory of the older book to accept that things happen the way they do.
On the boat back to Guadeloupe, he encounters by chance coincidence Nellie Raboteuse, fired, as we later learn, by Aimeric de Linsseuil (the Edgar Linton of Bronte’s book) and now working for a poor family elsewhere, and a fellow-passenger asks her who he is. She then launches into the beginning of the story of Wuthering Heights. Her account basically follows the earlier novel, but with differences, some trivial but others major.
While in Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff’s origin is mysterious – his appearance leads to the surmise that he may be a gypsy, but in any case he is something exotic to late eighteenth-century England – in La migration des coeurs, he is described as “a Black or half-Indian”, which is hardly exotic in Guadeloupe, where they are the majority of the population. This is the basic difference between the two novels; where in Wuthering Heights, the conflict is a clash of values between the rebellious Heathcliff and Cathy and the affluent upper-class Lintons, in La migration des coeurs it is recast as essentially racial, between the Black/Indian Rayzé and the de Linsseuil bekés (whites), with the mulatta Catherine torn between them in terms of ethnic rather than moral identity. The relationship of Heathcliff to Catherine, which is the center of the older novel, is far less important in this book; essentially it is just treated as a sort of background, and mainly for its racial aspect. While Heathcliff is always present in the older novel, either in fact or in the minds of the other characters, Rayzé tends to disappear from the narration for long stretches.
From then on, many of the events very loosely follow Wuthering Heights, but the characters of all the persons involved are totally different. While in the older book, Mr. Earnshaw is a gentleman farmer from an old family, although at a lower social level than the Lintons, who is concerned to educate his family and Heathcliff, in Condé’s novel Hubert Gaigneur (French for “earner”) is a coarse mulatto parvenu who is essentially held in contempt by his neighbors, and who, hating education, does not give either Catherine or Heathcliff any education at all. It is Justin (Hindley), an intelligent, forward-thinking intellectual, who after his father’s death (in a horseback accident) insists on giving the “savage” Catherine a proper education (from a live-in nun.) He also repairs L’Engoulvent and turns it from an impoverished sugar plantation into a prosperous model of multi-crop agriculture, with an Indian workforce specially imported from Calcutta. But not to worry; in the next chapter he is the unintelligent drunkard and wastrel of the original novel.
Among other differences, the personalities of Justin-Marie (who should be equivalent to Hareton) and Aymeric/Rayzé II (who should be equivalent to Linton) are exactly reversed. I won’t go into detail about the later developments, to avoid spoilers.
While the original novel is unified by the device of Nellie as narrator (relayed by Lockwood), Condé shifts between dozens of narrators, and often the narration strays from the supposed narrator into an anonymous third-person voice, which causes the book to basically fall apart into confusing and seemingly unrelated episodes with uncertain chronology. (This technique could have worked in the historical novel aspects, if it had been better done, as it is in many of Condé’s novels, but not in the Wuthering Heights plot.) The narrative voice is not consistent even within particular narrators; for example, Justin speaking to Rayzé about Catherine’s marriage (and incidentally telling us at length all about his past and what he thought and felt about everything, which Bronte lets us work out ourselves from the action and dialogue) goes on and on with poetic description of scenery and weather, and anachronistic sociological commentary, totally out of character, but then Condé seems to recollect that it is being spoken by Justin and suddenly we get a barrage of slang, Creole phrases, and foul language (with what I particularly dislike, words replaced by ellipsis marks).
Later on, Rayzé (who, like the original Heathcliff, is supposed to be reserved about anything concerning himself) meets two complete strangers and immediately tells them his entire life-story in detail, from his relationship to Catherine to his studies in Santeria. Of course, he is actually telling the reader. The book is full of this kind of inconsistency of tone and level, and of obvious anachronisms (would Nellie, who has certainly in rural Guadeloupe never seen a “horseless carriage”, really have described someone as “leaving in fourth gear”?)
About two-fifths of the way through the book, Rayzé, for no apparent reason (apart from the needs of the plot), decides to take his family away from L’Engoulvent to one of the larger cities, and the book takes a political turn. The political situation is not shown through the plot, but rather we get out-of-character monologues by various minor characters telling us about the racial history and current conditions on the island. In most cases there is no obvious occasion or audience for these monologues within the novel; they are just addressed to the reader. The actual events as they enter the story of Rayzé and the Linsseuils are unclear and the politics are confused and more superficially dealt with than in her other novels.
My most general impression is that Condé is trying to combine two different sorts of novel within the same book, the homage to Wuthering Heights and a historical novel about Guadeloupe in the period after the abolition of slavery, and perhaps for that reason neither is done well; the two aspects do not coalesce into any coherent whole.
I almost DNF’d this several times, but having liked many of Condé’s novels I persisted, hoping it would improve. It does have some good moments, especially in the second half which completely diverges from Wuthering Heights, and largely abandons the political plot as well, but on the whole it is far below her usual standards.
When I first read Wuthering Heights, some fifty years ago, I read it very superficially, just as a story. When I re-read it last month, I realized that it actually had much more depth, although I admit it is not one of my favorite classic novels. Condé’s novel copies the superficial aspects and leaves out the depth and the mystery. On the other hand, it adds a very different social and political content.
In Wuthering Heights, there are two mysteries connected with Heathcliff: his origins, and the period when he leaves the Heights and returns wealthy. La migration des coeurs, in contrast, begins with the missing period, with Rayzé in Cuba, making his fortune in a Chinese laundry business and trying to become a Santeria sorcerer, thus showing an interest in ghosts before the death of Catherine. (We are told later that Rayzé and Catherine’s favorite place as children was the local cemetery.) There is a particular historical setting: the deaths of José Marti and Antonio Maceo are mentioned, and people are speculating about the reason why the Maine is in the harbor. I thought that perhaps the Spanish American War would play a role in the book, but it never returns to it. To be honest, I was already put off from the novel by these first two chapters. In the third chapter, Rayzé leaves his Cuban mistress and decides to return to Guadeloupe to “get revenge”, although we have no idea for what and the decision just seems as arbitrary to the reader as to his mistress. In fact, much in the novel is not really motivated, relying on the reader’s memory of the older book to accept that things happen the way they do.
On the boat back to Guadeloupe, he encounters by chance coincidence Nellie Raboteuse, fired, as we later learn, by Aimeric de Linsseuil (the Edgar Linton of Bronte’s book) and now working for a poor family elsewhere, and a fellow-passenger asks her who he is. She then launches into the beginning of the story of Wuthering Heights. Her account basically follows the earlier novel, but with differences, some trivial but others major.
While in Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff’s origin is mysterious – his appearance leads to the surmise that he may be a gypsy, but in any case he is something exotic to late eighteenth-century England – in La migration des coeurs, he is described as “a Black or half-Indian”, which is hardly exotic in Guadeloupe, where they are the majority of the population. This is the basic difference between the two novels; where in Wuthering Heights, the conflict is a clash of values between the rebellious Heathcliff and Cathy and the affluent upper-class Lintons, in La migration des coeurs it is recast as essentially racial, between the Black/Indian Rayzé and the de Linsseuil bekés (whites), with the mulatta Catherine torn between them in terms of ethnic rather than moral identity. The relationship of Heathcliff to Catherine, which is the center of the older novel, is far less important in this book; essentially it is just treated as a sort of background, and mainly for its racial aspect. While Heathcliff is always present in the older novel, either in fact or in the minds of the other characters, Rayzé tends to disappear from the narration for long stretches.
From then on, many of the events very loosely follow Wuthering Heights, but the characters of all the persons involved are totally different. While in the older book, Mr. Earnshaw is a gentleman farmer from an old family, although at a lower social level than the Lintons, who is concerned to educate his family and Heathcliff, in Condé’s novel Hubert Gaigneur (French for “earner”) is a coarse mulatto parvenu who is essentially held in contempt by his neighbors, and who, hating education, does not give either Catherine or Heathcliff any education at all. It is Justin (Hindley), an intelligent, forward-thinking intellectual, who after his father’s death (in a horseback accident) insists on giving the “savage” Catherine a proper education (from a live-in nun.) He also repairs L’Engoulvent and turns it from an impoverished sugar plantation into a prosperous model of multi-crop agriculture, with an Indian workforce specially imported from Calcutta. But not to worry; in the next chapter he is the unintelligent drunkard and wastrel of the original novel.
Among other differences, the personalities of Justin-Marie (who should be equivalent to Hareton) and Aymeric/Rayzé II (who should be equivalent to Linton) are exactly reversed. I won’t go into detail about the later developments, to avoid spoilers.
While the original novel is unified by the device of Nellie as narrator (relayed by Lockwood), Condé shifts between dozens of narrators, and often the narration strays from the supposed narrator into an anonymous third-person voice, which causes the book to basically fall apart into confusing and seemingly unrelated episodes with uncertain chronology. (This technique could have worked in the historical novel aspects, if it had been better done, as it is in many of Condé’s novels, but not in the Wuthering Heights plot.) The narrative voice is not consistent even within particular narrators; for example, Justin speaking to Rayzé about Catherine’s marriage (and incidentally telling us at length all about his past and what he thought and felt about everything, which Bronte lets us work out ourselves from the action and dialogue) goes on and on with poetic description of scenery and weather, and anachronistic sociological commentary, totally out of character, but then Condé seems to recollect that it is being spoken by Justin and suddenly we get a barrage of slang, Creole phrases, and foul language (with what I particularly dislike, words replaced by ellipsis marks).
Later on, Rayzé (who, like the original Heathcliff, is supposed to be reserved about anything concerning himself) meets two complete strangers and immediately tells them his entire life-story in detail, from his relationship to Catherine to his studies in Santeria. Of course, he is actually telling the reader. The book is full of this kind of inconsistency of tone and level, and of obvious anachronisms (would Nellie, who has certainly in rural Guadeloupe never seen a “horseless carriage”, really have described someone as “leaving in fourth gear”?)
About two-fifths of the way through the book, Rayzé, for no apparent reason (apart from the needs of the plot), decides to take his family away from L’Engoulvent to one of the larger cities, and the book takes a political turn. The political situation is not shown through the plot, but rather we get out-of-character monologues by various minor characters telling us about the racial history and current conditions on the island. In most cases there is no obvious occasion or audience for these monologues within the novel; they are just addressed to the reader. The actual events as they enter the story of Rayzé and the Linsseuils are unclear and the politics are confused and more superficially dealt with than in her other novels.
My most general impression is that Condé is trying to combine two different sorts of novel within the same book, the homage to Wuthering Heights and a historical novel about Guadeloupe in the period after the abolition of slavery, and perhaps for that reason neither is done well; the two aspects do not coalesce into any coherent whole.
I almost DNF’d this several times, but having liked many of Condé’s novels I persisted, hoping it would improve. It does have some good moments, especially in the second half which completely diverges from Wuthering Heights, and largely abandons the political plot as well, but on the whole it is far below her usual standards.
August 1, 2024
“What is love? A bonfire of fluttering leaves that you light in the evening and in the morning is nothing more than a heap of ashes. That's it; that's it exactly. A catch, a zatrap. That's it; that's it exactly. You go to bed with a burning heart. You get up with both feet as cold as an old bag of bones. Only the departed remain handsome and desired forever.”
Wow. What a gut-punch of a story. I loved how half the story was told from all the different perspectives of the lower class characters in & around the main characters. Their vision of their world & the character & choices of the de Linsseuils & the l’Engoulvent clan was such a fascinating way to view the drama enfolding within the lives of these two families.
Click here to read my full review of WINDWARD HEIGHTS complete with my full thoughts, further reading suggestions, & more of my favorite quotes!
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
CW // lots—racism (n-word), rape, child abuse, graphic illness & death (tuberculosis)
June 11, 2024
Magnífic. L'ambientació de 10, la caracterització dels personatges, molt impactant. 100 % recomanable!
October 30, 2011
The description of food alone is worth the read. Conde does a fabulous job describing the setting as she shifts Bronte's cold-climate classic to a hotter one, not sacrificing any of the character development along the way.
April 12, 2025
"Our life is traced out for us long before we are born. Depending on the cradle that rocks us, we are given the gift of wealth or poverty, life's happiness or life's wickedness."
Originally in French, Condé writes a provocative rewrite of Emily Brönte's Wuthering Heights, set in the 18th and 19th century fight for liberation and abolition of slavery on the French-Caribbean Guadeloupe Islands. The context is heavily political, with Razye (Condé's Heathcliff) playing a big role in the socialist fight against plantation owners and the Gagneurs (Condé's Earnshaws) as a mixed-race family who aim for a prestigious status amongst the white plantation owners. Race is a much more prominent theme in this rewriting, further complicating the villany of Razye as well as the social aspirations of Catherine.
Though Condé has written an impressive work, I am not sure how to feel about it. It is extremely grotesque, as she leans into the necrophilic and perverted tendencies of which Razye is not only accused and suspected but we know he is guilty of too. The entire book is weighted down by the characters continuously expressing a strong desire to die, which creates these haunting sense amongst the living that is quite separate from the dead. Interestingly, in constrast to the original novel in which Heathcliff begs Catherine to haunt him, this novel has a 'Heathcliff' who is continuously frustrated by the utter absence of her hauntings (even in a lacking likeness to her in the face her child) and he himself instead becomes a ghost-like haunting to his descendants. Lots to discuss in terms of its neo-Victorian revisitations but I coudn't help but feel rather disgusted by most of it. There is so much more violence than in the original and the transgenerational trauma extends all the way to the final descendants (Cathy and Hareton) who go through yet more horrors, whereas the original characters got their happy ending. There are also strong references to suggest that Cathy is actually Heathcliff's son by Catherine, suggesting that Hareton and Cathy would be in an (even closer than cousins) incestuous relationship as half-siblings. I found their ending perhaps to be the most disturbing.
This is not for the faint of heart, do take heed that there is very explicit content. It is provocative, complex and interesting but incredibly dark and disturbing.
Originally in French, Condé writes a provocative rewrite of Emily Brönte's Wuthering Heights, set in the 18th and 19th century fight for liberation and abolition of slavery on the French-Caribbean Guadeloupe Islands. The context is heavily political, with Razye (Condé's Heathcliff) playing a big role in the socialist fight against plantation owners and the Gagneurs (Condé's Earnshaws) as a mixed-race family who aim for a prestigious status amongst the white plantation owners. Race is a much more prominent theme in this rewriting, further complicating the villany of Razye as well as the social aspirations of Catherine.
Though Condé has written an impressive work, I am not sure how to feel about it. It is extremely grotesque, as she leans into the necrophilic and perverted tendencies of which Razye is not only accused and suspected but we know he is guilty of too. The entire book is weighted down by the characters continuously expressing a strong desire to die, which creates these haunting sense amongst the living that is quite separate from the dead. Interestingly, in constrast to the original novel in which Heathcliff begs Catherine to haunt him, this novel has a 'Heathcliff' who is continuously frustrated by the utter absence of her hauntings (even in a lacking likeness to her in the face her child) and he himself instead becomes a ghost-like haunting to his descendants. Lots to discuss in terms of its neo-Victorian revisitations but I coudn't help but feel rather disgusted by most of it. There is so much more violence than in the original and the transgenerational trauma extends all the way to the final descendants (Cathy and Hareton) who go through yet more horrors, whereas the original characters got their happy ending. There are also strong references to suggest that Cathy is actually Heathcliff's son by Catherine, suggesting that Hareton and Cathy would be in an (even closer than cousins) incestuous relationship as half-siblings. I found their ending perhaps to be the most disturbing.
This is not for the faint of heart, do take heed that there is very explicit content. It is provocative, complex and interesting but incredibly dark and disturbing.
January 28, 2025
I recommend you read Windward Heights by Maryse Condé
I read Windward Heights last summer, I still think about it and will definitely be reading more of Maryse Condé’s work.
Windward Heights is a gripping exploration of obsession, power, and identity. It’s thought-provoking, and unforgettable.
This story is richly layered, dark, and haunting, offering a profound exploration of obsession, love, and revenge. Condé delves deep into the consuming, destructive forces of obsession and how they intertwine with themes of power, race, and identity. The relationships in this novel are raw and volatile, underscoring the ways colonial trauma and societal hierarchies shape human connection.
Condé also masterfully captures the complexities of the colonial transition in Guadeloupe, highlighting the tensions between formerly enslaved individuals, the Europeans who remained, and the precarious state of the mulatto class, while also shedding light on the near invisibility of those of Indian descent.
Her use of language is particularly striking, showcasing the power dynamics between French and Creole speakers —adding yet another layer to the novel's intricacies. The languages were and still are a marker of status, a tool for oppression, and a means of survival.
(Note: I haven’t read Wuthering Heights yet, but it’s on my TBR!)
I read Windward Heights last summer, I still think about it and will definitely be reading more of Maryse Condé’s work.
Windward Heights is a gripping exploration of obsession, power, and identity. It’s thought-provoking, and unforgettable.
This story is richly layered, dark, and haunting, offering a profound exploration of obsession, love, and revenge. Condé delves deep into the consuming, destructive forces of obsession and how they intertwine with themes of power, race, and identity. The relationships in this novel are raw and volatile, underscoring the ways colonial trauma and societal hierarchies shape human connection.
Condé also masterfully captures the complexities of the colonial transition in Guadeloupe, highlighting the tensions between formerly enslaved individuals, the Europeans who remained, and the precarious state of the mulatto class, while also shedding light on the near invisibility of those of Indian descent.
Her use of language is particularly striking, showcasing the power dynamics between French and Creole speakers —adding yet another layer to the novel's intricacies. The languages were and still are a marker of status, a tool for oppression, and a means of survival.
(Note: I haven’t read Wuthering Heights yet, but it’s on my TBR!)
December 12, 2024
I am not a Maryse Condé super fan. I think of her as the little girl with the curl. Windward Heights falls very comfortably within the category of her novels that are "very good indeed".
This is not a quarrel with a European classic like Jean Rhys' fight with Jane Eyre in Wide Sargasso Sea, or Elizabeth Nunez's row with The Tempest in Prospero's Daughter. Maryse Condé appears to have loved Wuthering Heights without reservation. Her approach here was to extract Heathcliff and Cathy from the Yorkshire Moors and place them in the Caribbean, about two generations after Emancipation.
This is a thoroughly Caribbean reimagining of the despondency Emily Brontë's imagination created. The historical novel was Maryse Condé's forte, and in this one, she was characteristically meticulous about historical accuracy. She also did not hold back on artistic flourish; her rendering of setting was nothing short of inspired.
Where this novel is concerned, I have to swallow the curmugeonliness I often direct towards Maryse Condé's work. Her writing here was simply superb.
This is not a quarrel with a European classic like Jean Rhys' fight with Jane Eyre in Wide Sargasso Sea, or Elizabeth Nunez's row with The Tempest in Prospero's Daughter. Maryse Condé appears to have loved Wuthering Heights without reservation. Her approach here was to extract Heathcliff and Cathy from the Yorkshire Moors and place them in the Caribbean, about two generations after Emancipation.
This is a thoroughly Caribbean reimagining of the despondency Emily Brontë's imagination created. The historical novel was Maryse Condé's forte, and in this one, she was characteristically meticulous about historical accuracy. She also did not hold back on artistic flourish; her rendering of setting was nothing short of inspired.
Where this novel is concerned, I have to swallow the curmugeonliness I often direct towards Maryse Condé's work. Her writing here was simply superb.
November 30, 2020
This is a five star for me - Maryse Conde grabs 'Wuthering Heights' by its teeth, wrestles with it and reworks it admirably into a Caribbean context. If you have read 'Wuthering Heights' (Emily Bronte) and 'Wide Sargasso Sea' ( Jean Rhys), then this novel should be next on your list.... There are multiple narrators, but I was never less than enthralled. I loved the naming of the characters and the writer expands the number of characters to include a wider range of voices and perspectives. The plot deviates somewhat from Emily Bronte's in terms of the Cathy Linton/ Linton/Hareton situation, but justifiably so, in that the essence of the original is recognisable. Obsession, revenge, racism, sexism, class, gender, politics, colonialism - it's all here and more - set in a Caribbean landscape that is alternately benign and ruthlessly harsh. Maryse Conde won the alternative Nobel literature prize, The New Academy Prize, in 2018.
June 3, 2020
I struggled getting through this. It's a retelling of Wuthering Heights set in Guadeloupe with the added themes of colonialism and race. The main storyline is familiar - but Conde really takes the story further with LOTs of 1st person narrated chapters from various characters. Too many characters. Maybe twenty perspectives total? It's a lot to keep track of, especially when one character will show up to tell their POV, and then never show up again as a character. I think Conde is trying to pull her themes through many people, but all it ended up doing is just making this real hard to wade though. There were also many unfamiliar words (this was originally written in French) which just made reading quite slow.
Also wow, not a commentary on Conde but of Bronte - I forgot how fucked up the characters in Wuthering Heights are.
Also wow, not a commentary on Conde but of Bronte - I forgot how fucked up the characters in Wuthering Heights are.
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