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Kate Bush

espite having written more than 100 songs before the release of the first single, Kate Bush
Dwas only 18, in 1977, when she wrote her debut Wuthering Heights, inspired by Emily
Bronte’s homonymous novel which was published more than a century before in 1846.

Bush shares the same birthday as the book’s author, she also happens to be called the same as
the Bronte’s most known character, Catherine. If the coincidences seem to be another excuse to
justify the legitimacy of Kate Bush’s composition of the song dedicated to the book, the facts that
she was a genius performer and a genuine talent remain undiscussed facts.

Besides acknowledging her remarkable voice, we need to add that she writes, composes and
choreographs most of her songs, creating multidisciplinary and intertwined works of art and
performances. Bush defines herself as “the shyest megalomaniac you’re ever likely to meet” and
surely she was not supposed to be forgotten as she published the most literary hit single in
history. Wuthering Heights was the catalyst of an incredible career in the music industry and, in
hindsight, she was right to insist for it to be her first release despite pushback from her record
label; it gained her the title of first female performer to ever have a self-written number 1 hit in
the U.K.

Bronte’s book Wuthering Heights is a traditional Victorian realist novel mixing an accurate
realistic depiction of setting, language and values of the Yorkshire moors with the ghost story
genre typically associated with the “Heights” and the wild nature of the moors that Bush’s recalls
in the song with “Out on the wiley, windy moors, we’d roll and fall in green”. The ghosts belonged
geographically and historically to the moors and their folklore. The supernatural was still widely
believed by lower classes, making ghosts an element that added to the realism rather than turn it
into simple “fantasy”. Moreover, Catherine’s ghost after death allows the love story between her
and Heathcliff to shift to a deeper level; a spiritual spiritual love.

Wuthering Heights is a story of middle class families (The Linton, Earnshaw and Heathcliff
families) but above all it is a story of possessive love and obsession, which in Bush’s lyrics can be
seen here: “You had a temper like my jealousy; too hot, too greedy”. The land of the moors
becomes the place of the wild, haunted, unknown and is the setting for a story of obsession, hate
and unconditional love: “Cruel Heathcliff, my one dream; My only master”. The narration spans
three generations, yet the love story remains around Cathy and Heathcliff and their unresolved
deep spiritual love. and Despite Nelly Deanthe, the housekeeper, being narrator in the book,
Bush’s song puts Cathy’s point of view at the center and allows her to finally have her own voice:
“Heathcliff, it’s me, I’m Cathy”. Bush decides to create a space where they can be protagonists
of their own dramatic love and uses quotes from the book to allow Cathy from to speak as she
pleads at Heathcliff’s window to be allowed in “Let me in! I’m so cold!”.

But as mentioned before, Bush was not only singing beautiful songs, she was composing, writing
and dancing, which is what makes her an eclectic and adaptive 360° artist. In 1978 the first
Wuthering Heights video is released and it features Kate Bush dancing indoor a white dress,
resembling Cathy’s ghost:
https://youtu.be/-1pMMIe4hb4
and then in the second video she is dancing outdoor in a red dress in a setting recalling the
famous Yorkshire moors:
https://youtu.be/BW3gKKiTvjs

If you haven’t watched them yet, be prepared to be hypnotized because Kate’s body movement are
not easy to forget. In both videos, the performance is expressive and theatrical both in the scenes,
in the colors and in the eye-catching, sinuous movements. These two videos put into perspective
her well versatility and innovation as an artist.

Bush interpreted Cathy’s character and feelings by mixing and creating connections between
the novel and her own life experiences. In fact, Bush is in the song with Cathy, with the same
fears and the same human need for love. Her ethereal high notes resemble those of a mermaid’s
voice, as “non-human”, the beauty of the interpretative dance moves she performs bring Cathy’s
character to life, the innovative sounds were ahead of their time as they only became a trend in
the subsequent decade; the intertextuality she uses to compose the story put Bush at the center
of the scene in the 80s, and solidified her as innovative, eclectic and future-oriented artist.

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