Brontë Studies. Volume 51. Issue 3, July 2026

The new issue of Brontë Studies (Volume 51, Issue 3, July 2026) is available online. We provide you with the table of contents and abstracts: 

‘A hot July day’: Editorial Introduction
pp 211-213  Author: O'Callaghan, Dr. Claire

Research Articles

Rediscovering Anne Carus Wilson
pp. 214-229 Author: Burstein, Moriam Elizabeth
Abstract: 
This article recovers the work of Anne Carus Wilson (1787–1859), who was the wife of William Carus Wilson (1791–1859), the model for Mr Brocklehurst in Jane Eyre (1847). Anne Carus Wilson has been ignored in accounts of the Brontës, despite her known involvement in the Clergy Daughters’ School. Now virtually forgotten, Carus Wilson was a successful children’s author in her own right, whose output during the 1820s and 1830s included short fiction, a novel, multiple devotional works, periodical articles and a children’s biblical card game. This article argues that analysing her surviving work clarifies how she and her husband may have disseminated their Evangelical Calvinism to students at their various schools, even as she sought to model forms of Christian activism for British children in general.

‘Let me try to wait His will in silence’: Silence and Faith in Jane Eyre
pp. 230-244  Author: Lewis, Ariadne
Abstract:
Silence in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847) is often unfavourably contrasted with the power of speech and ‘telling the story’. However, the novel’s silences are much more complex than simple signs of oppression or roadblocks to self-expression. Silences in Jane Eyre reveal Jane’s spiritual growth and a narrative of transformation in her relationship with God and Rochester. Jane initially reads God as silent in response to her prayers, which reading shapes her understanding of divine providence and plan for her life. She sees a similar sort of silence reflected in her earthly relationships, and these experiences of silence shape how she uses silence towards those around her. However, when the ‘mysterious summons’ breaks God’s silence, Jane comes to believe that there is a providential purpose behind the silence of God, allowing her to redeem and repurpose silence in her relationships.

‘Amusing you with an old world story’: Relating to the Past in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
pp.  245-257 Author: Walters, Elijah
Abstract:
This essay revisits the topic of narrative structure in Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) by exploring similarities between Helen’s diary and John Bunyan’s The Life and Death of Mr Badman (1680). As Brontë’s novel shifts from the Gilbert frame narrative to Helen’s Gothic diary, she introduces her topics of reform through an interpolation of Bunyan’s seventeenth-century fiction. Brontë’s careful interaction with Bunyan’s text makes The Tenant of Wildfell Hall not simply a commentary on Victorian society but also a transformative engagement with literature from the past.

Why Trees Matter in Wuthering Heights
pp. 258-275 Author: Defant, Ivonne
Abstract:
Trees are not a remarkable feature of the Brontë moors—trees are indeed rare–yet their very dearth is rife with significance in terms of both gender and ecology. This article proposes that the trans-corporeal interplay between trees and Catherine Earnshaw and her daughter, Cathy, in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights (1847) foregrounds ideas of transformation, connection and preservation. The episode of the fir tree in Lockwood’s dream introduces the reader to Catherine’s past and therein the past of the moorland: ancient forests that once blanketed the landscape participating in its formation. Drawing upon an intersection between matrilineality and the ecological history of the landscape centred on the arboreal, this article demonstrates how Brontë interweaves the identity of the moorland with the identities of mother and daughter. While Catherine’s arboreal embodiment allows Cathy to retrieve the spirit of the mother and of the place, trees enroot the self of Catherine, Cathy and the land, interconnecting and enriching them.

The ‘Pets’ of Edward Fairfax Rochester
pp. 276-288 Author: Pope, Liam George
Abstract:
In Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847), Rochester’s dog, Pilot, introduces Jane and Rochester, essentially setting into motion the main plot of the novel. To use Ivan Kreilkamp’s term, Pilot eventually becomes something of an anthroprosthetic seeing eye dog for his owner when he is partially blinded following the fire at Thornfield Hall. Anthroprosthesis refers to an anthropomorphic being that fits the role of a living ‘prosthesis’ for an injured or otherwise disabled human character. This article argues that Jane, upon returning to find Rochester at Ferndean Manor, willingly replaces Pilot in his capcity as Rochester’s ‘guide dog’, becoming an anthroprosthetic human guide dog parallel.

Special Interst Article

The Earliest American Reactions to Wuthering Heights: Some New Findings
pp. 289-297 Author: Evans, Robert C.
Abstract:
This Special Interest Article describes and quotes from over thirty ‘new’ responses to Wuthering Heights that were published in the United States immediately after the novel was first printed there in 1848 and in several later decades of the nineteenth century. These newly collected responses indicate that the book was at first strongly criticised, whereas other reviews offered occasional positive comments, although even these were often mixed with censure. In the decades following the novel’s initial American appearance, it was still sometimes described negatively; however, by the 1870s, opinion had clearly shifted, with Emily Brontë praised for her bold genius. Taken together, these reviews illustrate the vagaries of literary interpretation and the ways in which some books, initially condemned by their earliest reviewers, can eventually be fully accepted into the canon of great literature. 

Book Reviews

Anne Brontë and Lord Byron: Lost Echoes of Influence
pp. 298-300 Reviewed by Cook, Peter

Violence and the Brontës: Language, Reception, Afterlives
pp. 301-303 Reviewed by Curzon, Rachel

“Wuthering Heights”, a Film Directed by Emerald Fennell, Warner Bros., 2026
pp. 304-306 Reviewed by Seijo-Richart, Maria

The Edinburgh Companion to the Brontës and the Arts
pp. 307-309 Reviewed by Stoneman, Patsy

The High Flight: 50 Poems Inspired by Emily Brontë’s Hawk
pp. 310-312 Reviewed by Van Der Meer, Carolyne