Fanciful girls

Sue Lonoff de Cuevas, editor of The Belgian Essays, has written an article on Charlotte Brontë's L'amour filial for Harper's Magazine.

Charlotte Brontë wrote “L’Amour filial” in 1842, during the first of two years she spent at the Pensionnat Heger, a boarding school for “jeunes Demoiselles” (“young ladies”) in Brussels. At twenty-five, she was an over-age student, but she and her twenty-three-year-old sister, Emily, had come to Belgium with a purpose: to improve their French and so become more qualified to open a school of their own in Haworth, the village in Yorkshire where they had been raised. This three-page essay is one of many devoirs (assignments) Charlotte wrote for her professor, Constantin Heger, but, unlike the others, this one came to light only last year when a document written in faded brown ink was found in a private library. The essay was presented to members of the Brontë Society in June this year; my translation of it in Harper’s Magazine marks its debut before a wider audience. (Read more)

The Times has an obituary of Robert Barnard:

Barnard was also an expert on the Brontës and was involved in efforts to preserve their legacy. He published a study of Emily Brontë in the British Library's Writers' Lives series and co-authored, with his wife Louise, a comprehensive, alphabetically arranged Brontë Encyclopedia,published in 2007.

Total Film has compiled a list of the '30 Best Biopics Currently In Development', such as

Brontë
The True Story: Three sisters – Charlotte, Emily and Anne – became world-renowned poets and novelists in the nineteenth century and, between them, were responsible for Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall although all originally under male pseudonyms.
They are often remembered as being fanciful girls who emerged as incredibly writing talents, and who contended with a domineering father and a drug-abusing brother.
The Movie Version: A biopic of the three sisters is currently planned for 2016 to mark the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë’s birth.
Paramount are behind the project but there is no one attached yet, although Rupert Grint and Rupert Everett have both been mentioned in connection with the film.
Basically anyone called Rupert is a sure bet for a film covering this time period.
Why We're Excited: After years and years of adaptations of their works, it will be great to see a big-budget version of the real-life story behind it all. (Matt Looker)

Dave Astor writes in The Huffington Post about 'Fictional Characters We'd Most Like to Meet':

In Jasper Fforde's very clever novel The Eyre Affair, "literary detective" Thursday Next enters Charlotte Brontë's iconic Jane Eyre book to interact with Jane and Rochester.
Ms. Next's "novel" adventure made me think about which fictional characters I'd most like to meet if I had my own "Prose Portal." The quiet, likable, principled, resilient Jane would certainly be one of them.

Writer David Gilmour doesn't seem to share Mr Astor's taste in books. According to The National Post, he recently stated,

“When I was given this job I said I would only teach the people that I truly, truly love,” Gilmour, whose comments have predictably raised all sorts of ire online, told Keeler. “Unfortunately, none of those happen to be Chinese, or women. Except for Virginia Woolf. And when I tried to teach Virginia Woolf, she’s too sophisticated, even for a third-year class.”

A couple of articles from The National Post comment on this. One of them says,

Gilmour deliberately overstated his case, but I think that buried beneath the foolish extremism and outright absurdity — George Eliot? Jane Austen? Emily Brontë? All chopped liver? — he has the makings of an actual point. (Barbara Kay)

While the other claims that

Mr. Gilmour will now suffer the slings and arrows of loopy political correctness, and be forced to atone for his “sin.” Meanwhile, courses devoted to female authors will continue, and no one will say “boo” about syllabi replete with the works of Jane Austen and the sisters Brontë. (Mindy G. Alter)

We are not used to seeing this kind of blunder in a newspaper such as The New York Times, but here it is in an article about a temporary exhibition featuring Balthus's work at the Met:

These works earned Balthus, born Balthasar Klossowski (1908-2001), widespread notoriety, starting in Paris in the 1930s. But only a few match his best efforts, which are from the same decade. Those include his few portraits of adults; his illustrations for Charlotte Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights”... (Roberta Smith)

Edit: The article now has been corrected:

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: September 27, 2013
An earlier version of this review misidentified the author of “Wuthering Heights.” She was Emily Brontë, not her sister Charlotte Brontë.

Panorama (Italy) discusses authors and pseudonyms while Bustle discusses 'fan fiction'.

After all, when fanfic is good, it’s really good — and the fall catalogs for publishing houses are reflecting that. Proving that everything old is new again, the upcoming releases of Havisham by Ronald Frame (Picador, November) and A True Novel by Minae Mizumura (Other Press, November) find their source material in Great Expectations and Wuthering Heights, respectively. Havisham expands of the background of — you guessed it — Ms. Havisham. This is the same technique that made Harry Potter fan fiction that focused on the founders (Godric Gryffindor & co.) a successful subgenre. Similarly, A True Novel transplants Wuthering Heights into New York in the 1960s. In fan fiction, it'd be called a Wuthering Heights AU, or "alternate universe". (Caitlin Van Horn)

More on Elizabeth Gilbert's new book The Signature of All Things in The Star.

The era was a perfect fit. Her favourite writers are from that period — Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Henry James.
“I wanted to romp around in their language and their world.” (Andrea Gordon)

We would never have thought to include Jane Austen and Henry James in the same 'period'.

Bloggers[heart]Books reviews April Lindner's Catherine. The Brissioni Blog posts about Margot Livesey's The Flight of Gemma Hardy. The Brontë Parsonage Facebook page tells about a recent visit from staff from the National Portrait Gallery to the museum.