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Saturday, August 11, 2012

The Derby Telegraph reports that Hathersage Hall (in the Peak District) is still on the market (Blenheim Park Estates):
Not many people can boast their home has connections with such iconic and legendary figures as Little John and Charlotte Brontë.
But Hathersage Hall, home of Mike Harrison and his two teenage children, remains one of the most significant historic houses still in private ownership in the Peak District. (...)
"It is a brilliant house," says Mike. "This will only be the fourth time it has been sold in 300 years.
"It was owned by the Shuttleworth family from 1775 through to the 1940s. Some of the Shuttleworths still live in the village. The last occupant, Mrs Shuttleworth, is 91 and still drives. She's a fabulous lady, like the Queen."
Mike is proud of the history of the hall. He says: "Charlotte Brontë stopped at the local vicarage and people reckon she modelled the village of Morton in Jane Eyre on Hathersage and took the name from the previous owner of the hall.
"One of the rooms here used to have bars on the window and it's thought she may have got the idea of Mrs Rochester being locked away from it."
Peter J.Conradi talks about biographies, and their evolution, in the Financial Times:
Elizabeth Gaskell’s life of Charlotte Brontë in 1857 – to pick just one example – may have started a process of sanctification but not all Victorian biography created a stained-glass figure.
The New York Times interviews the writer and economist Sylvia Nasar:
Do you prefer a book that makes you laugh or makes you cry? One that teaches you something or one that distracts you?
I like books that make me do both, which is one reason I adore Victorian fiction. All English novelists, it seems, have a deliciously wicked sense of humor, including Elizabeth Gaskell and Charlotte Brontë. I do also like novelists like Tolstoy who combine strong plots with philosophical or political musings.
The Independent talks with the actress and designer Sadie Frost, who reveals she is a Brontëite (Emily's faction):
I also saw Wuthering Heights. Every year I re-read Wuthering Heights and the film directed by Andrea Arnold was so bleak. It made me think about what it would have been like to live on the Yorkshire moors.
The Kinodrome posts a review of the film.

Zoe Williams in The Guardian is exhausted after seeing the Olympic rhythmic gymnastics and particularly the emotional responses of the athletes to their scorings:
It is awful to watch, but you can't not watch, so you're constantly trying to cross-reference who is crying, what colour they're wearing, what their score was, who has just been announced; and often they're in a mum/aunt/coach hug-circle by now, so all you can see is the back of their head and the fact that their shoulders are shaking. It is emotionally exhausting. It's like watching Gone with the Wind at the same time as reading Wuthering Heights at the same time as listening to Cry Me A River.
The Washington Post speculates about who will appear at the Olympics Closing Ceremony:
Kate Bush
Confirmed?: The eclectic and reclusive singer might be the wild card here. No confirmation for Kate Bush yet. But a remix of one of her songs appeared on Amazon recently, fueling speculation.
What she should perform: “Wuthering Heights." It would make the Closing Ceremony really weird. (Maura Judkis)
Even The Times is giving some credibility to this.

The Montreal Gazette reviews The Curiosity of School: Education and the Dark Side of Enlightenment by Zander Sherman:
Most significantly, Sherman brings to the discussion an elitist conception of education in which reading Wuthering Heights is more commendable than reading Harry Potter, mastering Latin and Greek is a must, and everyone can be a polymath. Is his curriculum likely to capture the imagination of all of our children? (Eric Caplan)
The Wall Street Journal mentions previous books by Benjamin Black:
Mr. Black himself is the alter ego of the Booker-Prize-winning Irish novelist John Banville, whose novels under his own name are filled with cerebral teasers, such as quoting Nietzsche without attribution in "The Book of Evidence" (1989) or, in "The Newton Letter" (1982), naming a character Prunty (the Brontës' original, Irish, name), leaving readers to scramble along in his wake.  (Judith Flanders)
Gizmodo reminds us about the target of Kindle:
But more importantly, remember who the Kindle and Kindle Fire are ideal tools for: students. Specifically, college kids who may not have enough disposable income for an iPad but want to put as many textbooks (or, for English majors, free public domain Emily Brontë ebooks) on a tablet or ereader as possible to save backpack space and beer money. (Brian Barrett)
Which of course is ideal as Emily Brontë free public domain or not ebooks are reduced to just the one.

The journalist in the Marshall Independent has just seen Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris:
Other authors I wouldn't mind getting to know include Charlotte Brontë, Paula Danziger (who died in 2004, one of my young adult favorites), Louisa May Alcott, and J.R.R. Tolkein (sic). (Cindy Votruba)
The Palm Beach Post talks about Fifty Shades wannabes:
This time, the panting sex will be crossed with Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre in a little number called Jane Eyrotica. This isn’t really much of a stretch, as Mr. Rochester always seemed to have some potential for domination, what with the crazy wife imprisoned in the attic and all. (Scott Eyman)
Bad sign if you admire a writer and you spell the name wrong, but it's far worse if you don't even know who wrote what. We read in the Ripley & Heanor News about local screenings of films:
Based on the novel by Charlotte Brontë, Pride and Prejudice (U), from 2006, was shot on location throughout Derbyshire including Chatsworth House, Haddon Hall and Stanage Edge, and screens at Kedleston Hall on Saturday, August 18.
Maybe it's a new line of elitist mash-up, rewrite the classics in the style of another author. Just an idea.

The Western Mail has a very easy question for you:
Which film, TV programme or musical number do these initials stand for? We give you a clue to help.
WH – Oft-adapted Brontë work.
Examiner interviews Eve-Marie Mont, author of A Breath of Eyre:
In “A Breath of Eyre” an imaginative new YA novel by Eve Marie Mont, a teenage girl finds herself swept into "Jane Eyre" … literally. After she’s struck by lightning, Emma Townsend wakes up at her posh boarding school, only it’s not quite her school. While most of the historic buildings look the same, she finds she's been transported to Thornfield, Mr. Rochester’s estate in "Jane Eyre." As Emma moves back and forth between two realities, she can’t decide whether to stay in Jane’s world, where she’s comfortable and in love with Mr. Rochester, or her actual world where her mother is dead, her classmates mostly hate her and the boy she's after has his own secrets. (Read more) (Kristin Contino)
The book is reviewed on Candy Apple Books and Dear Author.

El País (Uruguay) reviews the DVD of Jane Eyre 2011:
Lo que consigue es una síntesis elegante y bien actuada, quizás un poco demasiado "luminosa", bien defendida en todo caso por sus dos actores: Mia Wasikowska se confirma (luego de En terapia y Alicia en el País de las Maravillas) como una joven interesante, y Michael Fassbender vuelve a demostrar que ningún papel se le resiste. Es probablemente el mejor actor angloparlante de hoy. (Guillermo Zapiola) (Translation)
Viddy Well  (in French) praises with enthusiasm Moira Buffini's adaptation of the novel; the film is also reviewed on Sapphire Reviews,

A Democrat primary candidate and Brontëite on WMUR9; Heavens to Mergatroyd doesn't remember having read Emma Brown by Charlotte Brontë and Clare Boylan; 101 Books in 1001 Days and Inadvertently Incorrigible review Jane Eyre;  Des Livres en Folie and A Fleur de Mots (both in French) and
Yksi luku vielä... (in Finnish) post about Wuthering Heights and, finally, The World Turned Upside Down posts a funny Jane and Edward exchange of text messages.

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