Writers' Cribs

The Paris Review Magazine Fall issue includes an excerpt of from Bibliophile: An Illustrated Miscellany, by Jane Mount

Bibliophile
An Illustrated Miscellany
Illustrated by Jane Mount
Chronicle Books
Publication: September 2018
ISBN: 9781452167237

The ultimate gift for book lovers, this volume brims with literary treasures, all delightfully illustrated by beloved artist and founder of Ideal Bookshelf, Jane Mount.
Book lovers, rejoice! In this love letter to all things bookish, Jane Mount brings literary people, places, and things to life through her signature and vibrant illustrations. 

Writers' Cribs: The Brontës

Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Brontë moved into the Haworth Parsonage in West Yorkshire when their father, Patrick, a priest and poet, was appointed there in 1820.
When Patrick Brontë died (he outlived all of his children) in 1861, the contents of the family home were auctioned off. Decades later, in 1893, at a librarian’s insistence that the artifacts be collected and preserved, the Brontë Society was founded and began gathering Brontë treasures.
Even though the Brontë sisters grew up seeing their name on book spines at home (Patrick was a published poet), they published their first work together, a collection of poems, under the (male) pseudonyms of Currer (Charlotte), Ellis (Emily), and Acton (Anne) Bell. Three copies of the book were sold.
After being in private collections for more than a century, the mahogany desk Charlotte wrote from was acquired for twenty thousand pounds and donated to the museum in 2011.
In 2015, the large mahogany drop-leaf table all the sisters used was purchased by the museum with a grant of five hundred eighty thousand pounds. In a diary entry from 1837, Emily sketches the table, showing Anne and herself working at it.