'I am hot and tiny, yet I wrote Jane Eyre'

 What'sOnStage shares pictures from the rehearsal of Wise Children's Wuthering Heights.

© Steve Tanner (Source)

Rehearsal images have been unveiled for Wuthering Heights as it prepares to premiere at Bristol Old Vic ahead of a tour into 2022.

Appearing in the show are Sam Archer (Lockwood/Edgar Linton), Nandi Bhebhe (The Moor), Mirabelle Gremaud (swing), TJ Holmes (Robert), Ash Hunter (Heathcliff), Craig Johnson (Mr Earnshaw/Dr Kenneth), Jordan Laviniere (John), Kandaka Moore (Zillah), Lucy McCormick (Cathy), Katy Owen (Isabella Linton/Linton Heathcliff), Tama Phethean (Hindley Earnshaw/Hareton Earnshaw) and Witney White (Frances Earnshaw/Young Cathy), with music performed by Sid Goldsmith, Nadine Lee and Renell Shaw.

Emily Brontë's novel follows the fractious relationship between Heathcliff (Hunter) and Cathy (McCormick).

The piece has set and costume design by Vicki Mortimer, sound and video by Simon Baker, composition by Ian Ross, movement and choreography by Etta Murfitt, lighting design by Jai Morjaria. Further creatives are to be revealed by the production.

Running at Bristol Old Vic from 11 October, the piece will go onto visit York Theatre Royal, Cornwall and Norwich. Previously announced dates also include Salford, Nottingham, Sunderland and Edinburgh. It will also have a run at the National Theatre from February 2022, through to April 2022. (Alex Wood)

Via Time Out we see that tickets are already available for when it hits the National Theatre in February 2022. Manu other sites announce the new season at the National Theatre including of course this production of Wuthering Heights: London Theatre, My Theatre Mates, Theatre Weekly, 

Los Angeles Review of Books reviews the poetry collection The Curious Thing by Sandra Lim.

Here we encounter kinship with Jean Rhys, Charlotte Brontë, Virginia Woolf, poems about Lim’s mother and her grandmother. [...]

With stylish swagger, she alludes to literary ancestors like Woolf, Vallejo, Flaubert, Goethe, and Charlotte Brontë: “I am hot and tiny, yet I wrote Jane Eyre.” (Aria Aber)

A columnist from The Daily Californian writes about reading a secondhand copy of Wuthering Heights.

Just as the air swarmed with Catherines, so too did my mind with thoughts of the previous readers. Did they feel the visceral wind on the moors between Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange? Did their hearts ache for Isabella Linton as she fell through the cracks of a loveless marriage? Did they have to look at the family tree diagram at least 15 times just to keep track of all the characters?

The book had few annotations, so clues came to me in the form of folded corners and browning pages. On page 80, however, a previous reader underlined a passage in dark blue pen: “He’s more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” This has since become one of my favorite literary passages. It possesses a certain simplicity and candor that speaks to a familiar feeling I cannot quite put into my own words. 

Brontë’s writing taught me something of the all-consuming, destructive capacities of love. But it was through previous readers that I truly felt the power of a shared experience. To say I would appreciate the passage on page 80 without the direction of the delicate blue underline is up for debate, but what I do know is that there is someone else out there who has felt somehow shaped by the beautiful prose of Cathy’s confession.

Perhaps, there is power not only in language, but in the collective, nonverbal experience of reading and interpreting a piece of literature. (Lauren Harvey)

BookTrib is giving away five copies of a new retelling of Jane Eyre: Private Property by Skye Warren.

Dear Reader,

I’ve loved the stoic Jane Eyre and the mercurial Mr. Rochester for years. That’s why I’m so excited to share Private Property, a modern-day retelling of the beloved classic. Kirkus Reviews writes of my new book, “Jane is a compelling heroine from beginning to end.” Find out what happens when the dramatic, mysterious story enters the contemporary world.

I’m giving away five books! Write skyewarrenbooks@gmail.com to win.

All the best,

Skye Warren

The Times has published an obituary for Ken Hutchison, who played Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights 1978. There's a short essay on 'Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights, and the Cost of Success' in The Lamron.