Charlotte, the ugly troll

Poor Charlotte. We know she was quite sensitive about her looks and this comment in a restaurant review of The Times goes in that direction:

Vogue is having a writing competition. There’s probably just enough time to get your entry in, if you hurry. And hurrying’s the best way to write for Vogue. What I particularly like about this literary competition, as opposed to all the others, is that they ask for a photograph, which seems sensible. You simply can’t get away with looking like Charles Dickens or a Brontë today. Author pics count for at least 50% of sales, and does Vogue want to have some ugly troll on its contributors page? I think not. (A.A. Gill)

The Scotsman presents txtng the gr8 db8, a new book by David Crystal that explores the the text-messaging phenomenon and its effects on literacy, language, and society. His approach is thought-provoking:

The book's author, Professor David Crystal, insists the idea that mobile phone messaging is breeding an illiterate and incomprehensible generation is nothing more than a myth.
The academic challenges the orthodox view head-on in 'txtng the gr8 db8' and points out that abbreviating English is nothing new.
Crystal said: "The popular belief is that texting has evolved as a 21st-century phenomenon – as a highly distinctive graphic style, full of abbreviations and deviant uses of language, used by a young generation that doesn't care about standards.
"There is a widely voiced concern that the practice is fostering a decline in literacy and some even think it is harming language as a whole. There is now a widespread folk belief that, whatever texting is, it must be a bad thing."
One critic is veteran broadcaster John Humphrys, who was so outraged by the trend that he labelled texters "vandals" who were "raping and pillaging" the English language.
But Crystal, a University of Wales academic and the author of the Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Language, said abbreviated sentences had a long and rich history.
"There is nothing novel at all about text messages such as 'cu l8r'. They are part of the European linguistic tradition, and can be found in all languages which have been written down.
"Individual texters may have devised some of the modern abbreviations, but they are only doing what generations have done before."
Crystal points out that non-standard spellings are a long-standing part of English literary tradition.
As such, the Oxford English Dictionary introduced "cos" in 1828, "wot" in 1829, "luv" in 1898, "thanx" in 1936 and "ya" in 1941.
"Many of the non-standard spellings in text messaging can be found in dialect representations such as by Charles Dickens, Mark Twain, Walter Twain, Walter Scott, Emily Bronte, Thomas Hardy or DH Lawrence," he added. (Marc Horne)

Summer reading articles proliferate. Nevertheless, this one in The Guardian is second to none. What can you think of an article that quotes in the same paragraph Charlotte Brontë and Aleister Crowley?

Reading is traditionally an indoor activity: think of Jane Eyre snuggled up on the window seat at Gateshead Hall, dreaming over Bewick's Birds , or David Copperfield sitting on his bed and 'reading as if for life'. But there are people who love reading outside. When the satanist, poet and self-proclaimed sex-addict Aleister Crowley set out in 1902 to climb K2, he insisted on lugging with him the complete works of Milton, Shelley and Wordsworth, arguing that 'the almost universal mental and moral instability of Europeans engaged in exploring' was due to 'the lack of proper intellectual relaxation rather than to any irritations and hardships'. (Robert MacFarlane)

The Hindu interviews author Shashi Deshpande:

My gold standard for a love story is Wuthering Heights — the scene where Heathcliff waits outside all night while Catherine is dying is so amazingly powerful. (...)
We read a novel not because it increases our knowledge, but because it illuminates our own lives; human stories echo one another across time and space. And if large issues and themes were to make novels significant, what about novels like Emma, Howard’s End, or Wuthering Heights, almost perfect novels in my opinion? It is tempting to see the big picture as the real one, but one can get as much, if not more, from a micro picture. (Interview with Usha K.R.)

Get2sammyb posts a short review of Wuthering Heights. Sumangali publishes a long review of Maureen Adams's Shaggy Muses. *~ the beauty of life ~* posts some pictures of a visit to the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

Categories: Books, Brontëites, Haworth, Jane Eyre, References, Wuthering Heights