Firmin: Adventures of a Brontëite (?) Lowlife

BrontëBlog recently read Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife by Sam Savage. We were aware of one Brontë reference in it prior to actually reading it, but the second one completely took us by surprise.

There must have been some kind of food there, for I could here Mama and Luweena crunching on something in the darkness up ahead. They didn't share, and when I came up all I found was a piece of lettuce. It taste like Jane Eyre. (ch. 3)

Judging from the theory that the rat Firmin develops later that if books taste good then they're good we are still wondering what to make of this statement. We like lettuce, though.

And here's poor Firmin feeling blue:

I wouldn't eat for two days. I would read Byron. I would read Wuthering Heights. I changed my name to Heathcliff. (ch. 5)

This links nicely to an interview with the author Sam Savage.

Q: I said I was going to ask you why there weren't any women writers in your Canon? Why all your Big Ones were males? But I'm not going to.
A: You could, and you have. But you must have missed the references to George Eliot (Middlemarch is in the list of great books whose very titles break the heart), to Emily Brontë (where Firmin imagines himself as Heathcliff). (William Baldwin)

Well then, we now know that at least according to Firmin (and Sam Savage) Emily Brontë is a Big One.

We have enjoyed this book tremendously and - if you like books - you should read it as soon as possible, and not just for the Brontë connection.

Categories: Books, Brontëites, Emily Brontë, Jane Eyre, References, Wuthering Heights