Our Sunday news survey.
Victoria Coren 'regrets' in
The Observer a possible cure for insomnia:
A cure for insomnia would be the death of culture. Can you imagine films, literature, music, in a world where everyone slept like a baby as soon as the sun went down? Where would that leave Romeo and Juliet, Heathcliff, Dr Frankenstein, Leonard Cohen, Jimmy Stewart in Rear Window, the Cincinnati Kid?
Melissa McClements reviews for
The Financial Times three books with a common trend:
Three contemporary female writers have produced fiction that illuminates modern women’s life choices in an intriguing format: the parallel life story. Lionel Shriver’s new novel, The Post-Birthday World, and Dayo Forster’s debut, Reading the Ceiling, both examine different outcomes to a pivotal decision in a heroine’s life. In her short story collection, My Nine Lives, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala’s approach is auto-fictional: she has written other possible versions of her own life.
And what's the best way to connect these books to the English canon? Through Jane Eyre, among others, of course:
What if Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre decided Rochester was an unreliable cad and didn’t marry him? (...) Many of the best 19th-century novels concern women struggling against society’s expectations. In this respect Gustave Flaubert’s terminally frustrated Emma Bovary or Henry James’s long-suffering Isabel Archer in The Portrait of a Lady are akin to Bronte’s unconventional governess and Tolstoy’s suicidal aristocrat. (Melissa McClements)
In
The Envelope (from Los Angeles Times) Jane Eyre 2006 is suggested as a possible nominee for the next Emmys.
Yeah, yeah, but this TV western must out-gun lots of top rivals in the miniseries race, which is especially crowded at the upcoming Emmys: "Nightmares & Dreamscapes" (TNT), "Prime Suspect 7: The Final Act" (PBS), "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" (HBO), "Casanova" (PBS), "Jane Eyre" (PBS) (...) (Tom O'Neil)
Nominations will be announced next July 19.
La Nueva España (in Spanish) publishes an article about governesses and ghosts, two particularly fruitful features of Victorian literature according to the author of the article. Of course, Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights are mentioned, but also Agnes Grey, which is not so frequent.
Another Spanish newspaper
El Periódico de Aragón, reviews El Cuento Número 13 (the translation of The Thirteenth Tale). The article is full of Brontë references. Some more or less inspired (the title: Secret Brontë Sister) and some other very bizarre (echoes of Branwell in Charlie Angelfield's character?) (
Ricardo Ruiz Garzón)
Categories: Books, In the News, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV
Re. the FT article - did you also think this was another example of journalists trying to put a Bronte link to everything?
ReplyDeleteMaybe I'm just being picky, but I don't think Jane Eyre and Isabel Archer have enough common points (other than both having to make a "choice")as to merit the parallel attempted by Melissa McClements.
And Isabel is best left out of the list entirely: her opportunities were far from limited, it's just that she did not know how to choose wisely.
Otherwise the article was an interesting read!
As always - thanks for your insight!
ReplyDeleteWe do think that some journalists think there might be extra cash in the way if they add the odd Brontë reference. Otherwise there's no explanation for some of the mentions we read.
I'm afraid I haven't read (yet!) Portrait of a Lady, so can't really say how they compare. But it was great having your opinion to vouch for it :) What can I say? I trust you much better than the journalist!
Thanks Cristina, I feel truly honoured! I am by no means an expert on Portrait of a Lady, having read it a long time ago - but the comparison did seem a bit overblown...
ReplyDeleteYou are right about journalists and the "Bronte bonus" - nothing is sacred! Best, NH
"Nothing is sacred" - the truth about it all in a nutshell ;)
ReplyDeleteOh, well, we have more fun this way, don't we?