"We're all writing Jane Eyre fan fiction"

The news of the upcoming publication of Eve Sinclair's Jane Eyre Laid Bare seems to have reached Australia:

Dear publishers: Enough is enough. I know you want to make any profit you can at a difficult time for the industry, so feel free to churn out Fifty Shades of Grey spinoffs for as long as the money keeps rolling in. But please get your grubby little mitts off Jane Eyre. (...)
Of course Jane Eyre is full of ''smouldering sexual chemistry'' - on one level, it's classic thwarted romance; on another, classic sadomasochistic fantasy. But that's the way things should stay: smouldering. We don't need the panting characters setting spot fires on every page, like poor mad Bertha in the attic. The intense eroticism of Jane Eyre works precisely because it is suppressed.
I'm no prude. In other contexts, I'm happy to read bizarre no-holds-barred erotica about sex with octopuses, or whatever. There's quite a tradition of it in Australia, with writers such as Linda Jaivin, Krissy Kneen and Tobsha Learner setting the imaginative bar high. Nor do I mind erotic fan fiction, or mash-ups such as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. But some things are still sacred, because if you tinker with them, you risk destroying the delicate balance of the original. (Jane Sullivan in The Sydney Morning Herald)

Some publishers have decided to simply re-write the classics with added sex. You'll think I've made this up, but next month, Pan Macmillan is publishing a racy rewrite of Charlotte Brontë's most famous book under the title Jane Eyre Laid Bare. Its author, one Eve Sinclair, describes it as ''an erotic version of my favourite classic''. (Richard Glover in The Age)

The Yorkshire Evening Post takes a look at the literary archives at the University of Leeds:

There are miniature fantasy novels penned by Branwell Brontë, brother to Charlotte, Anne and Emily, there are hand-written letters authored by Evelyn Waugh and J R R Tolkien and original manuscripts by Graham Greene and Leeds-born poet Tony Harrison. (...)
“We have a lot of material by D H Lawrence, Evelyn Waugh, the Brontës and even Oscar Wilde, who wrote a very serious historical play in 1883 called The Duchess of Padua, of which he was very proud but it wasn’t well received and he did nothing after that for about 10 years, after which he thought he’d try his hand at comedy.” [says Chris Sheppard] (...)
But the books themselves are fascinating – one could almost imagine a young Branwell Brontë penning his miniature novel, escaping to a fantasy world while at play with his sisters as they grew up amid the windswept Yorkshire moors.

University of Connecticut Today is selecting the UConn Reads 2012-13. Today, Women Writers:

Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë – is anyone surprised to find them on the nomination list? Like so many others, I discovered these authors as a young reader and go back to them again and again. Their books are life companions to me. (Anne D'Alleva)

The Guardian's Weekend Quiz has a Brontë-related question:

4 Who was Mrs Helen Graham in a Brontë novel? (Thomas Eaton)

The answer is TTOWH, of course.


The Telegraph asks several personalities about seaside reads. The children's author Sarah Crompton most fittingly says:

I always say I’ll tackle Dostoevsky, but never do. So my classic will be Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

Financial Times has an article about neuroscience and compares its overvaluation with the success of phrenology:

Among the writers and intellectuals attracted to this new science were the novelists Charlotte Brontë and George Eliot, and, rather later, the doctor and author Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. (Harry Eyres)

Deborah Harkness, author of the vampire novel A Discovery of Witches, is quite honest when she talks on NPR about the success of this subgenre:

Harkness also admits, vampire or no, that all authors of books with plucky enterprising heroines in love with dark brooding men have something in common.
"We're all writing Jane Eyre fan fiction."
Jane Eyre fan fiction — with bite. (Neda Ulaby)

The Guardian's Book Blog discusses alternative endings:

Part of the joy in rereading a favourite book is the impossible hope that things will somehow work out differently for the likes of Catherine and Henry, or poor fat Piggy, or poor crazy Heathcliff. (Alison Flood)

Caitlin Moran on Wardrobe vs Bookcase  in The Times:

The knowledge that it all worked out all right for Anne from Anne of Green Gables in the end. Obviously, I don’t mean just Anne from Anne of Green Gables – by gesturing to her I mean to include a whole pantheon of women and girls: Little Orphan Annie, Maria from The Sound of Music, Jane Eyre, Lizzie Bennet, Doris from Fame, Judy Garland in Easter Parade, Jo from Little Women and the be-booted lady Weetabix in the “We’re the Weetabix – OK?” advert from 1986. All pointedly described as “not beautiful”, all of humble origins and a bit gobby – but all of whom triumphed by being hard-working, cheerful, non-conformist and able to crack a joke.

Le Devoir (Québec) reviews the French translation of Louise Penny's The Brutal Telling:

Les allusions et citations littéraires sont nombreuses. On passe de Thoreau à Pascal, on visite Charlotte Brontë. Et ça coule, c’est sensé. C’est riche. Inspiré. (Danielle Laurin) (Translation)

The Dallas Morning News visits Traverse City, Michigan:

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is a top spot. I hiked there on an overcast day in May, and the landscapes with barren trees resembled Wuthering Heights. There was no sign of Heathcliff, only spectacular views. (Terry Gardner)

The Australian reviews Pride and Prejudice 1940:

The result preserved much of Austen's dialogue but added a few scenes to "open up" the story, including an archery lesson and a hilarious carriage race. Garson never did anything better than her Elizabeth Bennet, and Olivier seemed just right in a role requiring the passion of his Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights and a heavy dose of snobbery. (Evan Williams)

Wiener Zeitung (Austria) mentions Wuthering Heights 2011:

Viel Aufsehen erregte auch an der Isar Andrea Arnolds Interpretation von "Wuthering Heights", die einen neuen Grad an emotionaler Verstörung bei großer Werktreue erzielte. Auch wenn die Besetzung des "fremd" aussehenden Herumtreibers Heathcliff, der von einer instabilen Bauernfamilie in der Grafschaft Yorkshire aufgenommen und in eine wild-zerstörerische Liebesgeschichte mit Tochter Cathy schlittert, mit einem schwarzen Schauspieler einen Zug zum Plakativen bedeutet, gelang Arnold eine effektive, ästhetisch subjektiv gehaltene, zeitgemäße Tour des Schmerzes. ( Cathren Müller) (Translation)

Manuel Rodríguez Rivero in El País (Spain) experiences elaborated nightmares:

En cuanto a mis propias pesadillas, baste con que les diga que el otro día soñé, como el señor Lockwood en Cumbres borrascosas, que me despertaba el ruido de una rama golpeando contra la ventana de mi cuarto. Cuando saqué la mano para detenerla, no me agarraron los dedos trémulos y helados (a pesar de que estamos en julio) de la pequeña Cathy, sino los de Ana Mato, la ministra de Sanidad, que quería introducirse en mi dormitorio, supongo que con la intención de someterme a una drástica cura de desintoxicación etílica. (Translation)

Rachel Birdsell in The Free Weekly is not a fan of Wuthering Heights:

I won’t mind telling people that I think a lot of the classic books are boring. “Wuthering Heights” nearly drove me insane, and “The Scarlet Letter” was insufferable.

El Blog de Jocassan (in Spanish) posts about Emily Brontë; Ellie Ashton reviews Jane Eyre; Gen90 (in Romanian) reviews Agnes Grey; Fizzy Thoughts posts about The Flight of Gemma Hardy;  Writing Through Rose Tinted Glasses reviews Marta Acosta's Dark Companion; Esther and Howl reviews April Lindner's Jane; Feral Kid reviews Wuthering Heights 2011; Reading at Tiffany's reviews Desy Giuffrè's Io Sono Heathcliff; Sním svůj život a žiju své sny (in Czech) reviews Jane Eyre 2011; FRAYEDjade and Aimee Thomson review Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre respectively, among others on YouTube.