Extraordinary stories

Two Spanish-speaking newspapers show what good and bad journalism is.

Bad journalism is always fun when you can spot the mistakes and laugh at them, but not when you think of what impression people who know nothing about the subject matter will be left with. Edmundo Domínguez Aragonés writes a section called Historias Extraordinarias (Extraodinary stories) for the Mexican El Sol de México. And you can't begin to imagine how extraordinary - to put it mildly - the Brontë story becomes. We are 'only' quoting the mistakes, which as you will soon see actually are most of this rambling article. Many of the things the author quotes are as fanciful as the rest of his tale.

Patrick se había casado con Mary Branwell el 8 de diciembre de 1812 y era 15 años menor que Patrick.
El matrimonio engendró cinco hijas: Mary, Elizabeth, Charlotte, Emily y Anne, y un único varón Branwell.
Patrick had married Mary [sic; Maria] Branwell on 8th December [sic; 29th December] 1812. She was 15 years younger [sic; six years younger] than Patrick.
They had five daughters: Mary [sic again; Maria], Elizabeth, Charlotte, Emily and Anne, and just one son, Branwell. [...]

La señora Branwell de Bronte falleció en 1824, un año después de haber tenido su última hija, de cáncer en el estómago y entonces la tía soltera de las niñas, Elizabeth, se ocupó de la crianza de la huérfanas.
Mrs Brontë died in 1824 [sic; 1821], a year after having had her last daughter, of stomach cancer [possibly sic; possibly uterine cancer]. Thus, the girls' maiden aunt, Elizabeth, took charge of the orphans' upbringing. [...]

* Años escolares
Las niñas fueron enviadas al colegio para las hijas de los clérigos en Cowan Bridge. Mary y Elizabeth volvieron enfermas a Haworth y murieron de tuberculosis en 1825. Una tenía 11 años y la otra 10. Por este fúnebre desenlace, y por las pésimas condiciones del colegio, Patrick sacó a Charlotte y Emily del internado, que regresaron al hogar muy enfermas del mismo mal.
La enfermedad mató a Emily el 19 de diciembre de 1848, a la edad de 30 años, y Anne, también de la misma afección, el 28 de mayo de 1849, tenía 29 años de edad.
Finalmente, Charlotte, estando embarazada de su primer engendro, también moría consumida por la tuberculosis el 31 de marzo de 1855, a los 39 años de edad.
*School years
The girls were sent to the Clergy Daughters' School at Cowan Bridge. Mary [sic] and Elizabeth returned ill to Haworth and died of TB in 1825. One of them was 11 years old, the other 10. After this dismal conclusion, and because of the deplorable conditions of the school, Patrick took Charlotte and Emily out of the boarding-school, both of them returning home very ill with the same disease [sic].
The disease killed Emily on 29th December 1848 [correct, but so sudden!], when she was 30 years old, and Anne as well, on 28th May 1849, when she was 29 years old.
Finally, Charlotte, pregnant with her first child, also died consumed by TB [probably sic; she probably died of hyperemesis gravidarum] on 31st March 1855, when she was 39 years old [sic; she was in the last weeks of her 38th year].

* La imaginación para huir de una vida de privaciones
Patrick era estricto, bastante excéntrico y poseía una gran imaginación. La imaginación de Patrick "ayudó a que nuestra infancia fuera un lugar maravilloso, lleno de ideas y de juegos, por medio de los cuales nos evadíamos de la aridez del ambiente y de las influencias de la rígida era victoriana", escribe Charlotte.
* Imagination in order to escape from a life of privations
Patrick was strict, quite eccentric and had a great capacity for imagination. Patrick's imagination 'helped out childhood become a wonderful place, full of ideas and games, thanks to which we escaped from the barren atmosphere as well as from the influences of the rigid Victorian era', wrote Charlotte [sic; Charlotte didn't ever write such thing, particularly not with that ending]. [...]

Estos relatos contribuyeron a la creación de las obras posteriores de estas escritoras irlandesas.
These tales [from Angria and Gondal] contributed towards the creation of later works by these Irish [sic] writers. [...]

* El hermano incómodo
Tanto Charlotte como Emily con sus sueldos financiaron los estudios de Arte de Branwell, "quien soñaba con ser pintor", y fue enviado a Londres, ya que su padre esperaba "que sea el genio de la familia".
* The uncomfortable brother
Both Charlotte and Emily paid for Branwell's 'art lessons'. Branwell 'dreamed of being an artist' and was sent to London [probably sic], as his father expected him to 'be the genius of the family'. [...]

Sin embargo, los adúlteros fueron descubiertos por el reverendo y "aquello fue un escándalo que ocasionó un verdadero drama familiar para los Robinson".
However, the adulterous partners [Branwell and Mrs Robinson] were discovered by the reverend [Robinson] and 'that became a scandal which gave way to a true family drama for the Robinsons' [sic???]

Branwell poseía aptitudes artísticas y así pintó varios retratos de sus hermanas, los cuales todavía se conservan en exhibición en el Museo Bronte.
Branwell was an artist and thus painted several portraits of his sisters which are still on display at the Brontë Museum [sic; Branwell's pillar portrait and the fragment of Emily from the gun portrait are both kept and displayed at the National Portrait Gallery in London]. [...]
Cuando Charlotte y Anna regresaron de Londres a Haworth, después de revelar a los editores su identidad como las autoras de las novelas que publicaban, encontraron a Branwell agonizando. Murió el 24 de septiembre de 1848, a los 31 años.
When Charlotte and Anna [sic] returned from London to Haworth after revealing their identites as the authors of the novels they published to their editors, they found Branwell agonising. He died on 24th September 1848 [Charlotte and Anne went to London in July]. [...]

A la vuelta del entierro, Emily cogió frío, que se tradujo en resfriado, a cuya curación Patrick se negó tras rechazar al médico, lo que finalmente complicó la tuberculosis y la llevó a la tumba dos meses después del fallecimiento de su hermano.
Back from the funeral, Emily caught cold, which turned into a cold, to the cure of which Patrick refused after dismissing the doctor [sic!!!], which eventually made the TB worse and sent her to her grave two months [sic; almost three months] after her brother's death.

* Charlotte
La pequeña Charlotte "era un alma atormentada" y con profundas deficiencias físicas. Su carácter "trágico y sombrío" cambió al sentirse obligada a asumir el cuidado de sus hermanas a la muerte de su madre.
The little Charlotte 'was a tormented soul' [sic???] with serious physical deficiencies [sic!!!!]. Her 'tragic and dark' temperament [sic???] changed when she felt obliged to take up her sisters' care after their mother's death [sic; Charlotte was one of the middle children, only becoming the eldest after Maria and Elizabeth died four years after their mother].

Allí se produjo "un encuentro trascendental" para Charlotte al conocer a Constantin Heger, el director de la academia, por el que "me sentí atraída en un primer amor no correspondido".
There [ at the Pensionnat Heger] took place 'a transcendental encounter' for Charlotte when she met Constantin Heger, for whom 'I felt attracted in a first unrequited love' [sic; as Charlotte never wrote such thing].

El repentino fallecimiento de una tía de Heger, que se encargaba de la casa de la familia, obligó a Charlotte y Emily regresar a Inglaterra.
The sudden death of one of Heger's aunts [sic; as the dead aunt was Aunt Branwell], who kept house for the family, made Charlotte and Emily return to England [surely a complicated turn of events in the original article]. [...]

En otoño de 1845, el descubrimiento por Charlotte de los poemas de Emily las decidió a publicar un libro con poemas de las tres hermanas, que se editó con el título "Poemas por Curren, Ellis y Acton Bell", en 1846, empleando cada una de las hermanas las iniciales de sus nombres en los seudónimos.
In the autumn of 1845, Charlotte's discovery of Emily's poems helped them made up their minds to publish a volume with poems by the three sisters, which was published as 'Poems by Curren [sic; Currer], Ellis and Acton Bell' in 1846, each sister retaining her initials in her pseudonym. [...]

Antes de esta incursión editorial, Charlotte había "sufrido desprecio cuando le envíe unos versos de juventud en busca del apoyo del laureado poeta Robert Soouthey, quien me respondió secamente: 'la literatura no es asunto de mujeres y no debería serlo nunca'. Entonces decidí publicar bajo un seudónimo masculino".
Before that literary venture, Charlotte had 'suffered contempt when I sent him a few juvenile verses to the laurate poet Roberth Southey in hopes of support. He replied drily that "literature cannot be the business of a woman's life, and it ought not to be". It was then I decided to write under a male pseudonym' [sic!!!]. [...]

Como todos los tratos con los editores los habían hecho por correo, los editores sólo conocían al trío bajo los nombres de Curren, Elis y Acton Bell; sin embargo, la publicación de la segunda novela de Anne: "La inquilina de Wildfell may", obligó a Charllote ante el editor George Smith revelar las verdaderas identidades de los Bell.
All transactions with their editors had been conducted by letter, so the editors only know the trio by the names of Curren [si], Elis [sic] and Acton Bell. However, the publication of Anne's second novel, 'The Tenant of Wildfell may [sic!!]', made Charlotte reveal the true identities of the Bells to their editor George Smith. [...]

Fue la última de sus novelas que tuvo éxito.
[Shirley] was the last of her novels to be successful [sic]. [...]

Aunque las hermanas habían utilizado el apellido Bell como autoras, el reverendo jamás vinculó su nombre al seudónimo y Charlotte le aclaró que había sido "mera coincidencia".
Although the sisters had used the last name Bell as authors, the reverend [Arthur Bell Nicholls] never linked his name to the pseudonym and Charlotte made it clear to him that it had been 'by sheer coincidence' [sic!!!].

We have seen bad articles but this one with its lack of information and garbled timelines surely tops them all. Fortunately we have another Mexican article on the Brontë sisters on Milenio.com which is pretty accurate (despite calling Branwell Bradwell once and the typo that states that the Victorian era ran from 1937 to 1901).

Categories: In the News, Weirdo