Wuthering Heights: what race is Heathcliff?

As my previous blog post was about race and “diverse casting” in period dramas, let’s talk about Heathcliff: what is his race/ ethnicity?

This is how Heathcliff is described by Mr Lockwood, a stranger and the first narrator of Wuthering Heights: 

“He is a dark-skinned gipsy in aspect, in dress and manners a gentleman: that is, as much a gentleman as many a country squire: rather slovenly, perhaps, yet not looking amiss with his negligence, because he has an erect and handsome figure; and rather morose.” (ch.1)

When Heathcliff returns after a three years’ absence, Nelly Dean also describes him as having “dark face and hair” (ch.10). The word “gipsy” appears 6 times throughout the novel—said by Mr Lockwood, Mrs Earnshaw, Hindley, Mrs Linton, Joseph, and Edgar Linton—6 different characters. Some of these characters however also use different terms throughout the story. 

In one scene, to cheer up little Heathcliff, Nelly Dean says: 

““A good heart will help you to a bonny face, my lad,” I continued, “if you were a regular black; and a bad one will turn the bonniest into something worse than ugly. And now that we’ve done washing, and combing, and sulking—tell me whether you don’t think yourself rather handsome? I’ll tell you, I do. You’re fit for a prince in disguise. Who knows but your father was Emperor of China, and your mother an Indian queen, each of them able to buy up, with one week’s income, Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange together? And you were kidnapped by wicked sailors and brought to England. Were I in your place, I would frame high notions of my birth; and the thoughts of what I was should give me courage and dignity to support the oppressions of a little farmer!”” (ch.7) 

I have come across some readers who naively think this means Heathcliff is half Indian half Chinese, but all this means is that Nelly Dean—and therefore we—cannot tell Heathcliff’s parentage and origin. It might mean that she doesn’t know what Indian and Chinese people look like (who look too different to be mixed up); or we can read that speech as Nelly Dean babbling some nonsense to cheer up an upset child. 

Emily Bronte complicates matters. Mrs Linton for example says: 

“I declare he is that strange acquisition my late neighbour made, in his journey to Liverpool—a little Lascar, or an American or Spanish castaway.” (ch.6) 

The term “Lascar” is used for sailors from India or South Asia. 

All these different terms mean that Heathcliff is racially ambiguous, and that it’s Emily Bronte’s intention that his ethnicity is uncertain—the main point is that he is clearly an outsider—he is an outside force that brings destruction upon the Earnshaw family (and the Linton family) and harmony is restored only when he’s gone. I don’t think Heathcliff is simply a white guy with darker skin and dark hair, like Italian or Spanish; but I also don’t think he’s black, as depicted in the 2011 film, because he would be called a “mulatto” and there would be no ambiguity. My guess is that Heathcliff is mixed race—his father is Mr Earnshaw and his mother is either “Gypsy” or Indian. If we look at the cast of the 2026 film, Heathcliff in my head would not look like Jacob Elordi but perhaps more like Shazad Latif, an actor of mixed English, Scottish, and Pakistani descent, who for some odd reason is cast as the pale and blond Edgar Linton. 

I would say though that Heathcliff’s racial ambiguity is important and Emily Bronte can maintain and emphasise the uncertainty because this is a novel—a screen adaptation has to commit to one interpretation or another—I personally think Heathcliff is mixed race. 

What do you think?