Emily Brontë, anthropologist

The City Talking features Ken Spelman's lovely secondhand bookshop in York and comments on the recent interest in books with a history (and perhaps even a treasure).

The premium on the unique has changed bookselling from a steady trade to readers, to a hunt, much more competitive than it used to be. And more fun. Stumble across something truly unique and the prices it will fetch are exceptional; Tony showed us a catalogue from a seller in London, where an illustrated map of Middle Earth, annotated by J.R.R. Tolkien himself, is offered for £60,000 and is “not underpriced — they’ve had at least ten orders.” It will also grab attention; in the week we visited Tony, newspapers were reporting the discovery of unseen manuscripts by a young Charlotte Bronte, stuffed among the pages of a book owned by her mother; exciting the interest of people who never finished reading Jane Eyre at school, but who love to hear about history being brought within their reach. If they can find it, or afford it. (Daniel Chapman)

Belfast Telegraph tells about the life of a student living in a bedsit in the 1980s and 1990s. Apparently it involved wanting

to be thought profound thinkers and, especially if you were a young woman, profoundly sensitive - all those minor Brontë novels and LPs/CDs by sensitive singer-songwriters. Tanita Tikaram. Suzanne Vega. Um, Brian Kennedy.
In other words, we wanted everything. (Gail Walker)

This columnist from The Southern Gazette also reminisces about reading a Brontë work: Wuthering Heights.

How about Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff traipsing about the Yorkshire moors in the pages of “Wuthering Heights?”
Speaking of “Wuthering Heights” …
There’s a space on the top shelf of my heart for that book. I first read a major portion of it as a displaced bay-boy riding in the engine of a QNS&L freight train chugging towards Labrador City a century ago in 1963 — 1963! — or thereabouts. The tundra the tracks crossed wasn’t totally unlike the Yorkshire moors. At least, I didn’t think so.
My answer to the question above is Catherine and Heathcliff’s story.
Re-open “Against Her Rules” and have another gander at Cam in the doorway, the moor-like terrain of Heart’s Ease visible over his shoulder. He remind you of Heathcliff or what? (Harold N. Walters)

And yet according to The New Yorker,

I know perfectly well that there was never a Golden Age of Teen Reading. No more than a minority read, on their own, J. D. Salinger or Joseph Heller or Charlotte Brontë fifty years ago; or Kurt Vonnegut or Ray Bradbury or Allen Ginsberg forty years ago; or science and history. Yet now that minority has grown even smaller—and defensive, too. The celebrated nerds among kids are mostly techies. (David Denby)

Female First features writer Rosie Milne, who is a fan of Jude Morgan:

I am a promiscuous reader - I'll read the backs of bus tickets, if I have to - and I enjoy historical fiction. I am looking forward to reading The Tea Planters Wife, by Dinah Jefferies, and I love France, so I'm keen to read Elizabeth Chadwick's Eleanor of Aquitaine trilogy. I enjoy Jude Morgan's historical reconstructions of literary lives - the Brontë sisters, Shakespeare's wife, and so on.

Jewish United Fund recommends The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schitz.

Earlier this week I finished reading one of the books recently selected a National Jewish Book Award winner.
I inhaled the final third in one sitting, captivated by the protagonist, who kills chickens, reads Shakespeare and Brontë and Marcus Aurelius, stages an audacious attempt to secure compensation for brutal working conditions, and, when not successful, sets out alone on a quest for better circumstances. This tenacious character craves education, is moved to tears by La Traviata, and reproaches a priest for antisemitism, directly to his face.
You’re intrigued, right? (Betsy Gomberg)

The Telegraph looks into the reason why women are supposedly attracted to 'dark and brooding men'.

Women really are drawn to men with the dark, brooding looks that suggest they are mad, bad or dangerous to know, according to new scientific research.
From the moody Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights to evil soap psychopath Richard Hillman in Coronation Street, women are attracted to their facial features, psychologists said.
But it is not the love of danger that attracts them but a primitive desire to find a mate who appears mentally strong, confident and physically attractive in order to have healthier children.
Such men have facial features that display the 'Dark Triad' of personality traits - Machiavellianism, narcissism and psychopathy - said research for the journal Evolution and Human Behaviour.

While the Yorkshire Post looks at the origins of the so-called Northern character:

The concept of being “from the north” began, he said, with the Romans, Vikings and Robin Hood, and continued through the age of the romantic poets and authors, Cumberland-born Wordsworth and the Brontës of Haworth among them. (David Behrens)

KUTV discusses sex education:

"Talking to your kids about sex can be normal, it can be part of your conversation and it doesn't have to be compartmentalized" says Worthington.
That means having age appropriate books about bodies, development and even sex out in the open along with books like Doctor Seuss on up to Jane Eyre. (Heidi Hatch)

And this columnist from All Africa discusses feminism:

Should we redefine the terminology "feminism" to exclude gender equality? Feminism is a term I feel so very passionate about especially because of its history and the fact that my favourite persons Virginia Woolf, the Brontë Sisters, Susan B. Anthony, Mary Wollstonecraft, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie amongst others, have popularised it. (Jennifer N. Mbunabo)

Corriere dell'Umbria (Italy) mentions Charlotte's infatuation with M. Heger in an article on 'ridiculous love' (a term coined by Milan Kundera).On the Brussels Brontë Blog, Eric Ruijssenaars has written a fascinating article on the four editions of Villette available in Brussels in 1855. The Emerald City reviews Alison Case's Nelly Dean. Reading, Watching, Looking, and Stuff posts a Wuthering Heights dream cast. The Writing Kylie has a post on the seven-point story structure of Jane Eyre. Linnet Moss explores Jane Eyre on Page and Screen.