Nellie's babies

The Herald has an article on Susannah York, who plays Nelly Dean in April De Angelis's adaptation of Wuthering Heights, currently on stage in Edinburgh until Saturday.

In Wuthering Heights, York plays storyteller again in her role as Nellie, the maid who narrates Emily Bronte's windswept classic in April de Angelis's new stage version. "I modelled her on a lovely Scots woman I've known since childhood," York says of her character. "She has this wonderful sense of humour that's quite ironical, and I decided I'd make up stories about her that weren't in the book but which give her some kind of background. There's a line where she says, There are worse than Mr Heathcliff,' so I made up this story that she'd had an unhappy marriage and escaped to work in the house. At the end she says, This is my life.' Cathy and Heathcliff are her surrogate children, and she sort of scolds them, but watches over them as well, and in some way tries to teach them some sense of right and wrong. I suppose Nellie is the conscience of the story; Cathy and Heathcliff are her babies." (Neil Cooper)

South from Edinburgh is Brontë Country, which is the subject of a long article in The New Zealand Herald, with pictures. However, the article is either old or wrong, as it states, for instance, that the Thornton birthplace is still owned by Barbara Whitehead and open to the public, which it no longer is.

It's a tale which doesn't really start here in Haworth, but about 10km away in the village of Thornton.
I didn't go there myself - too much Nettle Thrasher - but Rev Bronte was curate in Thornton from 1815 to 1820 and it was there that Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne were all born.
The old parsonage where they lived is still open to visitors; these days it is owned by novelist Barbara Whitehead and fellow-writer Bernard Mayston, who proclaim on their website that they are "gradually restoring the interior to the Regency period when it was the home of genius". (Jim Eagles)

But the article is not all wrong, of course, and suggests sites of interest around Brontë Country:

Visiting Haworth - even though the shops are full of Bronte ticky-tack - you almost feel as though you're walking in the pages of one of their novels.
On our first visit we drove across the tops in a howling blizzard, along the way passing the lonely ruins of a huge old house, and I could have sworn I saw a wraith-like figure swirling outside and heard a plaintive voice crying, "Heathcliff, Heathcliff".
Apart from the tower, little remains of the Church of St Michael and All Angels which Rev Bronte preached in - it was extensively rebuilt in 1881 - but the stolid, sombre atmosphere, with two old ladies in dark coats and warm hats silently polishing the brasswork, is very much as I imagine it would have been in their day.
Most of the family were buried in a sealed vault under the church, but in 1964 the locals built a Bronte Chapel on top, and a plaque marks the spot where their black oak pew once stood.
Surrounding the church is the graveyard where centuries of stone memorials - including those of the Brontes' servants Tabitha Aykroyd and Martha Brown - are jammed together, shaded by dark pine trees and green with age. Beyond, across a protective ring of stone walls, are the unchanging moors and a pathway leading to the great grey pile of the parsonage.
Since 1928 this has been owned by the Bronte Society, which has done a magnificent job of preserving the building and furnishing it with the chairs and tables, clocks and beds, diaries and letters, clothes and nick-nacks they used.
As a result you can wander through the kitchen, Rev Bronte's study, Charlotte's bedroom, Branwell's studio and, best of all, the dining room where the young women did most of their writing, looking much as it would have when they were producing their masterpieces.
Upstairs, in a gable added to the parsonage by Rev Bronte's successor, there's a permanent exhibition on the story of this remarkable family.
You could easily spend a day absorbing the fascinating memories of Charlotte, Emily and Anne and their work ... but out in the surrounding countryside there are more sites associated with them still to be seen.
Alongside the path between the church and the parsonage, for instance, you'll spot a brightly painted building which now houses a childcare centre but was once a school where Charlotte taught.
A helpful map of Haworth and Bronte Country, put out by the English Tourist Board, identifies sites like:
* The village of Cowan Bridge, near Kirkby Lonsdale, where what is now a private residence once housed the Clergy Daughters' School which the girls attended.
Conditions were harsh - Maria and Elizabeth both died of tuberculosis shortly after returning home - and the school was portrayed as Lowood in Jane Eyre.
* Roe Head School, near Kirklees, where Charlotte, Emily and Anne studied and Charlotte later taught.
* Blake Hall, near Dewsbury, and Thorp Green, a hamlet close to York, where Anne was a governess.
* St Mary's Churchyard in Scarborough where Anne is buried (the only member of the family not to lie in Haworth).
* Top Withens, a ruined farmhouse at the end of a 10km round-trip walk from Haworth, said to have been the model for Wuthering Heights.
* The ruins of Wycoller Hall, near Colne, The Rydings, in Birstall, and Stonegappe, at Lothersdale, which respectively became Ferndean Manor, Thornfield Hall and Gateshead Hall in Jane Eyre. (Jim Eagles)

Incidentally, the local newspaper of that area, The Telegraph and Argus, reports the rise in TB figures we have seen lately. It seems as if no self-respecting journalist can write about TB without mentioning some of its most famous victims:

All three of the Bronte sisters died young from the illness.

Well, actually it's not quite so sure that Charlotte died from TB. The more widespread theory is that hyperemesis gravidarum killed her.

The Irish Times has an article on Tallaght Library. One of its members, a 13-year-old girl, is really sweet:

Caitríona Ní Cheallaigh (13) is currently reading Shirley, by Charlotte Brontë. She prefers Emily Brontë to Charlotte, though she's "not sure why". Caitríona reads "any chance I get - I read when I go to bed at about 9pm for an hour, and I usually read while Im eating".
As well as the Brontë sisters, she really likes Eva Ibbotson, Jane Austen, Thomas Hardy and Charles Dickens. (Catherine Foley)

Now for one of the weirdest things ever: a Japanese man who wants the Japanese Governemt to legalise marriage between humans and - erm - cartoon characters. And where's the Brontë connection of that? Well, it opens a can of worms when it comes to Heathcliff and Rochester, according to the Examiner.

Book character lust is nothing new. [...]
I've long hypothesized that what a woman REALLY wants from a man is their unwavering and unswerving devotion. Just take a look at the literary men that lady readers throughout time have swooned over--Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights? Mr. Rochester from Jane Eyre? Again, Mr. Darcy and Edward Cullen? What do these men have in common? They love only one woman and will do anything to get her love in return. If that doesn't light a woman's fire, I don't know what will. (Michelle Kerns)

Filmmaker Margarita Jimeno shows her true colours as a Brontëite in an interview on Spout Blog.

How, if at all, has reading informed your filmmaking?
It has very much, especially when writing characters. I think here’s where I’m influenced the most. Because you are usually reading into the character’s mind, it has been very helpful when I’m directing actors too. I think human understanding would take at least 3 lifetimes, but thanks to literature you can spend a couple of years and you have a very broad understanding. Of course I’m talking about classic literature, like Bronte, Dostoevsky, Austen, Conrad, Orwell, Steinbeck, Voltaire, etc etc etc. (Brandon Harris)

Categories: Brontëites, Haworth, Jane Eyre, Shirley, Theatre, Wuthering Heights