Jane Eyre in Romania and more

Today's edition of the Romanian newspaper Jurnalul National comes with a DVD: Jane Eyre 2006.

Jane Eyre 
Jurnalul Naţional le oferă cititorilor săi, din 10 octombrie, o colecţie specială de filme, marca BBC: Eroii literaturii universale.
Colecţia cuprinde 10 ecranizări ale celor mai importante romane clasice englezeşti, realizate sub forma unor miniserii de peste două sute de minute.
 Personajele romantice, pasiunile, intrigile şi controversele sunt ingredientele care dau unicitate acestei colecţii romantice.

An alert from Wellington, Colorado:

Wellington Public Library Book Club:
The next book club meeting is scheduled for Dec. 5 at 7 p.m. to discuss “Jane Eyre” by English writer Charlotte Brontë. (North Forty News)

Cathy's glamorous dreams

The New Criterion quotes from Wuthering Heights in order to describe glamour.

One of the best descriptions of glamour isn’t a description of glamour at all. In Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë’s dark and stormy novel, Catherine Earnshaw explains to her maid Nelly the intense hold her dreams have over her: “I’ve dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they’ve gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind.”
Like Earnshaw’s dreams, glamour colors the way we see the world and changes how we want to experience it. The promise it offers—an escape from the ordinary business of life, communion with beauty, and transcendence—is intoxicating. But it is also dangerous and deceitful. Glamour glosses over reality and presents a picture of how life ought to be. When we try to collect on its false promise, we get in trouble. (Emily Esfahani Smith)

The Fort Wayne News-Sentinel does its bit for reading... and for keeping gender stereotypes:

Now for young readers: I know they are “Hunger Game” fans, and I can understand that. But please do not forget the wonderful books that have been written throughout the years that should be part of everyone’s education. Each year I suggest some, like the Brontës' and Jane Austen’s books for girls and Jack London’s and John Steinbeck’s for boys. Edgar Allan Poe can still fascinate young readers, and Guy de Maupassant is still one of the best short-story writers ever. (Betty Stein)

Annabella Lwin of Bow Wow Wow talks to The Huffington Post and recalls,

"My mum took me to London. But then I ended up going to the countryside -- because my mother had family all in the countryside. You know, Cathy and Heathcliff? -- yeah, that was the kind of area I was brought up in." (Gregory Weinkauf)

The Bontë Parsonage Facebook Page brings our attention to the fact that there's a writing competition with the subject 'Inspired By My Museum' organised by the British Council and Sampad. Click here for further details.

Air on Brontë Moor

A very interesting event takes place today in Bradford:

Air on Brontë Moor
Bradford Cathedral, Wednesday 4 December 2013, 7.00pm

Music, Film & Poetry respond to the lives, the works and the landscape of the Brontës.
David Wilson composed Air on Brontë Moor in 2012 - a suite of music inspired by the Brontë landscape. Photographer and film maker, Simon Warner then shot a series of short films in response to the music and the films were screened with the live musical accompaniment at conference on the Brontës at the Brotherton Library in Leeds in February 2013.
David and Simon have now been joined by poet Adam Strickson who has written a series of poems inspired by the lives and works of the Brontës and will also read poetry by Ted Hughes, Syliva Plath and Charlotte and Branwell Brontë as part of a live performance at Bradford Cathedral on Wednesday 4th December 2013.
Composer and musician, David Wilson said that the music which is part composition and part improvisation was inspired by walks on Haworth Moor, the landscape around Haworth and its influence on the lives and works of the Brontës. (Yorkshire Times)

More information on Nick Cass and Simon Warner's websites.

And at the Universität Trier (Germany):

Das Fach Japanologie und das Zentrum für Ostasien-Pazifik-Studien (ZOPS)
laden ein zu einem Vortrag der japanischen Schriftstellerin
Mizumura Minae
zum Thema:

„A True Novel and Wuthering Heights: the Formation of Modern Japanese Literature”
Sunday, 4. December 2013, 18 h

Memories and books

IndieWire's Criticwire has asked a bunch of film and TV critics about their favourite memory of watching a movie with their family.

Alonso Duralde, The Wrap, What the Flick?!
Growing up with immigrant parents and six older siblings, I have any number of moviegoing memories from my childhood: being allowed to put off my homework because Hitchcock's Notorious was coming on, all of us piling into the car and driving across town to a rep house to see William Wyler's Wuthering Heights, sitting through Ball of Fire and Young Frankenstein with my father and watching him laugh harder than I'd ever seen him do. Sometimes, my family had a sense of humor all its own: No one thinks of these comedies as classics, but we would drop everything or stay up late if We're No Angels (the Michael Curtiz original), Bedtime Story (later remade as Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) or The Out-of-Towners (itself also remade) came on television in those pre-VCR days. My parents are no longer with us, but my brothers and sisters and I can always make each other laugh by quoting the waiter on the train from the latter film, telling the sensitive-stomached Jack Lemmon that all they have left is "peanut butter and crackers, and clam juice -- but it's not cold." Happy Thanksgiving. (Sam Adams)

USA Today critic Olivia Barker hasn't really enjoyed Joanna Trollope's Sense and Sensibility (a modern retelling of the novel of the same name by Jane Austen). She thinks that,

Modernized classics are audacious affairs to begin with, and they work best when the original characters are all but obscured, updated with more than mere iPod-studded nods to a different era (The Flight of Gemma Hardy, a recent retelling of Jane Eyre, is an exquisite example of how to do it right).

Another book reviewed today is Diane Setterfield's Bellman & Black. From The Star (Malaysia):

The Thirteenth Tale took Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and echoed and warped it so eerily that the author earned gushing plaudits for her deft interpretation.
Just as The Thirteenth Tale was homage to Charlotte Brontë, Bellman & Black homages Charles Dickens, but less skilfully. (Nick Walker)

Hot Press has interviewed Anne Rice and recalls the fact that,

Rice describes Great Expectations and Jane Eyre as huge influences on her as a child. Surely it is no coincidence that they are the stories of orphans who spend time in huge, lonely buildings. At 15, Rice’s mother died after a long battle with alcoholism. Her father sent his daughters to St. Joseph’s Academy – “a dilapidated, awful, medieval type of place”. Rice admits it took her a long time to recover from that painful period. She couldn’t even find solace in writing. (Roe McDermott)

Dear Author reviews The Tenant of Wildfell Hall while Alternate Readality reviews Agnes Grey.

Sicilian Brontës

A book published in France last month has a tenuous Brontë connection.

Dictionnaire insolite de la Sicile
Régine Cavallaro
Éditions Cosmopole
Posée tel un diamant sur la mer, la Sicile est une terre fertile et envoûtante qui a toujours attiré les voyageurs. Située au coeur de la Méditerranée, maintes fois conquise par ses voisins – Phéniciens, Grecs, Normands ou Espagnols –, elle a accumulé au fil des siècles un patrimoine historique, artistique et humain exceptionnel. Une richesse peu connue que ce dictionnaire permet de (re)découvrir. Sait-on, par exemple, que le diable aurait laissé dans un monastère une lettre mystérieuse ? Que la légende du cyclope tire son origine du crâne de l’éléphant nain ? Que les sœurs Brontë doivent leur nom à un village sicilien ? Que l’on peut skier sur les pentes de l’Etna… Régine Cavallaro est journaliste spécialisée dans le voyage et traductrice. Elle a longtemps collaboré aux magazines Ulysse, pour lequel elle a réalisé, entre autres, les numéros consacrés à l’Italie, et Courrier International dont elle a participé au lancement. Aujourd’hui, elle partage son temps entre Paris et Palerme, ce qui lui permet d’alimenter amoureusement son blog sur l’île de ses origines : http://siciliabellissima.com 
Parution : novembre 2013 Prix : 11 euros - 160 pages (Translation)

Last Tango at Wuthering Heights

Anjelica Huston shares her seven favourite coming-of-age books on The Week.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë [...]. A novel of great intensity and moral sensibility in which, as in Beauty and the Beast, love conquers all.

The BBC series Last Tango in Halifax is the subject of a couple of articles in the press, both of them sort of connecting it to the Brontës. According to the Leeds Student,

Inspired by her elderly mother’s second marriage, Sally Wainwright has created a drama that is more Alan Bennett than Wuthering Heights: quiet and understated but still packing a hefty punch. (Ben Cook)

While the Daily Mail looks at several places seen on the series, such as

Holdsworth House hotel and restaurant, in Calderdale near Halifax, is looking forward to starring in the second series. The elegant, ivy-clad Grade II listed building was home to the cast and crew for several days during September while filming took place in the lounge, restaurant, bar and garden.
This character-filled Jacobean manor house dating back to the 17th Century is on the edge of Brontë country and no stranger to famous guests. A year after it first opened as a hotel, the Fab Four came to stay for John Lennon's 24th birthday in October 1964. (Bridget McGrouther)

TV Equals reviews the Fallout episode of Masters of Sex.

On the other hand, we have the arguably more despicable Austin- at least in his own way. After all, the guy repeatedly and regularly cheats on his wife, and his reaction to finding out he’d gotten one of the girls from the sex study pregnant wasn’t exactly positive, if admittedly amusing. “I’m not insensitive to the needs of women,” he pleaded to a bewildered Masters, “I mean, I read ‘Jane Eyre’ in college. Or no, Jane Austen.” (Full disclosure: I might have laughed more at this than I normally would have, as I just had to read both of the above for class myself, so I felt his pain somewhat!) (Mark Trammell)

Brontë Moments

Via the Brontë Parsonage Blog we have discovered this book by the former Region 3 (Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma) representative of the US Brontë Society, Paul Daniggelis:

Brontë Moments 
A Compilation
Authored by Mr Paul Dean Daniggelis
Createspace
Publication Date: Oct 05, 2013
ISBN: 9781477553138

This compilation is a potpourri of several previously published articles (with new material and photos) in addition to three fiction pieces (short story, poem, novella) all related to the Brontë family of literary classics such as Jane Eyre (Charlotte), Wuthering Heights (Emily) and the Tenant of Wildfell Hall (Anne). I consider myself privileged to be able to write about this most remarkable family.
It is dedicated to the late Prof. Joan Helena Quarm, Professor Emerita at the University of Texas at El Paso, whose dedication to her craft was an inspiration to the author.
I have taken the liberty of thanking you in advance by providing an autographed inscription page.

The answer is probably Charlotte Brontë

Richard Osman gives clues to win at Trivial Pursuit in The Guardian:

[L]earn a few lists. My tips would be Oscar -winning films, kings and queens of England and capital cities of the world. If you know everything on these lists, people will think you are clever for the rest of your life.
And if all that fails, then the answer is probably Charlotte Brontë. Good luck!

Also in The Observer Catherine Bennett defends the validity of all-women literary awards like the Baileys (ex Orange) award:

Yet, while the men-excluding prize is associated – at least by Baileys – with celebration, and described by one supporter, Martha Lane Fox, as "joyous, glamorous, high profile", affirmative action anywhere else is continually denounced as demeaning and out of the question, often by influential, nominally feminist women, competing to see who can sound most like Kingsley Amis or, to be more accurate, Robert Southey, when he told Charlotte Brontë to put a sock in it ("Literature cannot be the business of a woman's life").

The Illinois Valley News Tribune reports the publishing of a ballad poem by a local author, Kiersch Haase, Violae:

Though she’s never been to Yorkshire in England, Lucia Kiersch Haase wrote her 45-page epic from the point of view of her own character. She did a great deal of research before trying to write in the “voice” of Megan Flame, a fictitious writer in England who has been inspired by the works of the Brontë sisters.
Kiersch Haase usually writes in sonnet or a formal verse. This time it’s all in ballad form. She’s written in the form before, but never one that could be considered a book. (...)
Kiersch Haase said members of her online community helped her with the editing process. Some of them are from parts of England not far from the moors and the land described by the Brontës in their 1800s works.
Kiersch Haase’s ballad, “Violae,” she said, is a love poem set in the latter 1800s. It’s about Violae, “who meets Theobald, the true love of her life,” a press release from Kiersch Haase noted. (Craig Sterrett)

El Confidencial (Spain) lists the going-to-bed habits of several writers/celebrities:

La autora de Cumbres borrascosas sufrió problemas de insomnio a lo largo de toda su vida, lo que muchas veces provocaba que diese vueltas alrededor de su habitación con el objetivo de cansarse y, así, conciliar mejor el sueño. Aunque la estrategia tiene su lógica, probablemente sería poco útil, ya que el cansancio sería contrarrestado por una acuciante sensación de nerviosismo causada por la activación del ejercicio físico. El insomnio ha sido, no obstante, una fecunda inspiración para poetas de muy diferente pelaje, como es el caso de Walt Whitman o Robert Frost, cuyos trabajos se recogen junto al de Brontë en el volumen Acquainted with the Night: Insomnia Poets (Columbia University Press). (Héctor G. Barnés) (Translation)

Stefania Marini sings the wonders of the traditional book love in Il Tempo (Italy):

Quelli che dopo anni custodiscono ancora gelosamente l’«Antologia di Spoon River» ricevuta in regalo da un amico, con tanto di dedica vergata dalla biro blu sul frontespizio, oppure spolverano con cura nella libreria del salotto la collezione dei romanzi di Jane Austen e nei pomeriggi uggiosi amano rileggere pagine, che ormai conoscono a menadito, di «Cime tempestose» e «La mia Africa». (Translation)

The News-Leader is not very conviced about the BabyLit classic books for toddlers; CubaSí announces the screening of Wuthering Heights 2011 in the XXXV La Habana Festival Internacional del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano (5-15 December) in an Andrea Arnold retrospective; the film is reviewed on harimohan paruvu; Linda blogs about her visit to Haworth and the Brontë Parsonage Museum on the English University of Leicester Blog; the harsh light of day... reviews Jane Eyre; Ordinary Reader has not loved Charlotte Brontë's first book, The Professor; via fuck yeah Jane Eyre we found this lovely Jane Eyre collage by Kiss Me Hardy, Kiss Me Quick.

Emily Brontë and the Religious Imagination

In all probability this is one of the scholar Brontë books of the year:

Emily Brontë and the Religious Imagination
Simon Marsden
Published: 21-11-2013
ISBN: 9781441166302
Imprint: Bloomsbury Academic

Readers of Emily Brontë's poetry and of Wuthering Heights have seen in their author, variously, a devout if somewhat unorthodox Christian, a heretic, or a visionary "mystic of the moors". Rather than seeking to resolve this matter, Emily Brontë and the Religious Imagination suggests that such conflicting readings are the product of tensions, conflicts and ambiguities within the texts themselves. Rejecting the idea that a single, coherent set of religious doctrines are to be found in Brontë's work, this book argues that Wuthering Heights and the poems dramatise individual experiences of faith in the context of a world in which such faith is always conflicted, always threatened. Brontë's work dramatises the experience of imaginative faith that is always contested by the presence of other voices, other worldviews. Her characters cling to visionary faith in the face of death and mortality, awaiting and anticipating a final vindication, an eschatological fulfilment that always lies in a future beyond the scope of the text.

Table Of Contents

Acknowledgements \ A Note on Texts \ Introduction: The Unfinished Sentence \ 1. Enchantment \ 2. Christianity \ 3. Death and Eschatology \ 4. Faith, Doubt and Wuthering Heights \ (not) Conclusion \ Notes \ Bibliography \ Index

Reviews

“Marsden provides new readings of elements in Emily Brontë’s work that have baffled scholars and readers: his readings of “No coward Soul” and Wuthering Heights, for example, provide a coherent analysis of seemingly irreconcilable elements of her work and thought. Marsden’s is not a dogmatic reading – such a reading would run counter to Brontë’s thought -- but a perceptive reading based on Christian epistemology, hermeneutics, and ontology. Marsden accounts for the religious elements in Brontë’s work even as he gives full recognition to her “somewhat heterodox” or even “heretical” stance toward Christianity.”
Micael M. Clarke, Associate Professor of English, Loyola University, Chicago, USA.

Victorian luminaries

counterpunch reviews A True Novel by Minae Mizumura:

Here’s something different: shifting Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights to Japan with the audacity of calling it “a true novel.” But wait a moment—as my mother-in-law used to say—you don’t really mean that, do you? Well, I don’t, but Minae Mizumura does, so let me explain. Mizumura sets up an elaborate façade: the story we eventually read is purported to be what literally happened to a man called Taro Azuma, whose life in many ways parallels Brontë’s Heathcliff. There are also suggestions at the beginning of the novel that Japanese readers do not like first-person narratives, so it is necessary to create an observer/witness who can relate Azuma’s story, though in fact two people narrate the story, one of them being Minae Mizumura herself, the author of A True Novel and an accomplished Japanese novelist. (...)
It is, thus, from Yusuke’s perspective that we learn about Taro’s early years—before he went to the United States. The second narrator is a woman named Fumiko (ten years Taro’s elder, and the equivalent of Ellen Dean, the housekeeper in Wuthering Heights) who relates the more recent events, after Azuma’s so-called disappearance. (...)
And because of the sympathy of the matriarch of the family Fumiko worked for, that boy (Azuma) became the close companion of one of the matriarch’s granddaughters, Yoko (the equivalent of Catherine in Brontë’s novel). (...)
Are the parallels between the two novels convincing? I’d say yes, particularly the replicated characters and romanticism of Brontë’s masterpiece. That noted, I’m not so certain that the 876 page story will grip Western readers as much as Asian ones. There are quite a few lengthy digressions that add little to the main story. Some of the other anomalies of A True Novel (such as a series of photos of traditional buildings in the country) appear to be little more than superfluous. You may want to read A True Novel out a sense of curiosity, especially if you are a Brontë fan. (Charles R. Larson) 

Los Angeles Times recommends the book as a gift book:

Some are almost traditionally rendered, such as Japanese novelist Minae Mizumura's ambitious "A True Novel" (Other Press, boxed, $29.95 paper). It is published as a two-volume boxed set including photographs and inspired, in some sense, by "Wuthering Heights," while also raising questions about where the line between fiction and remembrance lies. (David L. Ulin)

The Telegraph talks about the jeweller Annina Vogel:

At her concession in Liberty, hand-selected antique rings are engraved with quotations from Victorian luminaries such as Oscar Wilde and Charlotte Brontë while the customer waits. (Wendy Douglas)

Joe Queenan in Wall Street Journal has read the mind of this half of BrontëBlog:

Here is my basic problem. I like to put nutritious things with lots of roughage and fiber in my head. Shakespeare, the Brontës, Vermeer. Except when I watch sports, I never fill my brain with the intellectual equivalent of trans-fats: game shows, talk shows, reality-TV shows.The concerts and plays I attend, the paintings I look at, the books I read, are all, in their own way, every bit as nutritious as beets and organic zucchini and walnuts. To my way of thinking, Michelangelo is nothing more than cerebral kale.
But I don't like healthy food. I never have. 

Los Angeles Review of Books reviews the new film Mary, Queen of Scots by Thomas Imbach:

A sort of dark fairytale cut from the same cloth as Jane Eyre and Farewell, My Queen, Imbach’s biopic Mary, Queen of Scots is sumptuously photographed and less interested in history than atmosphere. (Michael Nordine)

Cricket and Jane Eyre in The Guardian:

This is the joy of [Jonathan] Trott, who has for the last four years acted as a kind of Jane Eyre of the top order, England's own winningly stubborn little 19th-century governess of a No3 batsman, the player you weren't supposed to fall in love with, of whom you may have even been rather grandly scornful – this mousey creature, this pinafored artisan – before finding yourself seduced, irresistibly, by his quietly insistent rhythms. (Barney Ronay)

Leeds Student reviews a performance by The Leeds Tealights at the Library Pub:

Stephen Rainbird was the dark horse of the evening in my opinion and his facial contortions were unparalleled. His gestures were very much Mr. Beanesque; a childish silliness which had everyone in stitches. The Wuthering Heights routine in particular was nothing short of ridiculous. (Polly Gallis)

The Shields Gazette reviews a recent concert by the band China Drum:

Biscuit Barrel, Wipe Out, Baseball In The Dark, Fiction Of Life, God Bets, Wuthering Heights and, finally, weirdly, a cover of Erasure’s A Little Respect were all delivered with power. (Paul Taylor)

Rzeczpospolita talks about the Polish publication of a new translation of Villette and the (in)famous book  Charlotte Brontë i jej siostry śpiące by Eryk Ostrowski:

Śpią także zmarli spoczywający na cmentarzu w sąsiedztwie ponurego budynku. Za to z pokoju stołowego dochodzi dziwny stukot. To trzy siostry chodzą wokół ogromnego stołu. Najstarsza Charlotte, młodsza Emily i najmłodsza Anna. Jest jeszcze brat Branwell, alkoholik, opiumista i mason, ale on jeszcze nie wrócił z oberży Pod Czarnym Bykiem, by jak co noc zwalić się na posłanie i czekać na kolejny dzień swego zmarnowanego życia. Po co one tak chodzą? Zobacz na Empik.rp.pl
Eryk Ostrowski, autor książki poświęconej trzem siostrom Brontë, nie daje jednoznacznej odpowiedzi na to pytanie. Raczej sugeruje, że to właśnie podczas tych dziwacznych spacerów mogły powstawać fabuły, które złożyły się potem na takie książki, jak „Jane Eyre", „Wichrowe wzgórza", „Shirley" czy „Vilette". Klasyki literatury europejskiej powstałe w Anglii podczas długiego panowania królowej Wiktorii.
Życie Charlotte Brontë było nacechowane nieopisaną stratą. Nastąpił feralny rok 1848. Najpierw odszedł Branwell, z którym Charlotte od dzieciństwa była bardzo związana. Zapił się i zaćpał do szczętu. Nie to jednak było najgorsze – w grudniu na gruźlicę umiera Emily, a w maju następnego roku z powodu tej samej choroby odchodzi 29-letnia Anna. Stukot kroków jednej już tylko kobiety wypełnia stołowy pokój. Charlotte wciąż chodzi. Oczywiście w tym czasie są już wydane książki trzech sióstr, które ukrywały się pod męskimi pseudonimami jako Currer, Ellis i Acton Bell. W książce Ostrowskiego mamy opisaną ze szczegółami tajemnicę sióstr, o której zresztą spekulowano już za ich życia: twierdzono bowiem, że autorką wszystkich książek sygnowanych pseudonimami jest tylko jedna osoba, czyli Charlotte, która – chcąc zapewnić byt swym obydwu siostrom – zdecydowała się na rozdzielenie praw autorskich do honorariów. A jak było naprawdę?
Chodzi i chodzi wokół stołu. Strata po ukochanych osobach jest dojmująca. Z żałobnego stukotu powstanie najbardziej dojrzała powieść Charlotte zatytułowana „Vilette", opublikowana w trzech tomach w roku 1853. Po 100 latach wzbudzi zachwyt m.in. w Wirginii Woolf, która nazwie dzieło: „najlepszą powieścią Charlotte Brontë". (Wojciech Chmielewski) (Translation)

Wuz (Italy) reviews Amorino by Isabella Santacruce:

Siamo a Minster Lovell, freddo e austero villaggio inglese. E al tempo stesso "paradiso terrestre" del romanticismo nero. Un luogo fatato che è già da solo un romanzo - un luogo, si direbbe, non troppo dissimile dalla brughiera selvaggia delle sorelle Brontë.  (Claudia Consoli) (Translation)

Targatocn (Italy) posts some biographic data of the Brontës presenting Wuthering Heights:

Immaginatevi una storia triste. Poi immaginatevi la vita dell’autrice dietro questa storia ancora più triste.
Bisogna sempre fare attenzione a cercare negli spunti biografici dell’autore una lanterna che ci guidi nel testo: ma nel caso di “Cime tempestose”, il faut conoscere la vita dell’autrice. Perché leggendo la sua biografia, non si capisce più dove finisce il romanzo e inizia la vita. (Marta Gas) (Translation)

Zaman (Turkey) talks about Byzantium by Neil Jordan:

İrlandalı Neil Jordan’ın ‘Byzantium’u başka bir gözle izlendiğinde ise Viktoryen hikâye anlatıyor seyirciye. Clara ve kızı Eleanor’un erkekler dünyasında, erkeklere rağmen ama onların yardımını umarak var olma savaşı, vampir öyküsünden bağımsız olarak Kraliçe Viktorya’nın 19. yy. İngiltere’sini resmediyor. Bu yönüyle Clara ve kızı Eleanor’u Dickens, Doyle, Conrad, Eliot ve Wilde gibi erkek yazarlar karşısında çetin bir var olma savaşı veren Brontë Kardeşler, Emily Dickinson ya da Christina Rossetti’ye benzetebiliriz. (Ali Koca) (Translation)

The Bibliophilic Book Blog  interviews the writer Jac Wright:

Q. What are you currently reading?
I am re-reading ‘Wuthering Heights’ because it is one of the all-time greatest love stories. I read it in my early 20s.

Keighley News gives more details about the campaign against the closing of the Haworth Central Park's public toilets; Le Nouvel Observateur (France) describes Twilight as a mixture between Wuthering Heights and Romeo and Juliet; bibliodevafiliala3 (in Romanian) posts about Jane Eyre;  Or Up to the Stars reviews one of its most recent retellings, Tina Connolly's Ironskin; the Brontë Parsonage Facebook publishes a picture of Anne Brontë's last letter.

Jane Eyre dresses in Charleston

An exhibiton in Charleston contais dresses inspired by the Brontës:

Cathy Earnshaws and Elizabeth Bennets generally don't have that much in common. One, the headstrong heroine of Wuthering Heights, is reckless and passionate, in touch with her inner wildness, beautiful but cruel. If, during your girlish literary daydreams, you imagine yourself running across a misty moor, your unkempt hair flying behind you, you might be a Cathy.

The other, the "prejudice" in Jane Austen's beloved Pride and Prejudice, is independent and a bit mischievous, but always held together. If your dearest fantasy involves dancing decorously in a beautiful ballroom while you swap witty remarks with a wealthy, handsome stranger, you're almost certainly an Elizabeth Bennet.

The two fictitious ladies really couldn't be more different, but through April, you'll find them both at the Charleston Museum — in spirit, at least.  (Elizabeth Pandolfi in Charleston City Paper)

Fashion in Fiction
From the pages of classic literature comes the Charleston Museum’s latest textile exhibit, Fashion in Fiction, on exhibit October 19, 2013 to April 6, 2014. This exhibit explores the fundamental role clothing and style play in some of our most beloved works of fiction. From Jane Austen’s sprigged muslin dresses to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s swinging flappers and dapper gents, fashion often becomes integral to a story and even helps to fix it to a particular time in history. Using clothing and accessories from our historic textiles collection as well as books and illustrations from the Archives, the Charleston Museum offers a light-hearted look at popular 19th and early 20th century fashions and shows off styles brought to life by some of literature’s most memorable characters.

A familiar literary trope

The Memphis Flyer features the exhibition We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Terri Phillips, currently at the University of Memphis' ArtLab.

We Have Always Lived in the Castle is the title of a psychological thriller written in the 1960s by the novelist Shirley Jackson, who is most famous for her short story "The Lottery." The novel's teenage female protagonist, Merricat, lives with her troubled, half-dissolved family in a disintegrating mansion. It is a familiar literary trope, more common in the 19th century than the 20th: females living isolated lives in strange houses that echo their psychological struggles. Most people who sat through high school English can remember Charles Dickens' Miss Havisham or the troubled wife in the attic in Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane Eyre. (Eileen Townsend)

Comicus (Italy) interviews graphic novel author Ramón Pérez who speaks about his future plans:

La classica domanda di chiusura: progetti futuri? Su cosa stai lavorando?
Al momento, come stavo dicendo a qualcuno l'altro giorno, non penso più in settimane e anni, sto cercando di pensare in anni perché la tabella di marcia sta diventando molto fitta. Ho un sacco di cose, sto solo cercando l'ordine in cui farle. Lavorerò ancora con Archaia su un altro graphic novel con la sceneggiatrice Aline Brosh McKenna, che ha scritto Il diavolo veste Prada. Stiamo lavorando a una reinterpretazione moderna di Jane Eyre. Sembra forte, in pratica farò quello e un graphic novel un po' sul genere romanticismo nero, spero di essere il disegnatore giusto per il compito. (Dario Drago Forti) (Translation)

Still in Italy, TargatoCN features Emily Brontë.

The Telegraph and Argus has an article on a local pub landlord who has become a member of the Fellowship of Professional Celebrants. Meaning that he

is willing to conduct services anywhere, from his own watering hole to the wild Bronte moors. He has trained with the Fellow-ship to carry out ceremonies in whatever form, location and costume his clients want.
He said: “I can hold a ceremony in whatever style people want, such as a football or pagan theme.
“I think the Great Northern is the first pub in West Yorkshire where you can do the whole package, but we can also do it outdoors, from the Brontë Waterfall to Ilkley Moor.” (David Knights)

Diana Damrau sings Chaslin's Wuthering Heights

The composer, conductor and pianist Frédéric Chaslin has written to BrontëBlog announcing the world premiere recording of Cathy's Vocalise from his opera Wuthering Heights. It is included on the latest CD by no other than one of the most celebrated sopranos today, Diana Damrau:

Diana Damrau
Forever
Unforgettable Songs from Vienna, Broadway and Hollywood
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by David Charles Abell
With Rolando Villazón

The soprano Diana Damrau stars in the operas of Mozart, Verdi, Rossini, Donizetti and Strauss, but Forever is the ‘soundtrack of her life’ in the form of much-loved numbers from operetta, musicals and the movies – including Die Fledermaus, My Fair Lady, West Side Story, The Phantom of the Opera and The Little Mermaid. “This music shows a side of me that many people don’t know yet,” she says. “These tunes are great art, because they are associated with unforgettable moments in everyone’s lives.”

The last track of the album is Cathy's Vocalise. You can listen to it (courtesy of Mr. Chaslin) here.

The ultimate heroine

Bustle recommends '9 Big, Fat Books to Devour on Your Precious Days Off'.

Whether you celebrate Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, or Winter Solstice, the holiday season has finally arrived. With any luck you’ll have a few precious days to finally sink your teeth into that novel you never have time to read (let’s be honest, you never got around to reading Jane Eyre in college) during the work week. [...]
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Many people are quick to assume they know the books of the Brontë sisters but in reality have never read their work. Do yourself a favor and read Jane Eyre, a compelling, empowering novel about self-reliance in the face of adversity. Jane is the ultimate heroine. In spite of her underdog status she refuses to be taken advantage of — a huge statement considering this novel was published in 1847 under a pseudonym. Oh, and there’s the love story — between Jane and Mr. Rochester — that pretty much tops all love stories in the history of English literature. (Jessica Ferri)

John Mullan discusses Bridget Jones in the Guardian and recalls a Brontë reference in the first book.

We know Bridget Jones's Diary is based on Pride and Prejudice, and Bridget half knows it, too. She latches on to the comedy of handsome, aloof Mark Darcy sharing a name with Jane Austen's paragon of pride. When she first encounters him, at Una and Geoffrey Alconbury's New Year's Day turkey curry buffet, she notes the parallel. Instead of mingling happily, he stands with his back to the room, scrutinising the Alconburys' bookshelves: "It struck me as pretty ridiculous to be called Mr Darcy and to stand on your own looking snooty at a party." As bad, she thinks, as being called Heathcliff and spending your evening in the garden "shouting 'Cathy' and banging your head against a tree". 

The Times Law Section quotes from Jane Eyre:

Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre observes that "Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs. " That wisdowm can apply not only to outbursts such as that of Mr Higgins but also to those who use the law to settle a score after a long, smouldering lapse. (Gary Slapper)  

The Nation (Pakistan) mentions the poetry of Ayesha Zee Khan and thinks that

The reader can smell of Emily Dickinson and Charlotte Brontë. (Faizan Hussain)

Which we would consider two very different kinds of poetry.

The Republican Herald discusses books as gifts for children.

Tiffany Reedy, principal at Pottsville Area High School, likes that students read, but what they read could be better.
"Some of our students like to read, but I would think for most it would be a more popular series, like 'Hunger Games,' not a classic like 'Pride and Prejudice' or 'Wuthering Heights,' unfortunately," she said. (Stephen J. Pytak)

We think that if they enjoy reading they will read them sooner or later. Get them reading now and they will find their way to those books.

Esquire's The Politics Blog promises the following for next week:

Next week -- why Charlotte Bronte would have painted her face and brought an octopus to a Red Wings game. (Charles P. Pierce)

That will keep us on the edge of our seat.

Via DeHavilland we have noticed this speech by Labour MP Nic Dakin at the House of Commons which is a bit misleading:

MPs debate Tuberculosis (diagnosis and treatment worldwide)
Tuberculosis [Jim Dobbin in the Chair] 2.30 pm Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab): Let me start in the past. In 1821, Maria Brontë died of consumption. Two of her daughters died of the disease in infancy and her four older children—Bramwell (sic) and his famous.siters, Anne, Emily and Charlotte—also died of it. According to the history books, they became
“ill from dampness and terrible living conditions”.

Maria Brontë didn't die of consumption. The most likely cause of her death was cancer, probably of the uterus. And when he says that her children died of consumption, that's wrong too, as Charlotte Brontë's probable cause of death was hyperemesis gravidarum.

Onirik (France) reviews a theatre production based on Marie-Aude Murail's novel Miss Charity.

Au moment de la sortie de son roman, Marie-Aude Murail expliquait : « J’ai écrit Miss Charity pour rendre hommage aux créatrices du 19e siècle, à la volonté de fer qui leur fut nécessaire pour se frayer un chemin dans un monde régenté par des hommes. J’ai hésité sur le modèle à suivre, Jane Austen, la comtesse de Ségur, Charlotte Brontë ou George Sand ? Puis je me suis souvenue d’une biographie qu’on m’avait offerte quelque vingt-cinq ans auparavant, Le petit monde animal de Beatrix Potter, par Margaret Lane. Je l’ai relue et j’ai été émerveillée. C’est une vraie vie d’héroïne dans cette Angleterre victorienne que j’aime tant. J’ai transformé cette vraie vie en une fausse autobiographie, celle de Charity Tiddler, une héroïne qui, au fond, me ressemble, petite fille enfermée dans un cercle magique, et qui, peu à peu, lentement, parvient à exister aux yeux des autres. Elle en dessinant, moi en écrivant ». (Claire) (Translation)

Aunt Branwell’s Japan dressing box can be seen on the Brontë Parsonage Facebook page.

Gothic Fires

Two more variations around Jane Eyre to be found on Smashwords:

A lesbian twist on Jane Eyre:

Fires I Would Like To Know
Hannah Johnson
Published: March 09, 2012
Words: 6,810 (approximate)
ISBN: 9781465981448

'He tells me, like a regular Bluebeard, never to visit the third floor.' What if Jane Eyre had found another source of fascination at Thornfield Hall?

Gothic West
by Jill Morrison

Published by J Z Morrison Press
Published: April 13, 2013
Words: 40,780 (approximate)
ISBN: 9781301929184

Two novellas of love and obsession: In the Shade of Horses A reclusive artist, her nurse and her two sons struggle to keep their secrets. Lightspeed In a twist of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, a male tutor comes to ruined Las Vegas to encounter, and fall in love with, his female employer.

Lightspeed
In the early days of a very close future, Owen Bland is on his way to Vegas, a place inhabited by the obscenely wealthy and the obscenely poor. He has taken a job as a tutor, escaping his savage boarding school life. His employer, Evelyn Sales, is beautiful, rich and brilliant. As Bland comes to love this complicated woman, he finds himself drawn into the terrible secret she cannot leave behind.