Another Brontë contemporary in Brussels

It will be remembered that the latest issue of Brontë Studies included an article called Brussels in 1847: Extracts from the Journal of Jenny Heslop. Well, we have found a 'similar' one, only by a more garrulous woman, which, for some strange reason, the writer of this review thinks could have come out of a Brontë novel(make of that what you will):

Witness "The Clumsiest People in Europe: Or, Mrs. Mortimer's Bad-Tempered Guide to the Victorian World," by Todd Pruzan. Last year's deftly edited reprint of these unintentionally hilarious ethnocentric screeds comes out in paperback in June (Bloomsbury USA, $9.95, 208 pages), quite the bargain if you (like me) missed it earlier. Seemingly out of a Charlotte Bronte novel, the vitriolic Mrs. Favell Lee Mortimer began her career as a children's author with a terrifying primer on Christianity, 1833's "The Peep of Day." Then, despite only having visited Brussels and Paris, she turned her dour sights on geography and culture with 1849's "The Countries of Europe Described," followed by equally dim views of Asia, the Pacific, Africa and the Americas.

These are Mrs Mortimer's views on the Irish:

The Irish are the "merriest, drollest people in the world," yet their religion is Roman Catholicism, "a kind of Christian religion, but a very bad kind."

Surely Charlotte *is* nodding frantically at that! :D

Categories: Books, Charlotte_Brontë