Rubbing elbows with Charlotte Brontë

The Ledger-Enquirer reviews Maureen Adams's Shaggy Muses (check our own review here):

Adams examines a basic premise -- dogs' roles as companions and nurturers -- in relation to female writers commonly associated with social isolation. (...)
Moreover, particularly as it pertains to authors of dark literature, Adams describes how dogs can represent an anchor to reality as an author buries herself in fiction.
The example is chiefly shown through Keeper, the fierce Mastiff who kept Emily Bronte company as she wrote her only novel, "Wuthering Heights."
"Dogs often witness parts of ourselves we have trouble recognizing," Adams writes. "As Emily Bronte tended Keeper, he was a witness to the feminine, nurturing side of her that rarely surfaced." (Sonya Sorich)

The West Australian presents the upcoming Australian premiere of Gordon and Caird's Jane Eyre: The Musical: (picture source)

This week, Jane Eyre has its Australian premiere courtesy of the third-year musical theatre students at the WA Academy of Performing Arts.
After nearly three years in Singapore establishing an international acting course, director Leith Taylor has returned to Perth to work with the students on their final production before graduation.
Taylor is regarded as a highly experienced theatre practitioner after working as a director and drama educator, locally and overseas. She is also a veteran actor of more than 60 theatre productions from classics to contemporary dramas and has appeared with such well-known actors as Leslie Phillips and Dennis Waterman. (...)
When she was first asked to direct the musical, Taylor admits she was a little taken aback. “In many ways it doesn’t sound the kind of story that would suit a musical. However, I listened to the CD and found it breathtakingly beautiful. The music is uplifting, emotional and has the most glorious melodies.” (...)
On reflection, Taylor believes that she has always been drawn to plays which have strong roles or relevance for women. She writes in her director’s notes: “Jane is on a quest to realise the ‘good within’ — to find herself — through tests and trials and, like a modern heroine, faces the world alone grappling with contradictory yearnings for independence and security.”
Described as being written in a style reminiscent of Les Miserables and Miss Saigon, and featuring a cast of 40 would-be stars, Jane Eyre: The Musical appears to have all the attributes of great musical theatre.
The fact that Jane Eyre is a much loved and well known story can be a daunting prospect for any director, but Taylor says even though it is a new way of telling an old story, she is confident that even Bronte purists will be satisfied that the production remains faithful to the thematic intentions and feel of the novel.
One of the innovations of this production is the use of an ensemble. Mirroring the first-person point-of-view of the novel, Taylor explains that “the ensemble sees the world through Jane’s eyes by speaking or singing out loud her thoughts and feelings. It also works to move the story forward scene by scene, and contributes to its ‘other worldly’ atmosphere.”
The story’s Gothic overtones are also heightened by the use of music, sound and lighting. “The production is an enormous undertaking but one of the joys of working at WAAPA is that you don’t have to consider the economics. We have the infrastructure to support the production — lighting, audiovisual and sound designers and a wonderful costume department who are having fun with all the crinolines,” she says.
Jane Eyre: The Musical runs from Saturday to September 1. Bookings at WAAPA box office 9370 6636 (Dale Fisher)

The San Bernardino County Sun gives us this 'colourful' description of what can be found in a used bookstore:

Where else can you find a dog-eared Kurt Vonnegut rubbing elbows with a faded Charlotte Bronte? (Michel Nolan)

Remember this swing version of Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights? The Puppini Sisters's latest album and their current US tour are getting several reviews: Mikael Wood in the Minneapolis CityPages says:

But the Puppinis' most potent reading is their take on Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights," where they flip the script on the doomed romance of Bush's original (and Emily Brontë's novel) with a peppy arrangement that makes the tune sound like it's being sung from Heathcliff's perspective, not Catherine's.

Lee1966 has uploaded a picture of the Brontë falls to flickr. The View from Chesil Beach recommends heartily Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea. Romantic_Envy (from bookish LJ community) does the same with Jane Eyre. Henk Grasduint continues the Anne Brontë series (in Dutch). Finally, This Korean Chinese (?) blog seems to talk about Jane Eyre as do this other one in Turkish and this one in Romanian.

Categories: Anne Brontë, Books, Haworth, In the News, Jane Eyre, Music, Theatre, Wide Sargasso Sea, Wuthering Heights