Emily Brontë carries Yorkshire

The cast of “Jane Eyre” at Brigham’s Playhouse,
Washington, Utah, Feb. 4, 2015 |
 Photo by Cami Cox Jim, St. George News

St George News reviews the current performances of Jane Eyre. The Musical at Brigham's Playhouse in Washington, Utah:

The quality of the production – from the sets to the singing – was superb. Some very talented singers and actors have come out of the woodwork of Southern Utah to grace the stage at Brigham’s Playhouse.
A musical adaptation of Brontë’s novel, “Jane Eyre” is double-cast – meaning different performers appear in the roles on different nights. Wednesday night’s show was led by husband-wife team Tamera Merkley and Tim Merkley in the starring roles of Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester. I was utterly charmed by the Merkleys. The couple filled their roles with strong dramatic presence – and they filled the theater with their absolutely gorgeous singing voices.
The collective vocal quality of the cast members blew me away. From start to finish, the characters brought professional-quality musicianship to the stage – just gorgeous vocals throughout the show. There were many standout vocalists. With the double-casting issue, I don’t dare name names for fear of naming the wrong performers, but, to the cast: Just know you truly impressed and delighted me.
Everything about “Jane Eyre” screamed polish and professionalism. For my money, the Brigham’s Playhouse thespians rival the likes of the Utah Shakespeare Festival in quality and poise. (...)
I heartily recommend Brigham’s Playhouse and its ongoing lineup of family-friendly shows for every Southern Utah theatergoer. If you miss Brigham’s Playhouse, you’re missing a theatrical treat. (Cami Cox Jim)

Valley News talks about the sequel of To Kill a Mockingbird that will be published by the author Harper Lee this year:

Devoted readers of, say, Emily Brontë, Margaret Mitchell, Oscar Wilde and J.D. Salinger know the feeling — that impossible yearning for more. Wuthering Heights was Brontë’s one and only novel — she died shortly after its publication. Gone With the Wind was apparently all Mitchell had to say about antebellum society and the Civil War, or anything else, for that matter. Wilde turned to poetry and plays after The Picture of Dorian Gray, which critics called “unclean.” Fans of J.D. Salinger, who died in 2010, hold out hope that Catcher in the Rye wasn’t the writer’s only novel: his literary estate is said to possess another.

Winnipeg Free Press is concerned about one-novel authors, now that Harper Lee has left the list:

The lone novel: Wuthering Heights (1847)
The one-hit wonder: Emily Brontë
The singular story: Writing was definitely in the blood for Emily, the second-oldest of the famed Brontë sisters, including authors Charlotte and Anne. As the website Flavorwire noted: "If you're going to be the Brontë sister with just one book to your name, that book might as well be one of the 19th century's greatest." Thanks to her reclusive nature, Emily remains a mysterious literary figure. When Wuthering Heights was published in 1847, it appeared under the androgynous pen name of Ellis Bell. It was published in the wake of the success of Charlotte's famed novel, Jane Eyre. Set in Yorkshire, it revolves around the tragic love story of Heathcliff and Catherine, whose love consumes and eventually destroys them. Chronicling the volatile love affair over the course of two generations, its theme is the destructive effect of jealousy and vengefulness. Now considered one of the most iconic novels of all time, it was met with mixed reviews from critics, who found it scandalous and hard to believe because of its stark depictions of physical and mental cruelty. One critic, the English poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti, branded it: "A fiend of a book -- an incredible monster... The action is laid in hell." Emily died of tuberculosis at age 30 one year after the novel was published. In 1850, a new edition was published with a preface written by sister Charlotte, who defended her sister's work. History has done the same. (Doug Speirs)

The Vancouver Sun discusses today's Google Doodle  and finds a Brontë connection:

Vancouver-based author and illustrator Holman Wang and his brother Jack have made small work out of some big projects.
They’ve shrunk classic tales like Moby Dick, Jane Eyre and War and Peace into 12-word books illustrated with needle-felted characters, and a short time from now in a galaxy very, very nearby, the brothers will release tiny takes on each film in the original Star Wars trilogy. (...)
But no mistake had been made. [Jennifer] Hom had stumbled upon the brothers’ take on Jane Eyre a couple of years ago and thought of their work when the Ingalls Wilder project came up. (Matthew Robinson)

Andrew O'Hagan discusses poetry in The Guardian:

The question of landscape was crucial. The world of Wessex was a thing of language, and it wasn’t borne on air or planted with trees but fully figured by the mind of the writer, in words and images. In some sense, great poets are the landscape they magic into being. The place isn’t quite there – not imaginatively – without them. Wordsworth carries the Lakes, Emily Brontë carries Yorkshire, Heaney is Ireland and Pope is the difficult London of his day.

The Irish Times opens an article in the Religion section with a quote from Jane Eyre (from Chapter XXVIII):

“We know that God is everywhere; but certainly we feel his presence most when his works are on the grandest scale spread before us; and it is the unclouded night-sky, where his worlds wheel their silent course, that we read clearest his infinitude, his omnipotence, his omniscience.” These words from Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre provide an interesting backdrop to tomorrow’s Old Testament readings. They emphasise the magnitude of the claim we make every time we say “I believe in God . . . maker of heaven and earth”, especially given today’s understanding of the vastness and complexity of the universe. (Gordon Linney)

A reader of The Southern Daily Echo didn't like at all the Wuthering Heights performances at the Nuffield Theatre in Southampton:

This stuttering version of the Brontë masterpiece was a disaster, a shallow interpretation that made no attempt to capture the psychological depth of the original.
The complex character Heathcliff was reduced to a bullying brute and Cathy was seen simply as a screaming shrew.
Its young actors struggled throughout to make sense of the director’s demands, while the audience struggled to make sense of their diction, which was either mumbled or shouted.
The set, which featured a fireplace in the middle of a moor, was simply laughable.
And to think I travelled 40 miles to see this pathetic offering, which sadly undermined the reputation of the usually first-class Maskers Theatre Company. (Alan Bartley)

TES News reminds us of

Jekyll and Hyde is one of only three texts to appear on all the exam boards’ lists of 19th century novels, the others being Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice.
But John Yandell, head of the English secondary PGCE team at the UCL Institute of Education, said the choices open to teachers were “disappointingly limited”. (Nick Morrison)

The Arkansas Traveler publishes some poetry to love (or not) in Valentine's day:

“Love and Friendship” by Emile Brontë: This poem turns friendship and love into two different plants and then juxtaposes the two to show the true lasting beauty of friendship. Tender and inspiring, Brontë’s poem proves the value of having a best friend worth celebrating on Valentine’s Day. (Michele Dobbins)

Amy Jenkins discusses the 'toxicity' of Fifty Shades of Grey in The Independent:

Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca comes to mind. Or Jane Eyre – sort of. Taming the beast. And it’s true, big Hollywood romantic fantasies – such as Pretty Woman – have always been pretty toxic, but this one surely crosses into a whole new territory of dodgy relationship advice.

Kate Bartolotta and Sara Crolick in The Huffington Post thinks that girls who drink whiskey:

know that Twilight is overrated; it was better the first time around when it was called Wuthering Heights. She wants to write her own story, and if you're lucky, she'll invite you along.

Jane Eyre in the information age would have a few changes according to The Advocate:

Victorian novels are famous for such intrigue. In “Jane Eyre,” we learn that Jane’s amorous employer, Mr. Rochester, has a wife. Furthermore, said wife is living on an upper floor of the grand house, insane and chained.
Suffice it to say, these heroines weren’t living in the information age. It’s really hard these days to hide a shady past or a living spouse. (Froma Harrop)

A teen publishes a eulogy of her dog in The Huffington Post:

There's an Emily Brontë quote that goes "Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same." That really makes me think of Satchmo. We were both always at lightning speed: getting stoked for dinner or stroked the wrong way by a simple noise from upstairs. (Kamrin Baker)

Cihan (Turkey) talks about the film Black or White and quotes from Charlotte Brontë:

I raise here something I bring up from time to time: The question we face for the future is what will we do with the prejudices, stereotypes and discrimination that hinder us from improving relations and current situations and what steps can be taken to pave the way for a better future?
“Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilized by education: They grow there, firm as weeds among stones.” -- Charlotte Brontë, “Jane Eyre” (Charlotte McPherson)

Scrigno (Italy) interviews the writer Chiara Giacobelli:

Il suo modus scribendi è influenzato da qualche autore o corrente in particolare?
No, perché non ho un modus scribendi, sono eclettica a 360 gradi. Mi piace cambiare totalmente stile, mi diverto quando le stesse persone leggono testi scritti da me e non immaginano neppure lontanamente che la scrittrice sia sempre la stessa. Sono curiosa nei confronti del mondo in generale e questo mio modo di essere si rispecchia anche nella scrittura, che per me è una continua sperimentazione. Ci sono comuque autori che prediligo in particolar modo, ma a questa domanda mi viene sempre inevitabilmente da rispondere citando i classici: Flaubert, Dickens, Emily Bronte, Coleridge, Goethe, Mann, Shakespeare e tutta una serie di altri defunti da cui traggo ispirazione per sognare. (Raffaele Cecoro) (Translation)

Diario de Jerez (Spain) interviews another writer, Espido Freire:

-¿Cómo se acerca una no creyente a una figura como Teresa de Ávila?
-La vengo leyendo desde muy pequeñita. Tengo una tía que es monja carmelita y desde pequeña me contaba cosas fascinantes de Teresa de Jesús. En lo literario entronca con mi interés por las hermanas Brontë, Jane Austen… Tenemos que esperar varios siglos hasta encontrar a escritoras como ella. He estado con Santa Teresa muchos meses de estudio, antes de esta conmemoración. (Francisco Andrés Gallardo) (Translation)