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Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Wednesday, October 31, 2012 8:24 am by Cristina in , , , ,    No comments
USA Today has asked 'romance authors share the books that haunt them' and has found a Brontëite among them.
Deborah Grace Staley, Unforgettable, The Fifth Angel Ridge Novel
"I have to say I loved The Turn of the Screw by Henry James and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. I went through a period where I was loving reading classic Gothic romance. I just love the creepy settings, i.e. a gray, drafty castle in the middle of nowhere with things happening in it that defy explanation. It just makes the reader turn each page, anxious to see what creepy thing will happen next. Ah, and then there's the dark, mysterious hero whose tortured soul calls to the naive, innocent heroine who thinks her love can heal him. And it usually does. Sigh ..." (Joyce Lamb)
And this Battleboro Reformer columnist is a Jane Austen fan with a Brontë past:
I didn’t discover the genius of Jane Austen until my mid-30s. Blame my preference for historical non-fiction, and the fact that my high school and college literature instructors--who knows why--preferred the Brontës and George Eliot. I penned numerous papers on Jane Eyre and Silas Marner--all extremely uplifting and elucidating, I’m sure--but not a single essay on Austen’s books. I’m embarrassed to say my affection for Austen did not begin until I watched the BBC production of Pride and Prejudice--long after its first release. (Rebecca Balint)
The New Scientist's Culture Lab tries and see beyond that preference with the help of the book Louder Than Words by Benjamin Bergen.
Considering how the brain embodies words - whether or not you have a strongly visual imagination, for example - might even explain a preference for the vivid imagery in Jane Eyre over the wordplay of The Importance of Being Earnest. (David Robson)
The Independent thinks there are at least three books in a league of their own:
Like Moby-Dick and Wuthering Heights, Frankenstein is a unique, sui generis work, born of obsession. (Philip Hoare)
The same newspaper also publishes an obituary of Daphne Slater.
Slater's talents were later transposed to BBC television, as it began to dramatise the English literary canon in serial form. In 1952 she played Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice, with Peter Cushing as Mr Darcy (he was then considered as good casting for a dashing gentleman). Four years later, in another serialisation, she became the small screen's first Jane Eyre, in a performance brimming with passion, with Stanley Baker playing Mr Rochester. (Anthony Hayward)
And yet again the same newspaper recurs to Heathcliff for a football article:
Of all the words in Harry Redknapp's statement rejecting the chance to manage Blackburn Rovers, the most significant ones were: "I am starting to get bored. You can only play golf so often and I am losing too many balls at the moment."
It was never likely Redknapp would go to Ewood Park. The furthest north he has managed in a 30-year career is Tottenham. In popular terms, he an Artful Dodger on London's streets not a Heathcliff striding the bleak northern moors. (Tim Rich)
The Irish Times compares some of the Irish heritage to some of the British heritage:
We’ve got Tayto, Gaelic games, Wilde, Yeats, the Irish funeral, red lemonade, Katie Taylor, and heading out for the messages. They’ve got Walkers, cricket, Shakespeare, the Brontë sisters, the royal family, ginger beer, Katie Taylor’s dad, and running errands. (Jennifer O'Connell)
But let's not forget that the Brontës were of Irish descent.

Cyn's Workshop posts about Jane Eyre while Picture Me Reading, Life with No Plot and Alone. Together. Fact. Fiction pick Jane Eyre as one of their top ten favourite tough heroines. Cine/musica rosalabrandero reviews the 2011 adaptation of the novel in Spanish. The Whole Story (in Finnish) and History and Other Thoughts post about Wuthering Heights while Ready When You Are, C.B. reviews the 2011 adaptation of the novel. The Relentless Reader reviews Jude Morgan's The Taste of Sorrow.

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