Easter with the Brontës

Two programmes about the Brontës have been broadcast this past weekend - Being the Brontës and The Brontës at the BBC - and a couple of sites mention them. The Times gave 3 stars out of 5 to Being the Brontës and this is how Radio Times described The Brontës at the BBC:

It’s turning out to be Easter with the Brontës, what with last night’s revealing documentary about Charlotte, Emily and Anne and this round-up of clips from BBC dramatisations of the sisters’ novels.
Brontës at the BBC is a look back at how the books have been interpreted – very widely, as it turns out – in dramas and documentaries during the past 60 years. Along with various faintly outlandish reimaginings, there have been some sturdy classics. Anne Brontë’s tremendous Gothic masterpiece The Tenant of Wildfell Hall with Tara FitzGerald in the title role hit the spot in 1996, while Ruth Wilson was the perfect Jane Eyre in the smashing 2006 version with Toby Stephens as tortured Mr Rochester. [...]
A look back at how the Brontë sisters' novels have been portrayed on TV over the last 60 years, as each generation of writers and directors has put their spin on the characters. The heroines of the novels have been portrayed in various ways, from 1950s housewives to empowered modern women, while their male counterparts have appeared as prigs, wife beaters and brooding rock stars. (Alison Graham)

Radio Times also announces that an interview with Sally Wainwright is forthcoming and we are hoping she will discuss her Brontë project: To Walk Invisible.

Besides, she has other things to do, such as write a drama about the Brontë sisters for BBC1 later this year. (Watch out for my interview with Wainwright in an upcoming RT.) (Alison Graham)

A couple of Brontë adaptations make it onto Female First's list of  'Top 5 ultimate literary adaptations'.

Wuthering Heights (1939)
Eight-time Academy Award nominated, Wuthering Heights, tells the passionate love story between Catherine and Heathcliff, two unlikely lovers. The movie is filled with intense passion, love and desire. How do we choose who to love? Is it based off desire, or what we are told is right?  [...]
Jane Eyre (2011)
Set in the 19th century, Jane Eyre tells the powerful story of heartache, loss and love. When Jane starts falling in love with Mr. Rochester, the master of the house, she discovers that he has a terrible secret. Will she accept it or run away? Watch to find out!

The Chronicle of Higher Education recommends Claire Harman's biography of Charlotte Brontë among many other books.

Charlotte Brontë: A Fiery Heart by Claire Harman (Alfred A. Knopf; 462 pages; $30). Draws on previously unavailable letters in a biography of the Jane Eyre writer that explores how internal torment, including her one-sided passion for Constantin Heger, spurred her ambition. (Nina C. Ayoub)

While ValueWalk includes Villette among other novels set in Belgium.

Villette by Charlotte Bronte
Charlotte Brontë set two of her novels in Belgium — Villette, published in 1853, and The Professor, published posthumously in 1857. Both books are based on the experiences she and her sister, Emily, had at a boarding school in Brussels in the early 1840s.
In Villette, the author of Jane Eyre takes her protagonist Lucy Snowe from England to Belgium, where she teaches at a girl’s school in the French-speaking town of Villette. In Villette, her fourth novel, Brontë goes beyond the standard romance/adventure themes of the day to explore isolation and subversion and the impact these events have on Lucy’s psyche.
Favorite quote: "Life is so constructed that an event does not, cannot, will not, match the expectation." (Tricia Drevets)

This columnist from The Huffington Post tells about how she has always felt the need to defend poetry:

Mainly because I always felt it needed defending. Opting for John Clare's melancholic poems of solitude and pain always seemed to lose out to Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights (though I do adore both) at school and at university. And there was just something refreshing and raw in an emotionally charged poem comprised of 12 lines that a detail-obsessive could really grapple with. (Clare Dyckhoff)

Libération (France) mourns the recent death of writer Jim Harrison.

Son héros de fiction était Heathcliff des Hauts de Hurlevent, mais aussi Dalva qu’il avait créée. (Matthieu Ecoiffier) (Translation)

Spanish writer Toni Hill speaks about his novel Los ángeles de hielo in El País (Spain)

Esos elementos, admite el autor, beben directamente de clásicos victorianos, como Otra vuelta de tuerca, de Henry James, o la Jane Eyre, de Charlotte Brontë, que el mismo Hill tradujo del inglés. (Anna Pazos) (Translation)

Wuthering Heights is one of this columnist's favourite books. From Viceversa (Venezuela):

Uno de mis libros favoritos es Cumbres Borrascosas -al igual que todos los demás libros de las hermanas Brontë-. Las razones son muchas y una de ellas es the moor, el páramo. El paisaje es en Cumbres Borrascosas otro personaje -tal vez el más fuerte de todos-, traducción geográfica del ánimus y ánima de los protagonistas. Heathcliff y Cathy son también un páramo. Uno más frío, seco, doloroso, oscuro; distinto al que los turistas ven en las postales. (Brisa Montoya) (Translation)

The Yorkshire Post has a fascinating article on Yorkshire's treasure trove of archives.

These wills are just a tiny fraction of those held by the Borthwick Institute for Archives at the University of York. Some of the wills housed in the archive, which includes those of the Brontë sisters, date as far back as the 14th Century. “The is the main archive for wills for the whole of Yorkshire and we think there’s about 350,000 individuals represented,” says Chris, Keeper of Archives at the Borthwick. (Chris Bond)

Except for the fact that the only Brontë sister to leave a will was Charlotte. But Patrick's and Aunt Branwell's may also be there of course.

Cannonball Read 8 and YA Romantics post about Jane Steele. The Book Jotter reviews The Madwoman Upstairs. Thoughts in Purple talks about The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.