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No matter which of Alice Hoffman's novels you choose to read, you can always expect a bit of the supernatural to haunt its pages.
Review by Nan Goldberg
So "Here on Earth," with its very pointed title, is a sort of ironic departure for Hoffman: She has chosen to retell the classic nineteenth-century Gothic tale "Wuthering Heights" -- leaving out the magic and the ghostly presences, and arriving at a more credible, though equally tragic, ending.
The story unfolds in contemporary Massachusetts but otherwise remains virtually unchanged: It begins when Henry Murray, a kindhearted country lawyer, rescues the teenage Hollis from the streets of Boston, and brings him home to Jenkintown to live with his own son and daughter in their motherless household. The son, Alan, has a weak character and a nasty streak, and will eventually let jealousy of Hollis develop into a feud that ruins both their lives. The young daughter, March, becomes romantically obsessed with Hollis from the moment she sees him.
Their torrid love affair is recognizably the story of Catherine Earnshaw and her beloved Heathcliff. And it culminates, as in "Wuthering Heights," in Hollis' abrupt departure because of a perceived slight by March; March's long, desperate wait for his return; and her eventual marriage to Richard, the earnest, casually wealthy next-door neighbor who has loved her hopelessly for years.
Hollis returns to town, mysteriously wealthy, respectable, and somehow irrevocably twisted inside. Learning that March has married Richard and moved to California, he weds Richard's sister and torments her; drives Alan into poverty, alcoholism and ruin; and informally adopts and raises Alan's son -- a good deed that's rooted in hatred. And of course he waits -- for March to return.
Nineteen years later, she does. Arriving with her rebellious adolescent daughter, Gwen, to attend the funeral of the woman who raised her, March is irresistibly drawn to Hollis and, once in his power, unable to free herself. Emotionally and sexually obsessed, she risks her marriage, her safety and her sanity.
Here Hoffman performs a twist on the familiar plot line. March does not die, as Cathy Earnshaw does; she does not return in ghostly form to redeem Hollis' tormented soul. Instead, she lives, and in living she is forced to live with her mistakes.
It takes March a long, long while to discover that Hollis is no longer the boy she once loved, that his bitterness and rage have transformed him in terrible ways.
But in slowly learning to cope, she begins to reach a level of understanding that poor dead Cathy never attained.
So you might call "Here on Earth" a feminist version of "Wuthering Heights."
Did we really need a feminist version of "Wuthering Heights"? Probably not. Can it compete with the original in drama or intensity? Unfortunately, no again. But "Wuthering Heights" is a hard act to follow, and anyway, tragic figures who never learn the self-inflicted nature of their tragedy are always more fascinating than those who figure it out.
So read "Here on Earth" for its own sake. It's got interesting, real-life characters; it's erotic, romantic and sad; and it's a great read.
Nan Goldberg is the former book review editor of "The Record" in Bergen County, New Jersey.
©1997, ProMotion, inc.
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