Top Withens is a much loved ruin

The Guardian asks retiring Ann Cryer MP for Keighley and Ilkley for her most memorable moment:

Making my maiden speech in 1997. I can't remember what I said except that I mentioned Top Withens, the derelict farmhouse in my constituency which inspired Emily Bronte when she wrote Wuthering Heights. (Article by Michael White)

The complete speech can be found on the House of Commons Hansard (23 July 1997):

For the benefit of those less fortunate hon. Members who do not live in the West Riding, let me begin by explaining what and where Top Withens is. Top Withens, or what remains of it, is a much loved ruin—a sort of last outpost of human endeavour—standing in grand isolation on a vast windswept moor-top above the hamlet of Stanbury, which in turn stands above Haworth. All that is in my constituency.
Haworth contains the parsonage, now a museum, which is dedicated to the life and work of the Brontë sisters. Emily Brontë wrote her passionate, haunting book "Wuthering Heights" there, and a family friend, Ellen Nussey, subsequently explained that Emily had had Top Withens in mind when she described the position of Wuthering Heights with its "pure, bracing ventilation". Although there are differences in the architecture of the two buildings, Withens remains a point of pilgrimage for Brontë enthusiasts from around the world, and a focal point for walkers, as it stands yards from the Pennine way national trail. (Read more)

Also in The Guardian we found this interview with Joan Bakewell. Describing her bookshelves:

Standard classics – Proust, Dickens, the Brontës – and art books occupy the shelves. (Stephen Moss)

The Yorkshire Post interviews the new Bishop of Sheffield, Rev Doctor Steven Croft:

Name your favourite Yorkshire book/author/artist/CD/performer.
I've visited (and loved) Haworth since I was a child, so it's going to have to be Jane Eyre. But all those Brontë girls were remarkable and talented women in their own way.

The blogosphere today brings posts about Wuthering Heights: Confessions of a Self-Important Man, Garotas de batom rosa (in Portuguese). She Is Too Fond of Books will participate on the Fizzy Thoughts's Wuthering Heights Brontë-Along. A little light reading posts some pictures inspired by The Tenant of Wildfell Hall as a part of the Brontë-Along! project. Art of the Auction chooses Wide Sargasso Sea as one of her favourite books. Feelin' Feminine explains how to make a "Jane Eyre hairdo".

Finally a new blog related to the Brontës can be found on blogger: Brontë Family Blog. The latest post consists in the facsimile images of the Ellen Nussey's Reminiscences of Charlotte Brontë as published in the Scribner's Monthly in 1871.

Categories: Brontëites, Haworth, References, Websites, Wide Sargasso Sea, Wuthering Heights