Mythic Aplomb (again)

The Guardian interviews Emma Mackey and mentions the Emily Brontë biopic project:

In May, it was announced she will play Emily Brontë in Emily, about the author’s journey to womanhood, which should start filming next year. How good is her Yorkshire accent? “Pretty good,” she says. “It’s Emily Brontë, I studied English at Leeds, we’re filming in Leeds, so it feels like a full-circle moment.” She sounds excited: “Twelve-year-old Emma would be freaking out right now.” (Rebecca Nicholson)

A new lockdown... and new lists of books to read. Once again. In The Independent:

Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë

Will there ever be a novel that burns with more passionate intensity than Wuthering Heights? The forces that bring together its fierce heroine Catherine Earnshaw and cruel hero Heathcliff are violent and untameable, yet rooted in a childhood devotion to one another, when Heathcliff obeyed Cathy’s every command. It’s impossible to imagine this novel ever provoking quiet slumbers; Emily Brontë’s vision of nature blazes with poetry. (Chris Harvey)

Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
You will need a cold, dead heart not to be moved by one of literature’s steeliest heroines. From the institutional cruelty of her boarding school, the “small, plain” Jane Eyre becomes a governess who demands a right to think and feel. Not many love stories take in a mad woman in the attic and a spot of therapeutic disfigurement, but this one somehow carries it off with mythic aplomb. (Ceri Radford)

Penn State News talks about a recent virtual class that Emeritus Professor Phil Mosley gave to students from Norwich School:

 “We did a close reading of an excerpt from the novel where the first-person narrator, an insecure young woman, finds herself lost in a haunted wing of an old country house, a typical Gothic element. I posed questions to the students, who responded in thoughtful and perceptive ways. It was nice to hear British accents again!” Mosley said. “Following the close analysis, I opened up a discussion both on the female Gothic, broadly understood as the saga of vulnerable women subject to mental and physical manipulation, and on the relationship of Rebecca to other literary texts, notably ‘Jane Eyre’ by Charlotte Brontë.” (Josh McAuliffe)

The Nerd Daily reviews The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins:

While our story begins from Jane’s perspective, Hawkins flips the script (more than once) and switches up who we the reader get each section of the story from. We get a lot more information this way, as opposed to having everything come from only one character, but at the same time we get a much more personal view of the story, including tons of neighbourhood gossip, than we would if the entire story were told through a third person omniscient narrator. This storytelling device works perfectly in The Wife Upstairs and will keep you glued to the pages. (Marla Warren)

And now, our Bridgerton daily dose: 

Alisa Chang: That's so interesting. What do you mean about the feminist lens into masculinity? Where do you think that is reflected in this series to you?

Regé-Jean Page: I think it's - we're at a point in history where kind of since you had Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Mary Shelley start writing these books that we've kind of adapted into the genre of the period drama, we've had, like - what? - four or five waves of feminism since then. And the genre on television appears has stood fairly still. And so we kind of wanted to see what we could do to advance that in the lens of the show. I think we're at a point in history where, generally, people consider themselves to be feminists in the sense that we believe in the equality of the sexes. And so how can we bring that agenda into the editorial stance of the show? And for my part, that's in the male romantic lead. And so...  (WQCS Morning Edition)

 I colori brillanti della fotografia e degli abiti alleggeriscono molto i toni della serie distanziandola da qualsiasi messa in scena dei romanzi della Austen o delle sorelle Brontë. Caratteristica, questa, che piacerà molto agli amanti del genere in costume; soprattutto per la cura dei dettagli. (Sara Formisano in Fortementein) (Translation)

 Vamos a ver, confieso que como a muchos otros que he leído en Twitter, a mí también me costó engancharme al principio. Para empezar voy a reconocer que más allá de mi pasión por el cine de terror de la que ya les hablé muchas veces, las historias de época son de mis guilty pleasures más secretos (la de veces que he visto las versiones de Orgullo y prejuicio de Keira Knightley o Jane Eyre con Mia Wasikowska son incontables). (Valeria Martínez in Cine54) (Translation)

NME recommends emergent musical talents such as:

Skullcrusher (...)

Why you’re going to love them: Skullcrusher – aka Helen Ballentine – finds beauty in solitude, with lush acoustics and painstakingly introspective lyrics making up her musical repertoire. Her ghostly yet hypnotic melodies interweave with touches of new-wave horror to create a Brontë-esque aesthetic. The result? An arrestingly fascinating style of musical production with the visuals to match. 

Bookriot lists literary characters with a librarian's soul:

Mary Porter-Malcolm in By the Book by Amanda Sellet

The heroine of this YA romcom is devoted to classic literature…to the point that she begins offering her friends love advice drawn from books like Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice. Her perfect ability to recommend books for every occasion, along with the ability to persuasively book talk to various types of people would make her excellent at working at the reference desk, presenting books to classes, and coming up with ingenious programming for teens. Perhaps once she ages into this career, it’s a path she would consider. (Ann Foster)

Britskélisty (in Czech) recommends Martha Nussbaum's Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions:

V druhé části své knihy pak rozebírá několik důležitých nejen literárních děl západní civilizace (díla Platóna, Prousta, sv. Augustina, Danta, Emily Brontë, Mahlera, Whitmana a Joyce), aby ukázala problémy a hodnoty našeho vnímání milostné lásky a vliv, jaký to má na kvalitu našeho života jako takového. (Boris Cvek) (Translation)

Business Insider recommends Airbnbs with beautiful libraries where you can 'crack open a Brontë novel'.