'We want to change this narrative of Anne being the forgotten Brontë'

The Yorkshire Post features the new exhibition on Anne Brontë at the Maritime Heritage Centre in Scarborough.

Now a new exhibition at the town's Maritime Heritage Centre explores her last days in the resort town, her achievements as an author and poet, and her final resting place.

Anne’s connection to Scarborough runs deeper than just being buried in the town, said organisers from The Anne Brontë Society, which is working with the museum.

Founder of the society, Lauren Bruce, said Anne spent more than just her final days in Scarborough, where she died at 29, most likely of pulmonary tuberculosis.

And they felt it was important to capture some of this connection and to recognise her as a major literary figure.

"We want to change this narrative of Anne being the forgotten Brontë," said Ms Bruce.

"She's a huge literary figure, and she still means a lot to the town.

"Many people might know she is buried here, but they don't think they realise she lived here for five weeks a year." [...]

The exhibition follows Anne's journey to Scarborough, visits to the Baths, a stroll on the sands, her funeral, and finally, her burial at St Mary’s Churchyard in the town.

There are also in the collection items exploring her love of art, her talents and time as a governess.

There are unique editions of Anne’s books on display including an early Folio edition of Agnes Grey, and a reprinted early edition of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

There are copies as well of her last letters, and unfinished drawings of her beloved dog, Flossy.

Additionally, researchers have uncovered an interesting finding in a sketch from the author, of a woman looking out to sea, and are working on uncovering a mystery.

The exhibition is already proving popular, and the hope is that it can shine a light on some of the literary legend's achievements.

"We've found references, right back to the 1930s, of Anne being the most 'tragic' Bronte," said Ms Bruce.

“We want to change that story. She meant a lot to the town.

"She is a celebrated novelist, she wrote the first true feminist novel. She wrote Agnes Gray, based on Scarborough. And she was an accomplished poet.

"Just imagine what she could have achieved if she hadn't got poorly."

The exhibition, The Final Days of Anne Brontë, runs until November 30 at Scarborough Maritime Heritage Centre.

Entry is free. (Ruby Kitchen)

Also in The Yorkshire Post an article on Joanne Harris's writers' retreat in York where

“Guests will have the chance to explore the wild and windswept Yorkshire Moors, where Emily Brontë penned the timeless masterpiece, Wuthering Heights and discover the gothic atmosphere of Whitby Abbey, the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s much loved novel Dracula.” (Chris Burn)

BBC Culture is worried about possible retellings of the works of George Orwell.

For all their differences, both [Sandra] Newman [author of Julia] and [Adam] Biles [author of Beasts of England] honour their debt to Orwell with the resonant clarity of their prose and their sense of moral purpose. DJ Taylor fears that Orwell's classics will not always fall into such careful hands. He recalls being commissioned by the Wall Street Journal a decade ago to review recent novels about Sherlock Holmes. "Three crates of books came across the Atlantic, and they were bananas," he says. "By this point Holmes had become a floating signifier - he could mean absolutely anything to anybody. I fear that Orwell may go that way. With Holmes you've only got the personality and the forensic ability whereas with Orwell you've got a set of political beliefs." While Newman's Julia is in the spirit of Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys's celebrated 1966 prequel to Jane Eyre, how long will it be before someone writes something in the more cavalier vein of Seth Grahame Smith's Austen-spoofing Pride and Prejudice and Zombies? Or a book that entirely travesties Orwell's politics? (Dorian Lynkey)

A contributor to The Guardian has had her love of literature reignited by audiobooks.

However, quitting my lifelong battle with reading books has undoubtedly reinvigorated my desire to learn, to appreciate other people’s work, and to shed the shame I previously felt calling myself a writer – one who has never read Wuthering Heights. (Verity Babbs)

The New Republic wonders, 'Can a New Generation of Luddites Take Down A.I.?'

The movement was aided by an ambient, creeping anxiety about what the machines were doing to a world that was still largely rural and steeped in tradition. “The future,” Charlotte Brontë wrote in her late novel Shirley, about the Luddites, “sometimes seems to sob a low warning of the events it is bringing us.” (James Robins)

Eyre Buds has a new episode on To Walk Invisible. The Times' News in Pictures highlights "David Everingham and Alison Aynesworth restore panels on the Apostle’s Cupboard at the Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth. It is mentioned in Jane Eyre".