An Extraordinary Heritage

The head of English Heritage, Baroness Williams, has visited Haworth and the Brontë Parsonage as The Telegraph & Argus covers (with picture on the steps of the Parsonage included):

The head of English Heritage praised local pride and efforts in protecting Haworth ’s rich history during a visit to the world-famous Brontë parsonage museum.
Baroness Andrews chose Yorkshire Day to visit one of Bradford district’s most important tourist traps, which is also a conservation area classified as in “very bad” condition in the organisation’s latest ‘at risk’ register.
English Heritage chiefs have described Haworth as being one of its top ten Yorkshire priorities, and have urged for more to be done to make it an international destination.
Baroness Andrews said: “Haworth has an extraordinary heritage and I can understand why it attracts people from all over the world. It’s a symbol of women’s writing and women’s freedom of expression and it’s in a most beautiful part of Yorkshire.
“The wealth of our country is not just its industry but is also its local tourism and its heritage, which creates wealth and employment. So valuing our heritage is not incidental or sentimental.
“In most places like Haworth, which have a level of international interest, you do see local pride kicking in.”
Baroness Andrews was on her first visit to Haworth with a delegation including English Heritage Yorkshire planning director Trevor Mitchell.
The English Heritage chairman stressed the need for historic villages such as Haworth to balance conservation with the needs of people who live and work in the area.
English Heritage is backing a project to renovate the rundown Old School Room, and is providing a £15,000 grant to pay for replacement windows.
It is also supporting the refurbishment of Haworth Parish Church, which contains the crypt where Emily and Charlotte Brontë are buried. After touring the parsonage museum, they were taken to see the Old School Room, the parish church and Main Street, and to the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway before a tour of regeneration projects in Bradford. (Miran Rahman)

Washington University News informs of a new adaptation of Jane Eyre to be performed at the 2012-2013 Edison Ovation Series in St Louis:
(Jane Eyre Promotional Video from Gravin Films on Vimeo)

 “What do I want? A new place, in a new house, amongst new faces, under new circumstances.”
So says young Jane Eyre, setting out to find her way in the world. Annie Loui  sympathizes. Since the early 1980s, the St. Louis native has created ambitious theatrical hybrids for prestigious venues around the nation.
On Sept. 7 and 8, Loui will return to St. Louis with Jane Eyre, an original adaptation of Charlotte Brontë’s beloved novel. The performance — the debut offering from Loui’s newly formed Counterbalance Theater — will launch the 2012-13 Edison Ovations Series  at Washington University.
“Jane Eyre represents a emerging theatrical form, sometimes referred to as devised theater,” says Charlie Robin, director of Edison. Brontë’s text serves as the jumping off point for a process of structured improvisation, with Loui and performers building and refining their scenes, characters and movement vocabulary collaboratively and organically.
“It’s more akin to dance than traditional theater,” Robin says. Or rather, the show “represents the points at which dance and theater intersect.”(...)
The seven actors, dressed casually in jeans and tights — the occasional lace shirt providing a hint of the Victorian — play almost 100 roles, ranging from Brontë characters to animals, architecture and furniture.
“When the lights came up, it was like waking from a dream.” (Liam Otten)

Marian Keyes in The Independent (Ireland) praises the work of the late Maeve Binchy:

As an example, Keyes has pointed out that there were raised eyebrows when 'Circle of Friends' first appeared on the reading list for the Leaving Cert, putting Maeve Binchy alongside names like Jane Austen and Emily Brontë. But that should not have been a surprise, Keyes says, because she believes Binchy deserves her place in the company of the great writers of the past.

Digital Spy interviews Toby Stephens who remembers his Rochester in Jane Eyre 2006:

You were also in the BBC production of Jane Eyre. It seems completely different to the rest of your TV and film work, did you find it challenging at all?"The original book is a masterpiece and it's very personal to a lot of people. Many women sort of hold it dear. I was very lucky because I think we managed to do it service and I managed to play Rochester in a way that most of the people who were fans of the book liked. I wouldn't want to p*ss them off, there's a huge amount of them.
"Those sort of things are very gratifying to do. I think they are slightly overdone - they come up with great regularity and they can be slightly formulaic. Prior to doing Jane Eyre, they had been on a slide. There hadn't been any adaptations that had really made a mark, they were just sort of churning them out. I think Jane Eyre was successful because it made the characters very real.
"I think when they do break the mould and create a world that people find interesting and real, that's when they work. I think when they become just another generic period piece, it's a bit boring." (Daniel Sperling and Freddie Edwards)

Forest Leaves Sun Times recommends teen reads:

A Breath of Eyre
Emma Townsend, who sympathizes with the titular character in “Jane Eyre,” finds herself lost in Jane’s 19th-century world when a lightning storm catapults her right into Jane’s body.

TV5 publishes the French box office for Jane Eyre 2011:

"Jane Eyre" a engrangé 51.846 sièges devant 90 salles, décrochant la meilleure fréquentation, après Batman, avec une moyenne de 576 personnes par écran. (Source:  CBO Box Office 25-31 July) (Translation)

IndieWire's The Playlist mentions Wuthering Heights 2011 but doesn't think it has many chances in the award's season:

And even if he had a bold take, that wouldn't necessarily be greeted well: Andrea Arnold's bold, Malickian "Wuthering Heights" is only just making it to theaters after mixed responses at festivals last year. (Oliver Lyttleton)

Gaming Illustrated complains about the continuing issuing of inane sequels of good franchises:

The market is saturated with C-grade product, and instead of putting their noses to the grindstones, it seems developers opt for picking over the fur of sleeping dogs who should be left alone. But maybe I’m wrong; maybe they know something I don’t. I mean, Wuthering Heights 2: Bloody Redemption does have a sexy ring to it. (Becca Gray)

Examiner interviews the writer Elisabeth Storrs:

What three novels could you read over and over?‘The Persian Boy’ by Mary Renault, ‘Jane Eyre’ by Charlotte Brontë and ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ by Harper Lee. (Kayla Posney)

Reading on the Wild Side talks to erotica writer Alice Gaines:

Kayla: What book has had the biggest impact on you?
Alice:  (...) I guess the one book that never leaves my thoughts and dreams for very long is Jane Eyre. The idea that a plain Jane can win the rich and powerful Mr. Rochester because of her integrity and decency holds a powerful appeal. Then, she will only accept him on her own terms. Of course, I wouldn’t love the book if it didn’t have a happy ending.

More writers and Brontëites. Cathy Hopkins on Daisy Chain Book Reviews:

What were some of your favourite books as a teen? Did any of the authors you read back then inspire you to become a writer?
I loved Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. And yes, they probably did influence my writing. In both books, the relationships are with difficult and dangerous (in Heathcliff’s case) men. Both Brontë’s wrote with such passion. Their lovers were bound together by fate, their souls connected. Cathy in Wuthering Heights or Jane in Jane Eyre would never have settled for Mr Ordinary or Mr Boring. Cathy tried to for a while in Wuthering Heights but her heart was really with bad boy Heathcliff. In the same way, I’ve tried to create interesting boy characters and with them, love never comes easily. If it did, there would be no story. 

Or Colleen Connally on Lace and Lavender:

LL: What is your all-time favourite book and why?
CC: Hard question.  I love so many books and authors. I love all the classics from Jane Eyre to Wuthering Heights.  

Or Tracie Banister on Reading is Fashionable:

What books have most influenced your life most?Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind, Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, and Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights were the novels that greatly influenced me.

A Girl Walks into a Bookstore... reviews Villette;  Rebecca Chesney on Brontë Weather Project talks about the recent Literary Weather event at the Parsonage; After the Page Turns posts about Agnes Grey; A Romp in the Real World has visited Haworth; Blue Sky Daze... reviews Sheila Kohler's Becoming Jane Eyre; Les Livres du Jardin d'Asphodèle (in French) posts about Jane Eyre; Rochester Big & Tall reviews Jane Eyre's Daughter by Elizabeth Newark; Lasso the Movies posts about Jane Eyre 1944; El Programator (in French) review Jane Eyre 2011 and bloody bird (also in French) posts some drawings inspired by the film; Escaping with Books talks about The Flight of Gemma Hardy; Outra vez na rede (in Portuguese) posts about the Brontë sisters.