With... Adam Sargant
-
It's our last episode of series 1!!! Expect ghost, ghouls and lots of
laughs as we round off the series with Adam Sargant, AKA Haunted Haworth.
We'll be...
5 months ago
Thursday, August 31, 2006
The North West Enquirer gives very clear directions on how to reach Wycoller Hall, the supposed real-life model for Ferndean Manor.We can't remember each stile and farm we passed along the way, but we are guessing this must be some sort of longer walk in order to see more scenery. It says 7 1/2 miles and 4 hours when we actually managed it in less. Or so it seemed.
The place is lovely and well worth a visit, Brontë connection or not.
(Picture by BrontëBlog)
Categories: Brontëana
One more article on movie adaptations of a Brontë novel. This time it's about Wuthering Heights, among others. We wonder they don't mention Jane Eyre as well, since the article is on the relationship between classics and film adaptations. You know you can't always judge a book by its movie.
As a former high school English teacher, and as a parent, I can empathize. My 15-year-old daughter is plowing through “Wuthering Heights” for her English class. I haven’t bothered telling her there are four — count ’em, four — movie versions of the Bronte classic. But when she is done with the book, we’ll sit down and watch one of them — likely William Wyler’s 1939 version with Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon, considered the gold standard.
Students should be forewarned of the pitfalls of relying solely on cinema to do the work for them. For instance, Wyler’s “Wuthering Heights” covers only up to Chapter 17 of a 36-chapter book. I’d advise completing the thing in its entirety if you prefer a passing grade. (And no cheating by watching the movie and then reading only the last 19 chapters.)
In fact, it’s a given that in most movie adaptations of big books, timelines are compressed, characters excised, and action streamlined to squeeze hundreds of pages of text into a two-hour time frame.
However, there's speculation that Emily might have intended to write only that in the first place. But since The Professor wasn't accepted by the publisher, there was a volume of the third-volume edition to fill. Hence, many people consider that the second generation is sort of an "afterthought". Who knows, really.
Now - how would that teacher look if the student were to add this to their essay? Highly surprised, surely!
Categories: Wuthering_Heights, Movies-DVD-TV
As a former high school English teacher, and as a parent, I can empathize. My 15-year-old daughter is plowing through “Wuthering Heights” for her English class. I haven’t bothered telling her there are four — count ’em, four — movie versions of the Bronte classic. But when she is done with the book, we’ll sit down and watch one of them — likely William Wyler’s 1939 version with Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon, considered the gold standard.
Students should be forewarned of the pitfalls of relying solely on cinema to do the work for them. For instance, Wyler’s “Wuthering Heights” covers only up to Chapter 17 of a 36-chapter book. I’d advise completing the thing in its entirety if you prefer a passing grade. (And no cheating by watching the movie and then reading only the last 19 chapters.)
In fact, it’s a given that in most movie adaptations of big books, timelines are compressed, characters excised, and action streamlined to squeeze hundreds of pages of text into a two-hour time frame.
However, there's speculation that Emily might have intended to write only that in the first place. But since The Professor wasn't accepted by the publisher, there was a volume of the third-volume edition to fill. Hence, many people consider that the second generation is sort of an "afterthought". Who knows, really.
Now - how would that teacher look if the student were to add this to their essay? Highly surprised, surely!
Categories: Wuthering_Heights, Movies-DVD-TV
From Thursday 31st August until Sunday 3rd September 2006, Haworth celebrates the Arts Festival.There are many activities going on:
The festival was re-launched last year and left a lot of people smiling. On that basis, it seemed a good idea to run it again this year. Because of the experience we gained, this year’s festival is going to be bigger, brighter and, we hope, better.
There’s going to be a whole range of events. Amongst other things, ghost stories in the graveyard; chainsaw sculpture; legendary poets; a parade of minis (the cars, not the dresses); art exhibitions; drumming workshops…okay, the list is pretty long. If you want to peruse it at your leisure, go to http://www.haworthartsgroup.co.uk – there is bound to be something that you’re interested in. Tickets and a brochure detailing all events will be available from Tourist Information (top of Main Street) from the beginning of August.
Two of the activities can be of interest to BrontëBlog readers. Both are taking place next Sunday, September 3:
The first one is not exactly Brontë-related, but as Joolz Denby is the Artistic Advisor of the upcoming Bradford Radical Brontës Festival and we published very recently an extensive article with her opinions about the Brontës, we highlight:
Joolz
West Lane Baptist Church: 2pm (September, 3)
Joolz Denby is an award-winning, multi-nominated novelist and poet and is considered to be the UK’s premier woman spoken-word artist.
Joolz has an international reputation for excellence in all her creative fields including her work as an illustrator, photographer and exhibition curator.
Cost: £5/£3
Poetry Writing Workshop
Brontë Parsonage Museum: 3:30pm
Sue Wood, local poet and winner in the Fish International poetry competition, will lead a Brontë themed poetry workshop. Includes free entry to the Brontë Parsonage Museum.
Cost: £3/£2
Categories: Haworth, Art-Exhibitions, Poetry
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Some days ago, Ruth Wilson was interviewed about her upcoming appearance in the new Jane Eyre BBC production. Now, her partenaire in the series, Toby Stephens, is the one interviewed in The Times. Among many other things he talks a little about what it is like to play Edward Rochester.Brooding, fiery, enigmatic — the object of Jane Eyre’s desire has caused a million female hearts to flutter. Enter Toby Stephens, heart-throb in waiting.
This could be the Mr Darcy moment for Toby Stephens. Eleven summers ago Colin Firth was just another good-looking British actor. Then came the BBC’s Pride and Prejudice. Firth, as Darcy, dived into a lake and emerged, wetly, in a clinging shirt, a star. In a few weeks, the BBC begins its four-part adaptation of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. Toby Stephens plays Rochester, the heroine’s mysterious lust object.
Apparently Mr Stephens is a bit of a recluse when it comes to promotion, etc, so if his word is to be trusted we won't be seeing him much despite the foreseeable media impact the new version of Jane Eyre will have.
His director on Jane Eyre, Susanna White, responsible for the second half of Bleak House, is trying to find his decision to scarper amusing. He admits that Sandy Welch, the adaptor, is appalled.
“She and Stephen Poliakoff (her TV dramatist husband) have this attitude that you want to be there and enjoy the whole thing, watch it go out on TV. I have an absolute terror of that.”
But now for the juicy bits - what he has to say about playing Rochester:
The contradictory aspect of this is that Stephens knows what Jane Eyre could mean for him. He says he grabbed at the chance with both hands. He then worked extraordinarily hard filming it, mainly at Haddon Hall, over a particularly cruel Derbyshire winter. “I remember sitting in the main hall thinking: ‘This is f***ing torture.’ My face was frozen in this kind of rictus and I thought: ‘This is going to be Rochester’s expression. I can’t move anything.’ It was horrible for about three, four weeks and then it slowly started thawing out. By the summer it was the most beautiful place on earth.”
He appreciates that, rictus grin or not, his Rochester will not satisfy all of the book’s devotees. “Every woman has their own idea of Mr Rochester. I’d had this image in my head of him being this rather remote, enigmatic, taciturn figure. And I read the book again and, actually, he never shuts up. He just grinds on and on and on, and he’s actually quite theatrical.”
In the book Rochester has to adapt to a female personality as wilful as his own. Susanna White says that Stephens exhibited no comparable agonies working for a female director.
I doubt that Brontë lovers will be objective about his Rochester. Controversy may also surround Ruth Wilson, the unknown whom White chose to play Jane. At least, however, having met her briefly on location in the spring, I can confirm that she looks the part. But is the world ready for a ginger Rochester? “Oh, he looks very different from me, I promise. I wore hair extensions and have black, curly shaggy hair. In the book the both of them are quite plain physically. At the time, what was seen as attractive was somebody slim and fair in a cavalry uniform; he was this shaggy, dark, blue-chin, person. But she finds him handsome.”
To judge from the few pictures we have seen - it doesn't seem like we're going to be disappointed about his looks. Nor about Ruth Wilson's.
And the article ends with this statement:
Jane Eyre is to be broadcast on BBC1 next month
That is September, so if the screening in London takes place on September 16 we are guessing this might be airing the weekend after that but more probably the last weekend of September. We will see.
Categories: Jane_Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV
Some years ago, when Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie was published, Anchee Min (author of Red Azalea and Becoming Madame Mao) said:
I recommend this book highly. I myself was also secretly introduced to Western culture through literature during the Cultural Revolution when I first read a hand copied Chinese translation of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.
Since those days many things have changed in China. The Guardian publishes how the black Penguins are prepared to enter into the Chinese market and the Brontës are in the first line: Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.
It has taken more than 70 years, but Penguin has finally arrived in China. The British publisher announced yesterday that classics such as Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Oliver Twist, Crime and Punishment and Moby Dick would be translated into Mandarin and sold under its logo in the world's fastest growing book market.
Categories: In_the_News, Books, Translations,Wuthering_Heights Jane_Eyre
I recommend this book highly. I myself was also secretly introduced to Western culture through literature during the Cultural Revolution when I first read a hand copied Chinese translation of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.
Since those days many things have changed in China. The Guardian publishes how the black Penguins are prepared to enter into the Chinese market and the Brontës are in the first line: Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.
It has taken more than 70 years, but Penguin has finally arrived in China. The British publisher announced yesterday that classics such as Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Oliver Twist, Crime and Punishment and Moby Dick would be translated into Mandarin and sold under its logo in the world's fastest growing book market.
The first 10 novels will go on sale in November under a licensing deal with a local partner that could eventually see the UK firm marketing Chinese literature and the works of Marx and Engels to a population of 1.3 billion people. (...)
They are unlikely to hit the best seller lists in a country where, with the exception of Harry Potter, the most popular publications are usually management guides, self-help books and biographies of the rich and famous. But the British firm is betting that the titles, which also include Dante's Inferno, Victor Hugo's Hunchback of Notre Dame and Leo Tolstoy's Resurrection, will have a long shelf life and beat off competition through the quality of their translations, expert introductions and copious footnotes. (...)
Penguin, which was founded in 1935, has previously sold the rights to English-language titles, but this is its first venture into the market under its own logo. It is a cautious first step. Under an agreement with Chongqing Publishing Group, the print run for the first 10 titles will be just 10,000 copies. At 20 yuan (£1.45) each, the revenue will hardly make an impact on the global balance sheet, but Penguin's chairman, John Makinson, said the company was looking at China as a long-term market. "We want to establish the Penguin brand in the Chinese market."Categories: In_the_News, Books, Translations,Wuthering_Heights Jane_Eyre
Bernard Herrmann is arguably one of the most important composers of the XXth century. He is better known for his soundtracks, especially the ones he composed for Alfred Hitchcock. In 1944 he composed the music for the Robert Stevenson's classical Jane Eyre.But his relation with the Brontës goes further. In 1951 he composed an opera based on Wuthering Heights. The libretto, that covers only the first half of the novel, was written by Herrmann's first wife Lucille Fletcher. It was recorded in 1966, reissued in 1971, in four LPs with the Pro-Arte Orchestra directed by Herrmann himself. In 1993, Unicorn-Kanchana released the opera in 3CDs, now pretty unavailable.
The Bernard Herrmann Society published last June an interview with Norma Herrmann, the third wife of Mr. Herrmann and Wuthering Heights is one of the topics discussed:
Günther Kögebehn: Did he ever sing Wuthering Heights to you?
Norma Herrmann:
Herrmann sing? Sing? It was the worst, worst sound. Worse than even playing the piano! Oh god, oh no, he couldn’t sing. Absolutely not - No!
You know to do Wuthering Heights he walked every step in Yorkshire and all the places where it took place. His heart and his soul was in that. He used to say one day somebody will do it. During my years with him there were about 4 or 5 approaches from different opera companies wanting to do it. And he said, they can’t afford the set, they can’t afford the size of orchestra and then he did it himself on record.
He was mad on Emily Bronte. He used to make a joke about why he got in with a Yorkshire girl, because his soul was up in the moors with Cathy. He once conducted the Halle Orchestra in Sheffield, this was after his divorce, and the leader of the orchestra said to him “Don’t you want one of our Yorkshire lasses? Don’t you like our Yorkshire lasses?” And then he used to tell this tale, “I ended up with a Yorkshire lass.”
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
The Yorkshire Post publishes an article by Joolz Denby, the Artistic Adviser to the Radical Brontës Festival. As a matter of fact, the article is the introduction to the Radical Brontës brochure that can be found on the Illluminate Festival website (you can downloaded it here).Ms. Denby explains clearly who are the Brontës that she's trying to uncover from the Brontë merchandising (which in a way is still an appendix of that Victorian reconversion of the coarse Charlotte Brontë into the angel-in-the-house in Lucasta Miller's words) and the fast-food Brontës of the movie adaptations. Although we don't agree with everything she says (i.e. that image of Patrick Brontë is still too anchored in Gaskell's preconceptions or the sexual abuse topic, why does some modern scholarship have this tendency to judge everything by 20th-century standards?, etc) , she is quite right in many other things:
It's not hard to find things I hate about the Brontës – I could give you a list a yard long, but just for starters:
1. Dainty tea shops called after Brontë characters serving fourth-rate rubbish also named after the Brontës or one of their characters. I once saw a Brontë Burger. A friend reported a Branwell Sundae – what was that comprised of? Two scoops of vanilla with absinthe sauce and opium sprinkles?
2. Adaptations of Brontë novels – especially Wuthering Heights, which is one of my all-time favourite books so this really gets my goat – featuring terminally fey French actresses as Cathy and lugubrious English accents with soupy Oxbridge-RADA accents as Heathcliff. She wanders drippily around a highly manicured moor while he looks slightly cross and snaps at people irritably.
Neither of them look like they could summon up enough passion to get mildly narky about the weather, never mind convey the stark, brutal emotional violence that is the hallmark of this amazing novel.
No, yet again the TV or Hollywood castrate this remarkable work in order to create soppy Victorian weepies that are carefully constructed to make sure no-one gets offended by the original story – which they might if they actually knew anything about it – and also that after its short turn at the cinema, Sunday afternoons are ruined throughout the country by the matinee showing of this farrago of spin.
3. And, while we're at it, why will no one ever cast an Asian actor as Heathcliff, when there are constant references to his being very likely of either full or half Asian extraction? When he is brought to Wuthering Heights, a small child rescued from the streets by the Liverpool docks where he is starving, he is referred to as possibly being a child of a Lascar (an Asian seaman) or a gipsy, which in those days would have meant a true Romany, rather than an Irish
traveller. He is called "dark" throughout, and the loquacious housekeeper narrator Nelly Dean says of him: "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". She also mentions the "gibberish that nobody could understand" he kept repeating on his first arrival which was probably some phrases in Romani or an Asian language. The racial subtext in this novel – Heathcliff cannot marry Cathy because she is white, cannot – and should not – be ignored.4. The fact no one now seems to fully realise the terrible personal suffering endured by these incredibly brave and resourceful women and what an incredible story it is in itself that they managed to bring their work to the public. They battled against the scourge of tuberculosis – a cruel and terrifying disease that laid waste most of the women in the family, leading to the impression that for every book that was published one of the sisters died. They lived in the kind of "genteel" poverty that led them to be constantly malnourished (and I do mean they literally didn't get enough proper food to eat) and forced them to live in cold, damp conditions. Some of them were sent by their father – a selfish petty tyrant with a violent temper – to boarding schools so barbarous and brutal in their regimes that they more resembled concentration camps than education facilities.
Their beloved brother was a hopeless junkie and alcoholic whose ruinous life more resembled that of Pete Doherty than the Byronic figure he is so often painted as. Some of the experts have suggested the sisters were serially sexually abused – a topic which even now people prefer not to discuss, but which was utterly taboo in Victorian times – leading to their notorious fugue states, possible anorexia and worse.
Except for Charlotte's tragic late marriage, they never formed lasting relationships with partners, no love, no romance, no sex-life, no companionship. Their lives by anyone's standards were horrible. But they wrote like fiery angels and left a legacy so brilliant it is admired all over the world.
I expect by now you can see it's not the Brontës I hate, it's the rape and pillage of their reputations and images I despise. So let's take the sisters seriously. Let's bring them back to the place of honour and respect they deserve. Because you know what, they really do deserve it.
Bradford-born novelist and poet Joolz Denby is artistic adviser to the Radical Brontës festival.
The Radical Brontës, which is part of Bradford's Illuminate Festival, runs from September 14 to 24. We have reported information about the different activities that will take place, as the presentation of Wuthering Heights: The Graphical Novel by Siku and Adam Strickson, Cornelia Parker's exhibition at the Brontë Parsonage Museum: Brontëan Abstracts. There are many others that we will be presenting in future posts (you can check them here if you don't feel like waiting).
Categories: In_the_News, Art-Exhibitions
Poetry for the Spirit: Poems of Universal Wisdom and Beauty is a collective book of poems edited by Alan Jacobs and published by Duncan Baird Publishers & Watkins last July:This is the greatest anthology of spiritual poetry that has ever been collected.
The sheer range of the source material is extraordinary: it spans all ages from the very early mystics over 4,000 years ago right through to the 20th century and includes contributions from every spiritual tradition – from every age.
Through this original and insightful anthology of mystical poems, we gain glimpses of the spiritual path from poets both famous and forgotten. There are poems from the pens of English-language writers as diverse as Sir Philip Sidney, John Donne, Christina Rossetti, W.B. Yeats, T.S. Eliot, Ted Hughes and Seamus Heaney, as well as literary translations of poetic passages from the Rigveda, the Bible, the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita and the Tao Te Ching; with contributions from legendary writers such as Teresa of Avila, Dante, Rumi, William Blake and Ramana Maharshi. There are 600 poems by more than 250 poets.
One of the poets is Emily Brontë. Two of the poems are hers: The Philosopher and Last Lines.
And still on poetry, we have come across this recent edition of the Poems of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell (the original book of poems by the Brontë sisters published by Aylott & Jones in 1846). This seems to be some kind of original reprint, but we are not sure.
Details:
- Paperback: 222 pages
- Publisher: BiblioBazaar (July 24, 2006)
- Language: English
- ISBN: 142640686X
Categories: Books, Poetry, Charlotte_Brontë, Emily_Brontë, Anne_Brontë,
Monday, August 28, 2006
One question that no one has ever asked about Charlotte Brontë is, if she came back as a dog - what kind of dog would she be? Well, perhaps it's not the image you had in mind, but in the picture you can see Charlotte Brontë the yellow lab, by Leon Hale himself (click here to find out more about Charlotte Brontë the dog and Leon Hale).The best thing that's happened lately was the greeting we got from Charlotte Bronte the yellow Lab, when we came home after a three-weeks absence. She carried on for half an hour about how glad she was to see us, and delivered a long speech granting us forgiveness for going off and leaving her at home.
Many newspapers print an article concerning a TV series that run from 1966 until 1971 called Dark Shadows. Apparently, it was reminiscent of Jane Eyre:
"Dark Shadows" premiered on June 27, 1966, a "Jane Eyre"-like Gothic drama about a young governess named Victoria Winters (played by Alexandra Moltke) who comes to live in a spooky old Maine mansion called Collinwood.
Movie legend Joan Bennett, then 56, played Elizabeth Collins Stoddard, matriarch of the Collins family.
Series creator Dan Curtis took advice from his children: Make the show scarier.
First, the show introduced a ghost. The ratings went up. Then, a few other spooks came to Collinwood. Viewership increased again. "When we put the vampire on, forget it -- the ratings went through the roof," Curtis said in the interview, included on a DVD.
But you know how these things go. Large house + governess = Jane Eyre.
Going by influences and reminiscences, we read on A Ramble in the Park a review on Firelight. Mysticgypsy - the author of the blog - was intrigued by this post where we talked about the film in connection to Andrea Galer (who, alas, didn't get to take the Emmy home yesterday) and got hold of a copy of the film. This half of BrontëBlog hasn't watched the film so can't comment much on it. But it makes for an interesting point of view, especially if you have seen the film.
And finally, Dan Harper writes about his travels in the footsteps of famous authors, and in favour of this way of travelling. What can we say? Despite it being frowned upon by many people, visiting literary shrines is for us one of the most interesting and fun things in the whole wide world.
Over the years we have tried to walk in the shadows of Thomas Hardy, D.H. Lawrence and the Bronte sisters in England.
Yes, that's right, we can only walk in their shadows.
Categories: Movies-DVD-TV, Charlotte_Brontë, Weirdo
Our first Brontëite lives in Florida, US. Her name is Ginny Esson and we read on The Villages Daily Sun how:
Since the mid-1970s, Esson has amassed more than 70 albums filled with photos and memorabilia related to the United Kingdom. (...)
Esson compiled several albums that are devoted to Brontë Society, a literary group that focuses on the Brontë sisters —Charlotte, who wrote “Jane Eyre”; Emily, who wrote “Wuthering Heights”; and Anne, who wrote “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall".
Several paintings and books are on display in one bedroom. Esson also has framed pictures of her posing at locations described in the books.
Esson had heard a radio dramatization of “Wuthering Heights” and “I just loved it.
“I found the book in the attic, and it’s the best thing I ever read,” she said. “Then I stumbled upon ‘Jane Eyre.’”
Next we go south, to Mexico, and we discover in this article published in La Jornada how the Mexican writer Sergio Pitol (awarded last year with the prestigious Cervantes award) loves Wuthering Heights:
"Sergio confessed to me: Wuthering Heights is, in my formation, a definitive work, the perfect model to structure a novel, an oblique writing, when I first read it I was extraordinarily impressed with the construction of the novel through a labyrinth of stories, of filters, that prevent the reader to know with exactitude what it's going on."
Further on the south, in Argentina we find how Florencia Bonelli, writer of romantic novels, confesses her devotion to Jane Eyre:
(...) the first book that I read and marked me forever was Jane Eyre.
And crossing the Atlantic we arrive in Spain where the singer and writer, Cristina Rosenvinge talks about Wide Sargasso Sea:
"I just finished it. It's a perfect book. (...) It's a wonderful novel because it assumes the risk of using the reference of Jane Eyre, the protagonist of the great writer Charlotte Brontë, but with a different and modern style. It's a masterpiece in itself (...) This book is a very interesting study about how madness begins in women. It describes little by little how a woman can be driven crazy by love."
Categories: Brontëites
Since the mid-1970s, Esson has amassed more than 70 albums filled with photos and memorabilia related to the United Kingdom. (...)
Esson compiled several albums that are devoted to Brontë Society, a literary group that focuses on the Brontë sisters —Charlotte, who wrote “Jane Eyre”; Emily, who wrote “Wuthering Heights”; and Anne, who wrote “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall".
Several paintings and books are on display in one bedroom. Esson also has framed pictures of her posing at locations described in the books.
Esson had heard a radio dramatization of “Wuthering Heights” and “I just loved it.
“I found the book in the attic, and it’s the best thing I ever read,” she said. “Then I stumbled upon ‘Jane Eyre.’”
Next we go south, to Mexico, and we discover in this article published in La Jornada how the Mexican writer Sergio Pitol (awarded last year with the prestigious Cervantes award) loves Wuthering Heights:
"Sergio confessed to me: Wuthering Heights is, in my formation, a definitive work, the perfect model to structure a novel, an oblique writing, when I first read it I was extraordinarily impressed with the construction of the novel through a labyrinth of stories, of filters, that prevent the reader to know with exactitude what it's going on."
Further on the south, in Argentina we find how Florencia Bonelli, writer of romantic novels, confesses her devotion to Jane Eyre:
(...) the first book that I read and marked me forever was Jane Eyre.
And crossing the Atlantic we arrive in Spain where the singer and writer, Cristina Rosenvinge talks about Wide Sargasso Sea:
"I just finished it. It's a perfect book. (...) It's a wonderful novel because it assumes the risk of using the reference of Jane Eyre, the protagonist of the great writer Charlotte Brontë, but with a different and modern style. It's a masterpiece in itself (...) This book is a very interesting study about how madness begins in women. It describes little by little how a woman can be driven crazy by love."
Categories: Brontëites
Sunday, August 27, 2006
The Arizona Republic confirms what we already knew without Oprah telling us:
Even Oprah's reading list now includes the classics. She has put her golden O stamp on Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights and a box set of William Faulkner novels. That has helped bring them to the attention of young readers, said Peoria Unified District's Rosa McCollum, 39, an English teacher and assistant principal. "Oprah has made the classics cool again," she said.
In our humble opinion classics were always cool in the first place. To show this, you just have to browse through our archives and see the amount of people in love with the Brontës and the many forms of art they have inspired. Here's one more example:
[In Writing Life,] Jane Urquhart, for example, best known for her novels, offers a pair of poems about the creative demons that haunted those novelist sisters of the 19th century, Charlotte and Emily Bronte.
If you remember, we presented the collective book Writing Life some time ago.
Otherwise, why would publishing houses use Jane Eyre as a means of selling a book? And they tend to do that even when the connection is quite tenuous, as you well know! People just have to read the classics to see many of them are as gripping - and much better - than most books in the best-seller lists today. It's only that the word "classic" seems to scare many people away for unknown reasons.
And finally, here's wishing Andrea Galer the very best tonight at the Emmy's!
Outstanding Costumes For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special
Bleak House (Masterpiece Theatre) • Episode 1 • PBS • A BBC WGBH-Boston Co-production in association with Deep Indigo
Andrea Galer, Costume Designer
Charlotte Morris, Assistant Costume Designer
She already won a BAFTA TV Award for Best Costume Design earlier this year. BrontëBlog would like to wish her all the luck. Hopefully a year from now we will be able to report a new nomination and many awards for her work in Jane Eyre 2006.
Categories: Books
Even Oprah's reading list now includes the classics. She has put her golden O stamp on Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights and a box set of William Faulkner novels. That has helped bring them to the attention of young readers, said Peoria Unified District's Rosa McCollum, 39, an English teacher and assistant principal. "Oprah has made the classics cool again," she said.
In our humble opinion classics were always cool in the first place. To show this, you just have to browse through our archives and see the amount of people in love with the Brontës and the many forms of art they have inspired. Here's one more example:
[In Writing Life,] Jane Urquhart, for example, best known for her novels, offers a pair of poems about the creative demons that haunted those novelist sisters of the 19th century, Charlotte and Emily Bronte.
If you remember, we presented the collective book Writing Life some time ago.
Otherwise, why would publishing houses use Jane Eyre as a means of selling a book? And they tend to do that even when the connection is quite tenuous, as you well know! People just have to read the classics to see many of them are as gripping - and much better - than most books in the best-seller lists today. It's only that the word "classic" seems to scare many people away for unknown reasons.
And finally, here's wishing Andrea Galer the very best tonight at the Emmy's!
Outstanding Costumes For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special
Bleak House (Masterpiece Theatre) • Episode 1 • PBS • A BBC WGBH-Boston Co-production in association with Deep Indigo
Andrea Galer, Costume Designer
Charlotte Morris, Assistant Costume Designer
She already won a BAFTA TV Award for Best Costume Design earlier this year. BrontëBlog would like to wish her all the luck. Hopefully a year from now we will be able to report a new nomination and many awards for her work in Jane Eyre 2006.
Categories: Books
The new BBC production of Jane Eyre is practically here. Recently, we reported that it was scheduled for late September. Furthermore, the special screening at the British Film Institute of the first two hours of the production will be held on September 16.Two weeks later (September 28) Penguin Books will reissue the Jane Eyre edition of Stevie Davies (that we presented last June) with a new cover featuring, of course, our new Jane: Ruth Wilson. No trace of Rochester (Toby Stephens), though.
These are the details:
- Paperback: 608 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd (28 Sep 2006)
- Edition TV tie in
- ISBN: 0141029080
Categories: Books, Movies-DVD-TV, Jane_Eyre
Saturday, August 26, 2006
The Yorkshire Post publishes an article today about the upcoming release of the Wuthering Heights graphical adaptation by Siku (illustrations) and Adam Strickson (text). We have posted previously about this publication (here and here, both with samples), but probably centering our comments on Siku's work. The article gives voice to Adam Strickson:The book, adapted by Yorkshire-based poet and playwright Adam Strickson and illustrated by Siku, one of the country's leading graphic artists, who has worked for Marvel comics and 2000AD, was commissioned by the Radical Brontës Festival, to be held in Bradford (15-24 September).
Both Mr Strickson, 48, and Siku, 34, worked on the project over six months and have created a book they hope will bring Wuthering Heights to a new generation of readers.
"I think the book is great," said Mr Strickson. "The visualisations are wonderful and I think Heathcliffe and Cathy are a bit sexier and sleeker than intended in the book but that is the style with this sort of thing.
"I kept the language close to the original, but the descriptive writing has been left out because it's all in the pictures. Siku has managed to recreate Yorkshire quite dramatically which is impressive because I don't think he has been here and it's all come from his imagination through reading the book."
Mr Strickson said he read Wuthering Heights nine times during the project but still enjoys it and hopes the graphic novel will lead a whole new audience back to the original novel.
The rest of the article is more focused on the Radical Brontës Festival:
The festival, which is the dream child of award winning novelist Joolz Denby, will look at the history and writing of the Brontë sisters from a radical point of view. Ms Denby, whose views of the Brontës are at odds with the conventional romantic portrayals of the writers, said:
"Never make the mistake of thinking the Brontë sisters were merely sweet, ringletted maidens sitting at home with their sewing. These intensely powerful writers, who dealt with the darkest and most savage material in their work, also had lives full of tragedy, struggle, disease and isolation."
Festival funding has come from the Illuminate project, a partnership run by the City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council that brings together Hull City Council, Leeds City Council, Sheffield City Council and City of York Council with cultural organisations and agencies across the region.
The festival will feature an art exhibition by Cornelia Parker, at The Parsonage Museum, Haworth.
Categories: Wuthering_Heights, Comics, In_the_News
The Sacramento Bee reviews several books that appear this Fall. The Thirteenth Tale written by Diane Setterfield and published by Orion (in UK) / Atria (US) next September, is one of them. The reviewer is a little bit confused about who wrote what:Here's a novel brimming with atmosphere and labyrinthine plotting that recalls the gothic-like chillers by Daphne du Maurier and Joyce Carol Oates, spiced with flavors reminiscent of "Jane Eyre" and "Wuthering Heights" by Charlotte Bronte (sic !!!!). The language is rich, the elements intriguing _ a secluded mansion populated by brooding characters, musty family secrets that must be unearthed, and ghostly presences that appear and vanish.
Vida Winter is a legendary author who over the decades has taken delight in making up stories about her past, most of which she tells during interviews with journalists. Now ill and aged, she wishes to tell the truth about her life. To that end, Winter commissions young but troubled Margaret Lea to move in to the ancestral estate, listen to her stories and write her biography. Lea, an amateur biographer, slowly learns that Winter's truth is far more bizarre than any of the fictitious versions she has fabricated.
Setterfield teaches French in England. "The Thirteenth Tale" is her debut novel, and was the subject of an international bidding war last year. Movie rights are expected to be snatched up soon.
On amazon.co.uk, a reviewer gives a more precise information of the Brontë connections:This is, quite simply, a rattling good yarn and that is not meant to sound derogatory in any way. One of those unputdownable books that take the reader over from the first page and leave you feeling bereft at the end. The story has everything, twins, a governess, house on a remote moor, a governess, warring siblings, abandoned baby, a fire - from this, it is clear to see that the author loves Jane Eyre (in fact quotes and references to this book abound) and, in the general decay and characteristics of its inmates, we are forcibly reminded of Wuthering Heights. There is a sneaky reference to Henry James The Turn of the Screw that sets your thoughts off at another tangent, and, in case you think this sounds all too gloomy and gothic, there are descriptions of the grounds and the gardener that make you think of The Secret Garden.
(Elaine Simpson-Long)
The Independent mentions the infamous Bloomsbury's editions of Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights that we have reported several times in the past.
Do you remember Cara Lockwood's Wuthering High? On ALAN online you can find an interview with the author:
Can you describe WUTHERING HIGH for our readers?
Wuthering High is the story of a haunted boarding school called Bard Academy. The ghosts are no ordinary ghosts, and while I don't want to spoil the ending, I will say that the lives of the students start to reflect classic books, like Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre. (...)
What are your plans for your next novel? Can you give us a peek? Yes! My next novel is a sequel to Wuthering High, and it's called The Scarlet Letterman. Miranda is back in book two, as well as love interests Ryan Kent and Heathcliff, who are still both trying to win her affection.
The Sydney Morning Herald's reporter Keith Austin travels around Lancashire County and visits Wycoller Hall:
My next stop is the car-free village of Wycoller (ancient bridges, old barns, Pierson's House - thought to be Ferndean Manor from Jane Eyre), which is an absolute delight. So all is well with the world. This is it, this is the green and pleasant land that you dream of, the England of myth made real.
Mark Richardson on Pitchford talks about the impact of listen to Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights in the late 70s:
But I heard "Wuthering Heights" and discovered that I wanted to live inside the song, to play it over again to see if I could figure out what made it so moving.
Categories: In_the_News, Books, References
Friday, August 25, 2006
The Taproot Theatre Acting Studio (in Seattle) organizes summer courses and classes with different theatre topics and levels. One of them is the Advanced Musical Theatre Supercamp:Aimed at young actors who want a taste of the professional world of musical theatre, this class is for the serious returning Acting Studio artist who wishes to take their performance to a new level. Each student will audition for a place in camp. Those who are accepted will audition for a role and be cast in a challenging Broadway musical.
Instructor: Sam Vance
Ages 12-18
The challenging Broadway musical is Gordon and Caird's Jane Eyre.Performances: Friday, August 25, 4:00 pm and Saturday, August 26, 10:00 am at TTC (Taproot Theatre Company, 204 North 85th Street Seattle 98103).
Categories: Theatre, Music, Jane_Eyre
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Old and new topics mix in this August 24 newsround.
The old ones:
A new review of Edward Mendelson's The Things That Matter appears today in The New York Times:
The rather cloudy essay on “Wuthering Heights” singles out childhood rather than adult love as the passion binding Catherine and Heathcliff. The opposite is true in “Jane Eyre”: Childhood was torment. She rejects Rochester until, an invalid and widower, he can become her husband without threatening her autonomy. “Reader, I married him,” she announces; Mr. Mendelson points out: not, “we were married.”
The Edmonton Sun publishes also a new review of the performanc:es of Jane Eyre. The Musical in the Edtonton's Fringe Festival. This time the reviewer, Erik Floren, seems more enthusiast than the last one :
Soaring melodies and a poignant love story culled from the classic novel Jane Eyre give this Broadway musical of the same name its beauty and rich depth.
In all these months publishing allusions and imaginative metaphores involving the Brontës we hadn't come across one tracing parallelisms between Jane Eyre's characters and computers:
Perhaps my computer had become more of a task-master than I imagined. Unlike the singular relationship pen has to paper, my computer holds all my tasks, so when I open the desktop’s folders, my attention remains divided among the projects I must sort through before starting on the one I choose. Putting pen to paper isolates the task at hand to the plain work
of putting words on paper. Plain like Jane Eyre, without adornment, straightforward. My computer had become Blanche Ingram, right down to her alabaster skin. (Amy Wink)
And a new novel that contains some Jane Eyre references. USA Today reviews Special Topics on Calamity Physics by Marisha Peissl.
Blue van Meer, the narrator and heroine of Special Topics in Calamity Physics, is a Keats-quoting wunderkind at the prestigious St. Gallway School in Stockton, N.C., gracefully able to reference works of both high (Jane Eyre) and dubious (Remembering "Solid Gold") literary merit.
EDIT: And yet more:
VueWeekly also reviews the Edmonton's production of Jane Eyre:
MacEwan brings the classic Charlotte Bronte novel to the festival, and I can’t help but wonder: why? It is such an elaborate production with an excessive cast that it sticks out. There is nothing Fringe about it. That said, they do not butcher, nor do they flatter, John Caird’s play.
And Georgia Straight reviews Peissl's book:
(Blue van Meer) jumpy overanalysis of everything and everyone is just one pleasure: “I had very little experience dealing with Dark Pasts, apart from close readings of Jane Eyre (Brontë, 1847) and Rebecca (Du Maurier, 1938) and though I’d always secretly seen splendor in melancholic chills, ashy circles stamped under the eyes, wasted silence, now, knowing each of them had suffered (if Hannah could be believed) it worried me.” Every sentence is that encrusted, that delicious.
Categories: In_the_News,Books, Theatre, Music, Jane_Eyre
The old ones:
A new review of Edward Mendelson's The Things That Matter appears today in The New York Times:
The rather cloudy essay on “Wuthering Heights” singles out childhood rather than adult love as the passion binding Catherine and Heathcliff. The opposite is true in “Jane Eyre”: Childhood was torment. She rejects Rochester until, an invalid and widower, he can become her husband without threatening her autonomy. “Reader, I married him,” she announces; Mr. Mendelson points out: not, “we were married.”
The Edmonton Sun publishes also a new review of the performanc:es of Jane Eyre. The Musical in the Edtonton's Fringe Festival. This time the reviewer, Erik Floren, seems more enthusiast than the last one :
Soaring melodies and a poignant love story culled from the classic novel Jane Eyre give this Broadway musical of the same name its beauty and rich depth.
With a haunting, memorable score and intelligent lyrics, Jane Eyre features musical jewels such as Forgiveness, Brave Enough for Love and In the Light of the Virgin Morning among its songs. (...)
Nicole Rowley has a lovely voice in the title role, and handles her character with the grace and conviction called for by the part (although she's certainly no plain Jane in looks).Her sweetly voiced renditions of Sweet Liberty, Secret Soul and Sail Away will linger in your mind.
Cody Michie boasts the ability and appearance to play a leading man in a musical, even one as emotionally complex as Edward Rochester. His voice, however, grew strained and then raspy toward the end of the show. He gamely carried on.
With all the soloing, duets and ensemble numbers, there's a demanding amount of singing in this show for the leads.
As Blanche Ingram, Stephanie Callow showcased her strong pipes and was particularly good in The Finer Things. Another fine voice was that of Lindsay McDonald as Helen Burns,
Myla Southward's wonderfully over-the-top performance as Mrs. Fairfax provided punchy comic relief, and was expressed through two buoyant tunes, Perfectly Nice and Slip of a Girl.
Many members of the strong cast of 16 have multiple roles. Ellie Heath was good in triple character as a schoolgirl, Cockney servant Grace Pool, and irrepressible French teenager Adele.
The musical concludes with a rousing Brave Enough for Love, neatly reprising a theme from earlier in the show. Written by John Caird and Paul Gordon, Jane Eyre wowed Broadway in 2000, as it did the audience at this performance.
It was well-cast and directed with a sure and creative hand by Tim Ryan.And in testimony to the reputation of Ryan and his MacEwan Theatre students, their production sold out the day I saw it. Which was amazingly because it was a Monday afternoon, normally a fairly quiet time at the Fringe.
And the new ones:In all these months publishing allusions and imaginative metaphores involving the Brontës we hadn't come across one tracing parallelisms between Jane Eyre's characters and computers:
Perhaps my computer had become more of a task-master than I imagined. Unlike the singular relationship pen has to paper, my computer holds all my tasks, so when I open the desktop’s folders, my attention remains divided among the projects I must sort through before starting on the one I choose. Putting pen to paper isolates the task at hand to the plain work
of putting words on paper. Plain like Jane Eyre, without adornment, straightforward. My computer had become Blanche Ingram, right down to her alabaster skin. (Amy Wink)And a new novel that contains some Jane Eyre references. USA Today reviews Special Topics on Calamity Physics by Marisha Peissl.
Blue van Meer, the narrator and heroine of Special Topics in Calamity Physics, is a Keats-quoting wunderkind at the prestigious St. Gallway School in Stockton, N.C., gracefully able to reference works of both high (Jane Eyre) and dubious (Remembering "Solid Gold") literary merit.
EDIT: And yet more:
VueWeekly also reviews the Edmonton's production of Jane Eyre:
MacEwan brings the classic Charlotte Bronte novel to the festival, and I can’t help but wonder: why? It is such an elaborate production with an excessive cast that it sticks out. There is nothing Fringe about it. That said, they do not butcher, nor do they flatter, John Caird’s play.
And Georgia Straight reviews Peissl's book:
(Blue van Meer) jumpy overanalysis of everything and everyone is just one pleasure: “I had very little experience dealing with Dark Pasts, apart from close readings of Jane Eyre (Brontë, 1847) and Rebecca (Du Maurier, 1938) and though I’d always secretly seen splendor in melancholic chills, ashy circles stamped under the eyes, wasted silence, now, knowing each of them had suffered (if Hannah could be believed) it worried me.” Every sentence is that encrusted, that delicious.
Categories: In_the_News,Books, Theatre, Music, Jane_Eyre
Some time ago, we posted about an unexpected and fascinating connection between the Brontës and Jorge Luis Borges that was unveiled in the book Literatos y Excéntricos-Los ancestros ingleses de J.L. Borges (Erudites and Eccentrics- J.L. Borges's English Ancestors) written by Martín Hadis (also the editor of Internetaleph).The author of the book, Mr. Hadis, has contacted us correcting and adding to the information that we posted:
Minor correction regarding the ALLBUTs: Mary Eleonora Allbut was indeed the daughter of Thomas Allbut (1777-1857) and Sydney Ashford.
As you correctly point out there´s a relationship between the Haslams and the Brontes through the Allbuts, but the three persons who were a) the father of Mary Eleonora b) the husband of Mary Anne Wooler and c) the distinguished physician are all called almost the same (THOMAS ALLBUT or ALLBUTT) but actually belong to three sucessive generations.
To re-cap:
Thomas Allbut and Sydney Ashford married on Feb 27, 1798 at St. Martin´s-in-the-Bull-Ring, Birmingham.
They had a number of sons and daughters (all of them with curious names - apart from Mary Eleanora, which we´re already familiar with, there were also Sydney Maria, Lauretta Jana and Frances Sarah Allbut. )
It is one of these sons, Thomas Allbut (Jr) (1800-1867), vicar of Dewsbury, named after his father, and brother of Mary Eleonora Allbut, who married Mary Anne Wooler on July 9th 1835. This Mary Anne Wooler indeed worked at Roe Head; in fact Mary Anne taught at Roe Head during the time that Charlotte Bronte was there. And Charlotte was well aware of Mary Anne´s courtship by Thomas Allbutt (Jr).
After Thomas Allbutt Jr married Mary Anne Wooler, they had the following children: Marianne Maria (1804-1906) and the distinguished Victorian physician Thomas Allbutt, the inventor of the clinical thermometer, appointed "Regius Professor of Physic" at Cambridge University.
For more information see: The Letters of Charlotte Brontë: With a Selection of Letters by Family and Friends, 1852-1855 , p. 190, footnote 7. (Letters of Charlotte Brontë). and also - Alexander, Christine. The Oxford Companion to the Brontes, pp. 10-11.This is indeed a fascinating connection. Especially because the Allbuts were a family of publishers, responsible for sending to print the writings of some other members of this erudite and eccentric clan. All through my research, I never ceased to be amazed by the extent to which the HASLAMs were inclined towards books - towards writing, reading, publishing. It is as if Borges´ works had been two centuries in the making. The two traits that Borges quotes in his "Poem of the gifts as " Books and the night "- - his literary inclination as well as his blindness- were both inherited from this side of the family.
Categories: Books, Scholar
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Two new Brontëites appear in the press today:
The Franz Ferdinand band confess their Brontëite-ness in this article that reports their appearance in the Edinburgh Book Festival:
Alex Kapranos, the band's lead singer, and Nick McCarthy, his fellow songwriter and guitarist, revealed their literary inspirations for a career that has so far netted six million album sales, the Mercury Music Prize and numerous other awards. (...)
Kapranos said he wanted to appear at the book festival because he believed song lyrics were an underrated part of literature. "I have always felt that songwriting and lyrics were seen as the poorer cousins of the literature world, but that's not necessarily the case," he said. (...)
The duo revealed an extensive list of books which had inspired them and their peers. Kapranos said: "If you are ever stuck for inspiration, just read a book." (...) Martin Amis's London Fields, a prime inspiration for Parklife by Blur, made their list, as did Wuthering Heights - by Emily Bronte, rather than Kate Bush.
In a quite different style, Filipino singer José Mari Chan also highlights Wuthering Heights as one of his top-10 favourite movies. We don't know which version, though.
And maybe we can create a new category of anti-Brontëites where we can include the sports editor of the Indiana Statesman who is currently reading James Tully's The Crimes of Charlotte Brontë:
I highly recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys a good murder plot with all the elements of love, suspense and deception entwined. It put some questions in my mind that I had never thought about, such as, "Was there a cold-blooded murderer at the heart of the Bronte family?" and "How did the sheltered daughters of a pastor know so much about love and death?" And last, but certainly not least, "Who really wrote 'Wuthering Heights'?"
Oh, well... here we go again.
Categories: Brontëites, In_the_News
The Franz Ferdinand band confess their Brontëite-ness in this article that reports their appearance in the Edinburgh Book Festival:
Alex Kapranos, the band's lead singer, and Nick McCarthy, his fellow songwriter and guitarist, revealed their literary inspirations for a career that has so far netted six million album sales, the Mercury Music Prize and numerous other awards. (...)
Kapranos said he wanted to appear at the book festival because he believed song lyrics were an underrated part of literature. "I have always felt that songwriting and lyrics were seen as the poorer cousins of the literature world, but that's not necessarily the case," he said. (...)
The duo revealed an extensive list of books which had inspired them and their peers. Kapranos said: "If you are ever stuck for inspiration, just read a book." (...) Martin Amis's London Fields, a prime inspiration for Parklife by Blur, made their list, as did Wuthering Heights - by Emily Bronte, rather than Kate Bush.
In a quite different style, Filipino singer José Mari Chan also highlights Wuthering Heights as one of his top-10 favourite movies. We don't know which version, though.
And maybe we can create a new category of anti-Brontëites where we can include the sports editor of the Indiana Statesman who is currently reading James Tully's The Crimes of Charlotte Brontë:
I highly recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys a good murder plot with all the elements of love, suspense and deception entwined. It put some questions in my mind that I had never thought about, such as, "Was there a cold-blooded murderer at the heart of the Bronte family?" and "How did the sheltered daughters of a pastor know so much about love and death?" And last, but certainly not least, "Who really wrote 'Wuthering Heights'?"
Oh, well... here we go again.
Categories: Brontëites, In_the_News
A post completing informations that we have been posting in the last weeks.Firstly, do you remember Deleers & Leclerq's Hurlevent graphical novel that we presented some days ago? Éditions Casterman have kindly provided us with the final cover. If you click on the right hand picture, you can enlarge the cover and if you check our post you can see some really nice samples.
Secondly, a few days back we posted about Hugh Dancy's addition to the cast of Brontë, the biographical film about the Brontës that Angela Workman writes and directs. We ended the post with the following question: Is Hugh Dancy our new George Smith? According to the imdb webpage of Brontë, he is.
And thirdly, a new name for the upcoming BBC production of Jane Eyre. This face on the left belongs to Ned Irish, he is George the Footman (we suppose he is the unnamed footman of Thornfield).
Picture credits: Andrew Chapman.
Categories: Comics, Fiction,Movies-DVD-TV, Jane_Eyre
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
The Edmonton Journal reviews the performances of Jane Eyre. The Musical in The Edmonton Fringe Festival that we recently presented. The reviewer, Liz Nicholls, doesn't seem too thrilled with the production and with the musical itself:(Picture: Nicole Rowley(?), courtesy of The Edmonton Journal).
With Jane Eyre HHH (Stage 5, King Edward school), we get to see a Broadway musical that picked up a 2000 Tony nomination for its Paul Gordon score, a version of the groundbreaking 1847 Charlotte Bronte novel. If director Ryan hadn't taught us that the musical theatre trolls widely for its literary provenance, this would seem, on the surface, like an improbable source: a complex Victorian narrative heavy on exposition. Even if the results are mixed, it is fascinating to see what music brings to an enterprise that travels widely through the years, event-filled. No accident that Brit director John Caird, who wrote the book, is one of the Les Miz team.
What turns out to be a natural fit for people bursting into song is the wincing chemical combination of the repressed and the luridly melodramatic, in the lush tale of the plain and plain-spoken orphan who overcomes her harsh upbringing and the brutal class system to prevail, a feminist scenario if there ever was one.
In truth, it all seems a little schematic, and the production sketchy, as we fly through Jane's tumultuous biography en route to the headliner: the love story of Jane and the mysteriously moody Edward Rochester, interrupted by occasional appearances from the lunatic upstairs lodger.
Gordon's songs, which veer from the gently melancholic ("there is a fever on my brow and I fear the time has come...") to the climactic pop(ish) anthem Brave Enough For Love, are proficient without being memorable. But the production is welcome on its own behalf, and a talent scout's delight. In addition to her luminous voice, Nicole Rowley brings intelligence and coiled tension to her role as Jane. The dithery half-deaf housekeeper, played by Myla Southward, gets the show's wittiest number. Cody Michie possesses vocal chops; youth and bearing conspire against his creating a complex, enigmatic, haunted Rochester. The choral moments reverberate.
Categories: In_the_News, Theatre, Music, Jane_EyreOld Bell Chapel, the place where Patrick Brontë used to preach in Thornton, has been undergoing repairs for four years, as this article reports. Sadly, the Bradford Council is failing to keep its commitment to the place while the volunteers are wondering whether their work has been in vain.
Volunteers working to preserve links between a village and the Bronte family have criticised Bradford Council for failing to carry out vital work - more than a year-and-a-half after it was requested.
An action group spent four years restoring the grounds of the Old Bell Chapel, in Thornton, Bradford, where Patrick Bronte preached before moving to the parsonage in Haworth.
Volunteers have cleared the overgrown site, repaired graves and headstones, installed lights and an information board and built a footpath to the historic chapel. They are now waiting for Bradford Council to complete the job and build a footpath and install drains on adjacent Thornton Road.
Site co-ordinator Steve Stanworth said installing drains was vital in order to protect the future of the site - which is quickly becoming a magnet for Bronte fans from around the world.
"In February last year I contacted the Highways Department to tell them of the need for a drain and a footpath," he said. "I was told the work would be completed by the end of that financial year. "
More than a year-and-a-half later we are still waiting. If this work is not carried out all the effort we have put in over four years will be in vain. "
Many headstones have fallen over because of the wet conditions in the cemetery caused, in part, by lack of a drain. This is an important site that needs this work doing.
"We spent around £10,000 putting in a path and sandstone worth around £1,000 has already been washed away."
A Bradford Council spokesman said they hoped to do the work later this year. (...)
Patrick Bronte preached at the chapel from 1815 to 1820 and Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne were all born at the parsonage on Market Street.
New volunteers are welcome to join the action group which meets each Saturday at the adjacent St James's church hall from 10am to noon.
We visited the place a few years ago and still found it a bit creepy because of the overgrown weeds and a certain monument on top of a tombstone. Nevertheless, it's an intersting trip as well as a nice little village. We truly hope the Bradford Council will be as good as their word and really start working on it before the end of the year. It should also be fun to join in as a volunteer - it should create a different kind of bond to the Brontë family :) Good luck!
Pictures: On the left, the Old Bell Chapel, today ( source); on the right: the Old Bell Chapel in 2004 (courtesy of BrontëBlog ;))
In similar - only much more agreeable - news: we recently reported the succesful story of Imelda Marsden's efforts to save Thornbush Farm. Today, though more tangently, we have heard of another house being given a grade II from English Heritage. According to the BBC News, Elizabeth Gaskell's house on 84 Plymouth Grove in Manchester, where Charlotte Brontë and other literary figures of the time such as Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray stayed, is starting its way to finally being the literary shrine it should have always been.
The Grade II-listed building, built in the 1830s, is described by heritage groups as second only in importance to the Bronte Parsonage at Haworth in Yorkshire.
It is also one of the few surviving buildings of its type in Manchester.
The property is owned by the Manchester Historic Buildings Trust, which is trying to save and restore it.
If you remember, last March the Lottery Fund and other sources donated over a million pounds to start the repairs, and English Heritage promised funding to come. Here it is, we suppose! It's always such great news to hear of a historic building being saved, especially if it's Brontë-related.
Categories: Brontëana, Patrick_Brontë,Charlotte_Brontë, In_the_News
Volunteers working to preserve links between a village and the Bronte family have criticised Bradford Council for failing to carry out vital work - more than a year-and-a-half after it was requested.
An action group spent four years restoring the grounds of the Old Bell Chapel, in Thornton, Bradford, where Patrick Bronte preached before moving to the parsonage in Haworth.
Volunteers have cleared the overgrown site, repaired graves and headstones, installed lights and an information board and built a footpath to the historic chapel. They are now waiting for Bradford Council to complete the job and build a footpath and install drains on adjacent Thornton Road.
Site co-ordinator Steve Stanworth said installing drains was vital in order to protect the future of the site - which is quickly becoming a magnet for Bronte fans from around the world.
"In February last year I contacted the Highways Department to tell them of the need for a drain and a footpath," he said. "I was told the work would be completed by the end of that financial year. "
More than a year-and-a-half later we are still waiting. If this work is not carried out all the effort we have put in over four years will be in vain. "
Many headstones have fallen over because of the wet conditions in the cemetery caused, in part, by lack of a drain. This is an important site that needs this work doing.
"We spent around £10,000 putting in a path and sandstone worth around £1,000 has already been washed away."
A Bradford Council spokesman said they hoped to do the work later this year. (...)
Patrick Bronte preached at the chapel from 1815 to 1820 and Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne were all born at the parsonage on Market Street.
New volunteers are welcome to join the action group which meets each Saturday at the adjacent St James's church hall from 10am to noon.
We visited the place a few years ago and still found it a bit creepy because of the overgrown weeds and a certain monument on top of a tombstone. Nevertheless, it's an intersting trip as well as a nice little village. We truly hope the Bradford Council will be as good as their word and really start working on it before the end of the year. It should also be fun to join in as a volunteer - it should create a different kind of bond to the Brontë family :) Good luck!
Pictures: On the left, the Old Bell Chapel, today ( source); on the right: the Old Bell Chapel in 2004 (courtesy of BrontëBlog ;))
In similar - only much more agreeable - news: we recently reported the succesful story of Imelda Marsden's efforts to save Thornbush Farm. Today, though more tangently, we have heard of another house being given a grade II from English Heritage. According to the BBC News, Elizabeth Gaskell's house on 84 Plymouth Grove in Manchester, where Charlotte Brontë and other literary figures of the time such as Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray stayed, is starting its way to finally being the literary shrine it should have always been.The Grade II-listed building, built in the 1830s, is described by heritage groups as second only in importance to the Bronte Parsonage at Haworth in Yorkshire.
It is also one of the few surviving buildings of its type in Manchester.
The property is owned by the Manchester Historic Buildings Trust, which is trying to save and restore it.
If you remember, last March the Lottery Fund and other sources donated over a million pounds to start the repairs, and English Heritage promised funding to come. Here it is, we suppose! It's always such great news to hear of a historic building being saved, especially if it's Brontë-related.
Categories: Brontëana, Patrick_Brontë,Charlotte_Brontë, In_the_News
We have came across this article published on the July issue of The Jacket where Nicholas Birns reviews A question of gravity: A selection of poems by Elizabeth Smithers (Arc Publications). In the book a quite funny, and absolutely tuned with this blog's topic, poem can be found.Smither sometimes starts out with a straightforwardly humorous premise, then leads the poem somewhere else. In ‘Error on a Quiz Programme’ she records the game-show challenge ‘Give me the name of three lady violinists/who lived at Haworth Parsonage.’ The confusion of the Bronte sisters with violinists sets Smither off on a series of musings about the counterfactual scenario of the three violinists:
Charlotte on the violin, Anne the viola
And Emily on the violoncello
Each evening in the dark drawing room
They drew up their instruments and played
With the wind above the graves
Charlotte was most in demand as a soloist.
Anne was too shy and with a limited repertoire.
The violoncello takes up too much room in a carriage
If anyone was asked out it was usually Charlotte.
Emily carried the violoncello on her back.
As she tramped across the moors. Sometimes
she laid it across a stream and jumped over it.
Categories: Poetry,Books
Monday, August 21, 2006
Keighley News covers the series of activities for children that have been taking place at the Brontë Parsonage Museum every Friday since the end of July.Children are being introduced to the world of the Brontë family through a programme of activities at Haworth's Parsonage Museum.
The weekly series of arts and crafts workshops for youngsters, aged five to 11, began late last month with a chance for children to design and make their own books.
Last Friday (for August 11), children were shown some of the simple toys and games which their Bront-era counterparts used to keep themselves amused.The children were then shown how to construct their own handmade toys, which they could take home.
Tomorrow (for August 18) , the workshop will revolve around the theme of weaving, an activity which was central to Haworth's textile heritage.
The "Wicked Weaving" session will reveal ways in which children can use unusual materials to produce objects such as wall hangings, bags or mats.
Picture (from Keighley News): Testing the poi balls made during the Brontë Parsonage Museum toy-making session are Chris Madngba, of Haworth, and Hannah Ketteman, of OakworthCategories: Brontë_Parsonage_Museum
We have recently come across an interesting blog: Jane Eyre-along. A group of people got together last July and started reading Jane Eyre together. Some of them are reading the book for the umpteenth time, while others are completely new to it.
We read that they are also open to discussions of all things Jane Eyre-related in the future. A lot of interesting things are being said right now anyway. They are currently discussing chapters 8-15, so perhaps it's a good time for you to blow the dust off your copy (?) and joining them! :)
Categories: Websites, Jane_Eyre
We read that they are also open to discussions of all things Jane Eyre-related in the future. A lot of interesting things are being said right now anyway. They are currently discussing chapters 8-15, so perhaps it's a good time for you to blow the dust off your copy (?) and joining them! :)
Categories: Websites, Jane_Eyre
Sunday, August 20, 2006
This half of BrontëBlog is a true admirer of Maggie O'Farrell, and has been ever since her first book, After You'd Gone (completely unrelated to this blog's main topic I would like to entreat anyone out there to grab this wonderful book and read it - you seriously won't regret it).Last week I was lucky enough to get a copy of Ms O'Farrell's new book The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, - due out on August 28, published by Hodder Headline in the UK - beforehand. Since that, I have only had time to read a few pages into it, but imagine my surprise to see it linked to the Brontës and particularly to Bertha Rochester in a review from The Scotsman. It is true the main theme of the book appears to be madness and how and according to what it is defined.
This is the story behind the Victorian madwoman in the attic, of all the forgotten women whose rewritten histories replace isolation with hysteria, and non-conformity with insanity. This is not to say that it reads as a politically charged feminist indictment. Like Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea - which gives a voice to Bertha, the first Mrs Rochester in Jane Eyre - all this is reflected through one woman's tragic tale. (...)
Women's 'madness' may seem like ground well-trodden - from Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar to Rhys's novel, as well as, more recently, the study of the housebound wife in Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White - but it's a disturbing subject worth revisiting and one which continues to resonate. (CHITRA RAMASWAMY, reviewer)
I am told that the review contains spoilers so if you plan on reading the book, just keep the link until you are done with it.
If you are around Edinburgh next Friday August 25, you might get a chance to hear / ask more about this Brontë connection at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, where Maggie O'Farrell will be making an appearance at the Scottishpower Studio Theatre at 7pm.
Categories: Books
Two Brontë-related books recently published in Spanish and Portuguese:1) Charlotte Brontë by Carmen Albaladejo is published by Edimat in the series Mujeres en la Historia (Women in History).
- Hardcover: 189 pages
- Publisher: Edimat Libros (30 Jun 2006)
- Language Spanish
- ISBN: 8497647424
2) Livro das Passagens is a book of poems written by Maria Andresen published by Relógio d'Água Editores. As the author says in this interview, one of her main influences is Emily Brontë and Wuthering Heights in particular.
She has written some poems in the book (and in her previous one) devoted to Emily and her novel. More information about the book (in Portuguese) here.
- 104 pages
- ISBN 972-708-882-1
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Some weeks ago we started a series of posts with new graphical adaptations of Brontë-related material with Siku's adaptation of Wuthering Heights, that will see the light next September in the UK as a part of the Radical Brontës Festival in Bradford.The Brontë Parsonage Blog publishes an article about the graphical novel that includes a new sample (check our last post if you want to see more) and republishes some information that has appeared in The Telegraph and Argus previously.
The book has been specially commissioned for the Radical Brontes Festival, which runs from September 15-24 and, as its name suggests, aims to paint the women and their work in a very different light to the common misconceptions surrounding them - that they are cosy, romantic novels written by genteel sisters with nothing better to do.
Graphic novels generally begin life as a script produced by a writer with dialogue and "stage directions" for the artist to interpret in a series of sequential panels, which was why Keith Jeffrey, who is heading the umbrella initiative Illuminate, under which Radical Brontes falls, brought West Yorkshire poet and playwright Adam Strickson on board.
Adam says: "Keith knew I was a Bronte enthusiast and got in touch. My first reaction was I don't know anything about graphic novels', but when I started looking into it I realised it wasn't too distant to scriptwriting for the stage."
Adam, who has worked as director of inter-cultural stage company Chol Theatre and had a writer's placement at Birmingham Repertory earlier this year, then had to break down Emily's original novel into a narrative suitable for the comic book treatment.
So what will Bronte purists make of his adaptation? "It is quite a complicated story when you get into it," says Adam. "There are a lot of flashbacks and I had to do away with a lot of the long narrative passages but at the same time keep to the style and preserve the language of the novel.
"But by and large, I think I've been fairly faithful to the original while endeavouring to keep the pace moving. I'm not really worried that I'll upset the Bronte faithful because there haven't been any major changes to the story."
He is hoping that those already fans of the Brontes will enjoy this fresh take on the book, while at the same time the format might draw other people who have never read the original into Emily's text.
For the art duties, an industry professional who will doubtless help the book cause a stir within the comics fraternity was commissioned. Siku is a Leicester-born artist who went to Nigeria at an early age and mastered his craft there. He has worked in commercial graphic design and computer games design, but is perhaps most well known for his work on the pioneering British science fiction comic 2000AD, for which he has illustrated a variety of strips including the comic's flagship character, Judge Dredd.
Siku's work has an almost dreamlike quality to it, heavily shadowed and perfect for the gothic tragedy of Heathcliff and Cathy. His art is quite unique in the mainstream comics world, eschewing the god-like anatomy usually associated with superheroes for a more elongated, almost otherworldy effect - sometimes to the annoyance of fans. Before he was accepted as a contemporary master of painted comics, he received hate-mail from fans who didn't like the way he drew Judge Dredd's famous jaw!
Siku says: "I suspect it was the moodiness of my work and the heavy amounts of shadow and black, which drew Keith Jeffrey to me. The gothic story actually suits what you might call my sci-fi' style."
In keeping with the original text, which describes moody anti-hero Heathcliff as the "child of a Lascar" (Asian seaman) or a "gypsy" - a fact often ignored in movie and TV adaptations -
Siku wanted to highlight what he saw as the character's exotic nature.
He says: "I was always aware when working on the book that I was adapting a classic story - it's a great project to work on and I'm exceptionally proud of my work on Wuthering Heights."
Whether the Brontes' father Patrick would have allowed comics or graphic novels - had they existed in those days - into the Parsonage as suitable reading matter is a moot point. A new take on a classic story has been created, and might possibly create a mutual respect between graphic novel fans and Bronte enthusiasts.
l Wuthering Heights: The Graphic Novel will be launched at Waterstone's in Bradford on Saturday, September 16.
Categories: Wuthering_Heights, Comics
Spero News traces the life and work of Frederick William Faber (1814-1863) First Provost of the London Oratory, passionate promoter of the Faith and the cause of Our Blessed Lady, and composer of the Roman Catholic 'Anthem' Faith Of Our Fathers.In the article is pointed out that:
Nevertheless, Faber had a renewed vigor. Among his congregation he identified a spiritual group he called his 'Belgravians'. Obtaining another room allowed for expansion. Newman started to come quite regularly and gave sermons, attracting such people as Thackeray and Charlotte Bronte.
Newman is for Cardinal John Henry Newman. The picture on the right is a George Richmond (yes, the same that painted the famous Charlotte Brontë's portrait) 1844 portrait of him.
We have found some information about Newman's lectures and Charlotte's attendance in Winnifred Gérin's biography of Charlotte Brontë:
1850 Visit to London (May-June 1850)
Gérin's Charlotte Brontë: The evolution of Genius, Chapter XXII (p. 596 Additional notes to Chapter XXII)
Coinciding with C's visit to London that summer was a series of lectures given by 'Father' John Henry Newman, several of which she attended. Their subject was 'The Difficulties of Anglicans', delivered twice weekly on Thursdays and Fridays at the Oratory Church, King William St. Trand, beginning 9 May. The object of the lectures delivered by the brilliant convert only returned to England three years before and filled with fresh missionary zeal, was to carry along with him his former associates in the Tractarian Movement who had stopped short of taking the final step towards Rome. Starting from their common disillusionment with the Church of England, which he described as without antecedents in the Churches of other lands, and no more than a Government department, he called on his listeners to by-pass the High Church compromise, and go straight back to Rome. With his charm, his wit, his dialectics, he made an immense impact on his hearers, as the cartoons of Punch attest; conversions followed in numbers, the sanguine Cardinal Wiseman forecast the general return of England within the fold. Such a wave of feeling provoked the inevitable reaction; by the following November the Guy Fawkes celebrations were marked by scenes of violence and the burning in effigy of the Pope and Cardinal Wiseman. Only the politic action of the Cardinal in writing to the entire press on 23 Nov., steadied public opinion and won him respect. Amidst the heated arguments f the day, Charlotte Brontë was, as usual on religious questions, remarkable for the sobriety of her views. This Mrs. Gaskell noted on their first meeting at Windermere that summer. On 25 August she wrote to Catherine Winkworth of their talks together and of Charlotte's account of Newman's lectures given 'in a very quiet, concise, graphic way...'.
It is to be noticed that according to the Oxford Companion of the Brontës, Charlotte didn't tell her father of her attendance to the lectures.
Categories: Brontëana, Charlotte_Brontë
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