This was really tough. Or not really. It was, at the beginning.

I was reading in English and, to my disbelief, or not willingness to admit it, I realized I understood almost nothing. Or I was simply not getting it, or perhaps even didn’t want to.

I was on the verge of giving up, assuming this was another book society had somehow gotten wrong again, and that it didn’t deserve my time, for I obviously know best what a good book should feel like.

Except that—no. I couldn’t do it again. Please, not this time. There had to be something wrong with me; this was impossible.

I went back to the beginning and started reading again, trying to decipher unknown words in almost every paragraph.

Still in vain.

Am I crazy?

I went to Reddit asking something like: “How the hell am I supposed to understand Wuthering Heights?”

To my surprise, I learned that even native speakers struggle with it. Not so much because of the content, but because of the old English.

So perhaps I wasn’t entirely to blame. That gave me some motivation.

But how was I supposed to read it and actually understand it?

I could, of course, get a Czech translation. But to me, reading a book in another language than the original is like watching a movie with subtitles. If I speak the language, why another?

If only this language weren’t completely beyond my capacity.

Then I did the unspeakable.

ChatGPT.

I sometimes pasted in entire paragraphs, asking it to translate them into simpler English and Czech. At that point, I thought it would mainly help improve my English, or perhaps simply help me catch the nuances between the two languages.

And they say AI is crap.

Jesus Christ.

And how was it?

Even once the language becomes clear, the book still demands a great deal of focus, especially at the beginning. Perhaps because of that, one constantly wonders what the story is really about. It does not become clear until about twenty or thirty percent in, when it mostly seems like a recollection of old memories.

Then, before I knew it, I was there. The story suddenly finds its track. The somewhat lazy, confused stream that at first seemed not to know where it was going soon turns into a river with a steady flow.

And it gets rougher and rougher—brutal, in fact. This is a book from the 19th century, written by a woman. I admire her.

Yet the narrator feels so gentle and innocent. So human. At least the narrator, yes. The other characters, however, feel like living hell—more human then?

The way they interact with each other turns the reader into a breathless witness hidden in the corner of the room, not daring to move for fear of missing a single word, a single gesture, of what is happening.

It is direct to the point of being fatal. One starts to wonder: if this could be created in the mind, could it also have happened in real life?

No doubt it could. It did.

It was written nearly two hundred years ago. That is how strong and lasting hate and the desire for revenge are. But let’s be honest—goodness is stronger.

Now I was no longer reading some paragraphs twice or even three times because I didn’t understand. Now I was reading because I wanted to feel and live the experience over and over again. The result was that, along with the translations, I had practically read the book twice in one go.

It strikes me that people, with all their intelligence and passions, are willing to use them mainly for the destruction of others—and thus themselves too. And it strikes me that time does not seem to change that at all. No matter the age we live in, the human mind does not evolve morally. It may even be shrinking.

Because of the language, I was not able to determine how well the text fits the rhythm of its time. Occasionally, it felt a bit jumpy, but it never lacked emotion. This makes me think it does not matter what we say, or even how we say it. What truly matters is what we feel—everything else will be understood.

I keep asking myself how someone who had no electricity, probably ate porridge for breakfast every day, travelled on horseback, and could easily die from illness still managed to create something like this. Its brilliance casts a long shadow over much of today’s intelligence. We can only google.

The psychology and morality of this work inspire a certain faith in humanity. The philosophy is as simple—or as difficult—as life itself. It answers questions even without asking. Not necessarily the grandest ones, but the most human. And amid all the hatred, cruelty, and chaos, there appears perhaps the most unexpected thing of all—and much needed as well—humor.

This is exactly the kind of book you finish and you still want to ask: “And what happened next?”

Oh God, thank you I didn’t give up. This was a lesson for me. I’m deeply touched.

Masterpiece.