Emily, the guerrilla

A couple of recent books with Brontë appearances:
1.

Dead Iraqis:
Selected Short Stories of Ellis Sharp
New Ventures
ISBN 978-1-905510-09-2
(Paperback, 320 pages)
Date of of Publication: 1 August 2009

Dead Iraqis brings together the best short fiction of one of Britain's leading underground writers. Written against the grain of commercial literary fiction, these stories from the era of neo-liberalism are often darkly comic in thrust, with a strong historical or political dimension. Emily Brontë runs off to Nicaragua and starts a new life as a guerrilla. Stalin fakes his death and becomes a Conservative MP. Karl Marx is discovered alive and well and living on the Isle of Wight. Using a range of techniques from collage to surreal satire, Sharp savages the values and delusions of the age, mocking everything from crop circles to political biography and imperialism. But Sharp is also a writer acutely conscious of literary tradition. Informed by influences as various as Swift, Gogol, Proust and Joyce, these fictions engage with language and the nature of narrative as they explore history, story-telling, memory, philosophy and the monstrous temper of an age steeped in blood.

The story where Emily Brontë appears is Shooting Americans, with Emily and was first published in Lenin's Trousers (1992). From The Guardian's review of the book:

At which point I found myself becoming quite fascinated by Sharp. His first name was also the first nom de plume of Emily Brontë - and she features here in a story called "Shooting Americans with Emily" ("Her family. They drove her to it. Sister Charlie a real bitch, sister Anne a pious worm"). (Nicholas Lezard)

2.
In the latest book by Swedish poet Gunilla Witt there's a poem (Bipolärt) with Jane Eyre references:

Halvvägs nerför Vasagatan
Gunilla Witt
Heidruns Förlag
ISBN: 978-91-977554-5-0

From the Svenska Dagbladet's review:

De litterära referenserna, mer eller mindre dolda, löper i täta underströmmar genom dikterna, från en avigvänd Birger Sjöberg i den första svitens titel ”Den sista gång jag såg dig” till den avslutande tvådiktssviten ”Du, Karin”, som refererar till Karin Boye. I den första sviten handlar det om en åldrad mor som dör, en mor-dotter-systerproblematik upptar sviten ”Lilla syster”, med anspelningar på såväl Hugo Gyllanders ”Lille Pers vandring” som Ulf Nilssons och Eva Erikssons barnböcker om Lilla syster Kanin, en kort svit heter just ”Lille Per”, i sviten ”Bipolärt” glimtar på några rader Askungen, Törnrosa, Jane Eyre och Karin Boye förbi. (Tom Hedlund) (Google translation)

Categories: Books, Poetry, References