Wutheringly realistic

The Telegraph and Argus reports the visit of author Tracy Chevalier to the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

Award-winning author Tracy Chevalier has visited the Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth.
The novelist, whose novels include Girl With A Pearl Earring, discussed plans for the forthcoming Brontë bicentenary celebrations.
The celebrations will start in 2016, the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë’s birth, and will run until 2020, to mark the births of Emily and Anne.
The museum, which is due to reopen on Sunday after its winter break, said further details of the celebration would be unveiled later in 2015.

The Millions reviews Silvina Ocampo's Thus Were Their Faces.

Like Emily Brontë, Ocampo was a younger sister whose literary vision takes its own unruly path away from that of her elder (in Ocampo’s case this elder sister, the revered writer and critic Victoria, was her first publisher). Love is as fearsome in an Ocampo story as it is in Wuthering Heights; emotion has a way of sealing us into a charmed circle that makes us incomprehensible to everyone who stands outside it. This kind of circle shrinks and shrinks until even the beloved is impossible to read clearly, and then finally we’re unable to even pretend to understand our own thoughts. (Helen Oyeyemi)

Reader's Digest reviews Thornfield Hall by Jane Stubbs:

Thornfield Hall works because it doesn’t rewrite the original, but reimagines it from another point of view – that of the housekeeper Mrs Fairfax. It is through her eyes that we see the full goings-on at Thornfield, from the moment she joins the household, widowed and penniless. Young Edward Rochester is away in the Caribbean, and he only returns when he inherits the estate after his father’s death. (Farhana Gani)

This columnist from The Hartford Courant discusses the concept of 'realistic romance'.

Is the new designation for books — “Realistic Romance” — a contradiction in terms? Is it a classic oxymoron right up there with “free gift,” “business ethics” and “adult children”?
Or will “Realistic Romance” now forever (another lovely oxymoron) be known as the category designed for readers who seek plots focused on the wild, unstoppable and inevitable merging of two soul mates who, despite all odds, face the world more bravely because their love has made them strong and also really good-looking?
That sure sounds like romance. What it doesn’t sound is realistic.
I’m saying this not only as a happily married woman but also as a fan of impossibly unrealistic classics such as “Wuthering Heights,” “Gone with the Wind” and “The Princess Bride.” (Gina Barreca)

The Independent has an article on how books are interpreting reading as a 'social exercise'.

The rise of the BookTuber speaks volumes, pun intended, about how reading is adapting to suit our modern, socially obsessed lives. Both teenagers and adult BookTubers sit in front of their laptops and talk about their "TBR" (To Be Read) piles. They speak into the camera with impressively large book collections in the background, holding up gorgeous hardcovers. Whether they're talking about Jane Eyre or the Twilight saga, this fills me with optimism.
Today's young people interpret reading as a social exercise. It's not just about picking the book up and reading - it's about interaction.
As long as there are platforms for sharing, whether over a beer or through an iPhone screen, there will be readers. This is what libraries and bookshops would be wise to embrace. (Eleanor Dunn)

Nottingham Post recommends 'seven hidden gems' in the city.

If you're more of a book worm than a crate digger, Bromley House Library's 41,500 books and ornate wooden spiral staircase might be more up your street.
Librarian Carol Barstow said: "I like the term 'hidden gem', although we've been trying to make ourselves more well-known."
The library houses early editions of novels by the Brontë sisters in its Grade II* listed Georgian townhouse. The library is also home to one of just two walled gardens in the city centre. Fortnightly tours give non-members a chance to have a guided look around. (Ben Ireland)

Writer Santiago Posteguillo mentions Charlotte Brontë as one of his influences in this interview on Semana. Escritores looks at classics which received bad reviews when they were first published, such as Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre. Celestial Timepiece posts an introduction to Jane Eyre by Joyce Carol Oates.