The Weekend of the Brontës

The Brontë Parsonage Blog has three (there will be more) posts about the AGM. The first one provides some glimpses into the participants and their expectatives on arrival to Haworth. The second one talks about the restoration of the Brontë piano:

Parsonage Director Andrew Macarthy gave praise where it was due, to the three people without whom the restoration of the piano would not have happened, and the first was Virginia Rushton, "who had the dream of hearing it played and then did something about it". The second was Virginia Esson from Florida, because it was largely because of her great generosity that the work took place, and the third was the brilliant and remarkably modest Ken Forrest, who had devoted three years to the instrument, both in the Parsonage and in his workshop. Virginia Esson stepped forward to stand beside a slideshow, receive flowers and speak about how she was moved by the experience of hearing the instrument played, and then Virginia Rushton spoke. (Read more) (Richard Wilcocks)

But the highlight is, of course, the actual recital by Maya Irgalina at the piano and Catherine MacDonal singing. The third post is a must:

All the music was taken from the Brontës' music books which are now in the Library. Photocopies were used. The first item was Sonata in E flat op. 7 by Muzio Clementi, at the time of the Brontës often known as 'the father of the pianoforte', and it was just right, but possibly too difficult for Emily. Did she struggle with it? Maya didn't appear to, and we got the same professional sweet smile and bow after that as we did after the other items - Beethoven waltzes in F minor and in E flat major, and his Grand Waltz in A minor, then Handel's Harmonious Blacksmith. Catherine sang with great commitment and a fine sense of the dramatic - Ye Banks and Braes o, Bonnie Doon (which had great significance for Charlotte, Ann and Branwell, Charlotte using it as a narrative device in Shirley), The Old Oak Tree and My Mother Bids Me Bind My Hair. (Read more) (Richard Wilcocks)

The Age talks about the London success of the play Holding the Man with Jane Turner, Kath in the successful Australian comedy series Kath & Kim:

Turner is new to London; she is more familiar with Moscow, where she lived for a year before glasnost. Her husband, John Denton, was a diplomat: cue disturbing image of Kath handing out Twiglets at an embassy function. There is another jolt when she talks, with something approaching rapture, about the Brontes. Kath Day-Knight reading a book you can't buy in the supermarket? (Stephanie Bunbury)

Single-sex schools are discussed in The Independent. We suggest the editors of this kind of articles think of other authors besides the Brontës when they try to sell the alleged wonders of gender-apartheid education:

Researchers have revealed that girls are more likely to be stimulated to read by classical romantic tales such as Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, while boys are likely to be wooed by action stories. Girls are likely to be more methodical in their learning and cope better with a modular approach to GCSEs, while boys can put on a spurt to do better in examinations. (Richard Garner)

1001 Libros posts about The Tenant of Wildfell Hall in Spanish, Birdie's Nest talks about Lockwood's enclosed bed in Wuthering Heights, The Lost Entwife reviews Juliet Gael's Romancing Miss Brontë and Confessions of a Nymphet posts about her love for Jane Eyre and Oyunun başı sonu… posts about Jane Eyre 2006 in Turkish. Finally The Diary of a (no) Frog-eater in Fog-land has visited Haworth and the Parsonage (in French). On Flickr we find a tribute to Jane Eyre and photographer Brooke Shaden by Jayde Wofford and some pictures of Abigail709 in Victorian costume around Haworth.

Categories: Brontë Society, Brontëana, Fiction, Haworth, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, References, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Wuthering Heights