A feline Brontë

Let's begin this by congratulating our friends at Ponden Hall. As Keighley News reports,

The Dorset Cereals B&B Award has gone to Ponden Hall, and was presented at a ceremony last month. (Nov) [...]
It was one of just five such enterprises to receive the national accolade this year, scooping the prize for the "friendliest host" category.
Ponden Hall is owned and run by Julie Akhurst, with help from her husband Steve Brown.
Reacting to the award Mrs Akhurst said: "I'm astonished and delighted. I think it says such a lot about the kind of people that come and stay with us. We really do have the best guests."
She said someone had nominated Ponden Hall and people had the chance to vote for it online. It was then visited by a mystery "secret sleeper" guest.
Mrs Akhurst thanked everyone who had supported her business's nomination, including its many previous guests.
"We've lived here for 18 and a half years but the B&B has only been here for two and half years, so it's so pleasing to get this when we haven't been going that long," she added.
"We're right on the edge of the moors so we get a lot of walkers, but about half the people come to stay here because of the building's connection to Wuthering Heights." (Miran Rahman)

More local news, as Keighley News also reports

A trio of Worth Valley Primary Schools have announced they are now part of a multi academy trust.
Oakworth, Lees and Haworth Primaries confirmed they have now come together to form Brontë Academy Trust. [...]
A spokesman for the venture said: "This is an exciting step forward for our schools. Oakworth and Lees converted on July 1 and the process for Haworth Primary was finally completed on September 1.
"On Thursday November 10 we had a launch event with representatives of staff, children, parents, governors and trustees."
The launch saw the staff and children from the school councils beginning the morning at West Lane Baptist Church with a talk from Sue Newby and Rebecca Yorke from the Brontë Parsonage Museum.
This looked at the heritage in the village and the significance of the Brontë sisters, who inspired the name of the new academy trust.
Following the talk the group was treated to a tour of the parsonage museum and was also given a guided tour of the village by Ms Newby. (Miran Rahman)

Good things DO come to those who wait - the Brontës have finally got their school!

Source

Not very far from there, The Huddersfield Daily Examiner announces that,

Felix the Cat, Huddersfield Railway Station’s cat, has her very own portrait.
Huddersfield artist Rob Martin created the oil portrait of Felix in a dress at the station yesterday.
It depicts her as Felix Brontë – in an era of the Brontës. [...]
“Felix is a girl, but not many people know that with her name. It’s why she’s in a dress in the portrait.
“Also there is a Brontë connection as she’s coming from West Yorkshire so she’s seen as Felix Brontë in the portrait. (Joanne Douglas)

Kensington Chelsea & Westminster Today features John Joubert's Jane Eyre opera.

It was an unmissable privilege to be invited by Kenneth Woods to the recording of the world premiere of John Joubert’s third opera Jane Eyre. [...]
You’ve done the travelling; there is no marginal cost. Music critic and journalist Christopher Morley, and Senior New Music Editor at Faber Music, Elaine Gould’s introduction to Joubert was unmissable. I thought it would be useful.
It was essential, and at times a most moving tribute to their former teacher, who as he approaches his ninetieth birthday is extremely active, and his attendance raised the drama of the performance. Making the pilgrimage to Birmingham willingly, I was delighted by the experience. The other hacks were charming about the online Woods’ interview, and the school and its music
hall are gorgeous, as indeed is Sophie Larsson who was sitting next to me.
Since I’d lauded the two productions I saw her in last year (Woods’ Mozart’s Requiem K626, and the RCM’s Britten’s Albert Herring) we had a fine time. The opera itself is stunning. This in
concert production, recorded for live CD to be released on 1 March 2017, was a remarkably evocative rendition, and one was left feeling that this cast would certainly do the full-staged Jane Eyre justice. (James Douglas)

Impact suggests a trip to Hathersage as an 'arty outing'.

This ‘bit of culture’ can be found in Hathersage, a small village about an hour and a quarter away from Nottingham, which is the perfect place for your day out. None other than Charlotte Brontë visited this sleepy village in 1845, and took inspiration for various settings in her famous novel Jane Eyre. [...]
The route takes you out of the village, through sheep-filled fields, up towards the impressive gritstone Stanage Edge. On the way you’ll go past North Lees Hall which is the inspiration for Thornfield in Jane Eyre, particularly its battlements from which Rochester’s wife Bertha Mason plunges to her death. This manor house was one of the many family homes owned by the well-known Eyre family, whose name was also the source of Jane’s surname. (Anna Seton)

Entertainment (Ireland) comments on this statement by Kate Bush on MacLean's:

Q: There’s always chat about a Kate Bush biopic kicking around the BBC. Is that a turnoff for you? A: I don’t think it’s a very nice idea at all. I don’t think my life is that interesting. I’m quite a private person and I like my work to do the talking. However, if I ever were in a position to choose who would play me, I think I’d choose Johnny Depp. (Elio Iannacci)

While we'll respectfully disagree about how interesting your life has been, Kate, given Depp's recent film choices with Pirates of the Caribbean et al, maybe playing a reclusive legendary female musician doesn't sound as outlandish as it seems. Plus, we'd love to see him trying to nail the high notes and doing the 'Wuthering Heights' dance.
Or else Kate is trolling us all magnificently. Yeah, it's probably that, actually. (Lauren Murphy)

The Bad Sex Award was announced earlier this week and Independent (Ireland) discusses sex in literature.

Ironically, for a culture saturated (nope, still no pun) in sexuality, there really are a strikingly small amount of good sex scenes in literature. [Romance writer Abby Green] namechecks ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’, John McGahern’s ‘The Pornographer’ and, as “a classic example of suppressed passion”, ‘Wuthering Heights’. (Darragh McManus)

Oscilloscope, which distributed Andrea Arnold's Wuthering Heights, has an article on Filming the Unfilmable: On Six Versions of Emily Brontë’s ‘Wuthering Heights’ by Soheil Rezayazdi. Jane Eyre is one of '15 British books everyone should read in their lifetime' according to Business Insider.