Sales of Wuthering Heights have quadrupled ~ BrontëBlog

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Sales of Wuthering Heights have quadrupled

Saturday, April 10, 2010 4:18 pm by M. in Fiction, In the News, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, References, Wuthering Heights 1 comment

Sales of Wuthering Heights have quadrupled according to The Telegraph. The newspaper attributes the phenomenon to the influence of Twilight:

Sales of Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte's classic gothic novel set on the Yorkshire moors, have quadrupled over the last year thanks to its appearance in the cult teenage film Twilight.
After 150 years of steady sales, the romance between Heathcliff and Cathy has started flying off the shelves thanks to a generation of teenagers discovering the book through the Twilight saga – a trilogy of books by Stephanie Meyer, which have been turned into hugely popular films, staring Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart. (...)
And now, thanks to the lead character Bella quoting Wuthering Heights and comparing her love for the vampire Edward with Cathy's passion for Heathcliff, some of the magic is rubbing off on Emily Bronte's great work.
Wuthering Heights, before the first Twilight books came out in 2005 sold 8,551 a year in Britain. However, the publishers Harper Collins reissued Wuthering Heights last year, with a cover inspired by the Twilight artwork and including the tag-line: "Bella and Edward's favourite book".
Following this reissue, sales peaked at 2,634 in one week and totalled 34,023 during the year, according to Nielsen Bookscan, which monitors book sales across the industry. This was a fourfold increase and it is now one of the best selling novels at Tesco, as well as more traditional book shops.
Discussion forums on the internet have not welcomed Harper Collins's marketing ploy, with reviewers on Amazon sharing their displeasure. One said: "How disgusting that they'll take a literary classic, and revamp it just so it looks like the "teen sensation" that is Twilight. Drawing this parallel is an absolute atrocity, Emily Bronte would be turning in her grave if she could see this.
However, booksellers said it was wonderful the classic had taken off once again.
Tesco's assistant book buyer Rachel Harcourt said: “It’s fantastic to see teenagers are reading a whole different genre – the classics – as well as fantasy novels because of the popularity of Stephanie Meyer’s books.
"The new sleek black gothic-style covers of Wuthering Heights clearly appeal to lovers of vampire romance stories and are helping them to try out a different read. Anything that encourages teenagers to read good books is welcome as there are so many distractions which prevent today’s youngsters from developing reading as a hobby." (Henry Wallop)

The Yorkshire Post announces another local casting for finding the young Cathy and Heathcliff in Andrea Arnold's production of Wuthering Heights:

Some of the most famous names in stage and screen have taken the roles of Cathy and Heathcliff in productions of Wuthering Heights.
But yesterday casting directors were in Leeds looking for a young, unknown actor to take the role of Heathcliff for a new film version of Emily Brontë's classic tale of love and loss.
Actors also auditioned for the roles of the young Cathy and young Heathcliff.
The film's casting director, Gail Stevens, previously allocated roles for the 2009 hit Slumdog Millionaire.
A number of hopefuls yesterday auditioned at the Jury's Inn, Brewery Wharf in Leeds city centre. Some had come from as far afield as London.
One to audition was Phoebe Tissiman, 11, of Garforth, Leeds, who said: "I saw the film with Heathcliff and it was really sad and I just loved it."
For the part of Heathcliff the casting team want someone between 16 and 21, from Yorkshire, of mixed race, Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi or Middle Eastern. They are looking for a young Heathcliff of the same background aged from 10 to 13.
Producers said the young Cathy should be "pale-skinned, fair-haired and feisty", also aged between 10 and 13 with a Yorkshire accent.
Actress Kaya Scodelario, best known for TV series Skins, has been cast as Cathy.
Filming is due to start in Yorkshire in May.
Auditions will also take place at the Jury's Inn at 9am today [for April 9].

Lucy Mangan writes in her column in the Guardian a most confusing statement:

And then, of course, there was the disappointment of knowing that not one of them was reading Jane Eyre, my mournfulness naturally lessened not a whit by the fact that I slogged my way through it only 10 years ago and went cross-eyed with boredom throughout, yes, even when Helen Burns dies, the drippy, Rasselas-clutching freak.*
*To all teenage readers, this is what is known as ADULT HYPOCRISY. Please file accordingly in your still-supple memory banks (...) for withdrawal and flinging in the faces of those who Just Don't Understand You at future opportune moments.

And was this article adult hypocrisy as well?

Katie Wright at the Hillsboro Time-Gazette selects Jane Eyre for her spring bookshelf:

My favorite book of all time, Jane Eyre is a must-read for anyone looking for meaningful, gripping literature. Along with her sisters, Charlotte Bronte was a literary genius whose writings have left their stamp on history. I can't do the book justice with a description, so you will just have to read it!

The New York Times's Children's Books Sunday Review highlights The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place. Book I:The mysterious howling by Maryrose Wood:

After Penelope, a plucky governess who’s just 15, arrives at Ashton Place, she wonders why the coachman seems to be watching her. Also, what’s that howling in the barn? She’s uncovered only one of those mysteries by the end of this first book in a new series. Plot twists out of Charlotte Brontë or Arthur Conan Doyle keep the action absorbing even while the narration is thoroughly tongue-in-cheek. (Julie Just)

Reasons for traveling are discussed in The Australian:

And as part of this, some travel to enjoy history, to follow in the footsteps of someone or to visit locations made famous in history. They may visit the Romanesque or Gothic cathedrals of Britain or the continent, perhaps the places where Mozart or Beethoven wrote music, where van Gogh or Dali painted, where Charlotte Bronte wrote Jane Eyre or where the Scotsman Robbie Burns penned Tam O'Shanter. (Will Davies)

The Wilmington Star-News talks about Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran:

As a kid, Ansari was a science-and-math nerd, following “Star Trek” even in Tehran. In a way, “My Dream of Stars” is a right-brain counterpoint to Azar Nafisi’s “Reading Lolita in Tehran,” with William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy substituting for texts by Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte. (Ben Steelman)

The Fluvanna Review talks about local author Gwendolyn Graham and her recent novel Beyond the Mists:

Beyond The Mists describes an era of unwavering Christian faith when etiquette and civility ruled. It fashions itself after past classics including Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre, Jane Austin’s (sic) Pride and Prejudice or such contemporary epics as the Forsythe Saga. Not as light and frivolous as Austin’s romps it models itself more after the Bronte sisters work, more dark and mysterious with forbidden passions. (Page H. Gifford)

The Times Literary Supplement includes a review of the The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, recently screened at the BFI London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival and:

Lister lived in refined society in Yorkshire in the 1820s, so it is appropriate that the visual references for her story should fall somewhere between Jane Austen and the Brontës; we know from literature what the lives of gentlewomen in that world were supposed to be like, and the prettiness of the filming has the advantage of creating a set of expectations which Maxine Peake's delightful performance as Anne continually subverts.

This article in La Opinión de Murcia (Spain) makes a rather silly statement:

Aunque la novela caballeresca, protagonizada por supermachos dotados de arrojo suicida y músculo gimnástico sin prejuicio de romanticismo y filantropía sin límites, fue ridiculizada con insólito talento por Don Miguel de Cervantes en el Quijote hace ahora cuatro siglos, los posteriores literatos que han cultivado con éxito la novelística hasta el presente, con escasas acepciones, no se han enterado de nada. Ahí estaban, erre que erre, los gurús anglosajones Defoe, Takeray, Bronte, Austin [sic, sic, sic], etc. y, destacadamente, Dickens. (José Antonio Atanet) (Google translation)

ABC (Spain) talks about María Tena's novel La fragilidad de las panteras, runner-up in the recent Premio Primavera de Novela:

Si Madrid fuera la campiña inglesa y todavía viviéramos rodeados del esplendor victoriano, tal vez podrían ser Charlotte, Emily y Anne, las tres hermanísimas Bronte…Pero no, son Itziar, Laura y Teresa, las tres mujeres protagonistas de "La fragilidad de las panteras" (Espasa), novela de María Tena con la que ha sido finalista del Premio Primavera. "Bueno, mis hermanas también tiene alguna similitud con las Bronte, por son mujeres de mucha personalidad, muy potentes". (Manuel de la Fuente) (Google translation)

On La Gaceta (Argentina), students that like Wuthering Heights:

Según la docente, a los chicos les entusiasma leer hoy la saga de Crepúsculo, las obras referidas al mago Harry Potter, clásicos de la literatura romántica ("Cumbres Borrascosas", "Romeo y Julieta") y cuentos de Edgar Allan Poe. (Google translation)

Il Recensore (Italy) reviews W.M. Thackeray's Vanity Fair:

Non c’è in Becky una traccia di ragione e sensibilità, né di orgoglio né di pregiudizio. Non assomiglia nemmeno alla romantica Jane Eyre di Charlotte Bronte pubblicato nello stesso anno di Vanity Fair. (Alessandra Stoppini) (Google translation)

Jérôme Attal, singer and author, is interviewd in L'Express:

Le livre que tu aimes honteusement
Cette question me pose un problème car quand j’aime ce n’est pas possible que ce soit de manière honteuse. (...)
Lectures qui me viennent : (...) Emily Brontë. (Alexandra Galakof) (Google translation)