All the romance and fabulous plot twists of a Brontë novel

The Age (Australia) features the Sydney Theatre Company and its future projects.

“We’ve been doing a lot of commissioning and development as we are coming out of the pandemic,” says [STC artistic director Kip Williams], “and trying to keep writers and artists working during the period of theatre shutdowns, so now we have a wealth of new stories and new writing in the bank.”

Among those new works is an adaptation of Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Emme Hoy, a graduate of Sydney Theatre Company’s Emerging Writers Group.

“It’s a big, sprawling epic period drama mashed with [hit TV show] Fleabag,” says Williams. “It’s got all the romance and fabulous plot twists of a Brontë novel mixed with contemporary humour and witticisms.” (Nick Galvin)

Redditch Standard recommends '5 new books to read this week' and one of them is

2. Devotion by Hannah Kent is published in hardback by Picador, priced £14.99 (ebook £8.49). Available now

Devotion by Hannah Kent. Picture credit: Picador/PA.

Devotion is a modern classic, on par with heart-wrenching love stories such as Wuthering Heights and Pride And Prejudice. It tells the story of an achingly beautiful love and a brutal search for freedom, with the epic landscapes as pressing and foreboding as the thoughts and feelings weighing on main character Hanne. 15-year-old Hanne prefers being in nature than hanging out with girls her own age – until she meets Thea, and finds acceptance. This moving tale is told from Hanne’s perspective, and features a twist so brilliantly done, it will leave you gasping for breath.

8/10 (Sophie Corcoran)

London Review of Books has an article on V.S. Naipaul by Paul Theroux.

Later he saw that Jean Rhys had had a clear vision of the West Indies in Wide Sargasso Sea and other works, and she became one of the very few living novelists he recommended.

According to Il Fatto Nisseno (Italy), Jane Eyre is the second most romantic book in the world and Wuthering Heights the third (the first is Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet).

Al secondo posto troviamo “Jane Eyre”, romanzo di Charlotte Brontë ambientato nell’Inghilterra vittoriana che racconta le vicende dell’orfana Jane Eyre che dopo una vita difficile trova l’amore con Mr. Rochester. Il romanzo è stato tradotto in 43 lingue.

Sull’ultimo gradino del podio si classifica “Cime tempestose”. L’unico romanzo dell’autrice e sorella di Charlotte Brontë racconta la storia d’amore di Heathcliff, un ragazzo orfano che ha la fortuna di essere adottato, e Catherine, che diventa sua sorella nella famiglia adottiva. Anche questo classico della letteratura inglese è stato tradotto in 43 lingue differenti. (Translation)

Everything GP quotes from Charlotte Brontë's opinion of TB:

It was often called “consumption” because of how much weight those inflicted with tuberculosis lost. Another nickname was “the white plague” because of how pale people would become. And yet, its final nickname was “the romantic disease.” People became enamored with the physical effects of contracting the illness. Pale skin, thin waists, and flushed lips and cheeks from long-term fevers were seen as quite desirable. “Consumption, I am aware, is a flattering malady,” Charlotte Brontë wrote in a letter as she watched her sister fall ever sicker with the disease. (Kelsey Roslin)

Delirium Nerd (in Portuguese) discusses Heathcliff's skin colour and possible origins.