Toxic Travel Companions

The worst that can possibly happen is happening. We warned about this a few days ago, and here it is: the politicization of the opposition to the Calderdale windfarm. The harm that this initiative will do and the fact that local media unashamedly dance to the orders of the local right-wing leaders is just terrible. Look at the comments if you don't believe us. Now if you oppose this obnoxious project, you turn out to be an ally of the fossil fuel industry and a follower of the Farage sect. We read in The Telegraph & Argus:

Three leaders of Reform-led councils in West Yorkshire and Lancashire are united in their opposition to a giant windfarm which a company hopes to build on Calderdale moorland.

Calderdale Energy Park (CEP) plans to put 34 giant wind turbines on Walshaw Moor, which is located between Hebden Bridge and Haworth, the village associated with the Bronte sisters.

The company says the turbines will generate enough low carbon electricity to power 198,000 homes a year.

But the proposals have met with strong resistance from campaigners concerned about potential damage to peatland and loss of moorland habitat which is home to birds.

The Government’s Energy Secretary – currently Miatta Fahnbulleh – will ultimately decide whether or not this controversial application is given the green light. (...)

Councillors Dan Sutherland, the leader of Calderdale Council, Stephen Place, leader of Bradford Council, and Stephen Atkinson, leader of Lancashire County Council, met at Halifax Town Hall to discuss and set out their concerns.

By responding to the Calderdale Energy Park proposal collectively, they hope to amplify concerns about the plans – which have also been made by campaigners and residents – not just regionally but nationally. (...)

Another factor causing alarm was the impact on the heritage associated with the moorland.

“The Brontes’ work is of global significance,” said Coun Sutherland.

The final outcome might come down to the Brontë moors – or the Calderdale Energy Park, he said. (...)

Coun Place said: “We don’t think it’s been widely enough known in the Bradford area, which is why we’re keen to get involved with this.

“It’s just something we have got to make the public aware of.

“The Brontës’ works are cherished and protected peatland could be severely affected,” he said. (John Greenwood)

It's certainly disturbing to link together in the same phrase Reform Party and the Brontës. But here we are.

It's much, much better to associate the Brontës with solidarity initiatives like this one that happened in Haworth. In Keighley News:

More than 200 people took part in a new charity walk through Brontë country.

The first-ever Brontë Pub Walk started in Haworth and wound through Stanbury, Ponden and the outskirts of Oakworth, finishing on Haworth’s Main Street.

Walkers followed in the footsteps of the famous literary sisters while raising funds for Sue Ryder’s palliative and end-of-life care services.

Routes of five and 10 miles were available, with pub stops along the way.

Adam Brunksill, regional fundraising team manager at Sue Ryder Manorlands Hospice, said: "We’re incredibly grateful to everyone who took part in our very first Brontë Pub Walk and helped make it such a special day.

"It was fantastic to see people enjoying the beautiful countryside, visiting some of the places connected to the Brontë family and, of course, stopping for a well-earned drink or two along the way. (...)

he walk passed by the Brontë Parsonage Museum and St Michael and All Angels’ Church, where several members of the Brontë family are buried. (Francis Redwood)

Another review of The Bronté Sister House Party is online. In City Cast DC: 

Brontë Sister House Party, a comedy that’s equal parts literary feminism and Christopher Durang-style surrealism, feels like it was expressly written for Nu Sass Productions. (...)

Nu Sass co-founder and artistic director Aubri O’Connor plays Jane Eyre author Charlotte Brontë in House Party. Her performance as a neurotic people-pleaser who lives (well, “lives”) in hope that a Belgian professor who inspired characters in at least three of her novels will at last show up for this interminable soirée is one of the best reasons to attend.

Written in 2021, this clever provocation comes to us from playwright Courtney Bailey. Bailey holds a Ph.D. in English literature from Baylor University, but her premise is far from academic: We are all the invited guests of the three literary Brontë ladies, none of whom lived to see 40, now sentenced to entertain us in some otherworldly bardo until their jailer decides they (we?) have reached The Point of Celebratory Reverence. Our hosts have little guidance on exactly how they might achieve this ecstatic state. Their only clue is a game show-style chime that rewards them whenever they do something to indicate that they’re fun-loving and sociable and not just a trio of introspective and invariably miserable writers. (..)

 Her characters are not all of equal interest, and the performances animating them are variable. Director Kathleen Barth struggles to keep the pace of all this clever existential chitchat sufficiently caffeinated, as evidenced by the fact that a play with a published (and ideal) run time of 90 minutes to two hours stretches out, intermission included, to two and a half. Still, it’s a fun night out, and one that might inspire you to brush up on your Brontë bibliography. (Chris Klimek)

The Fan Carpet explores "how John Caird and Megan McGinnis are reimagining Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre through ensemble storytelling":

Rather than asking one performer to carry the weight of Charlotte Brontë's first-person narration, co-book writer and co-director John Caird has transformed the ensemble into Jane's collective voice.

It is a deceptively simple idea, but one that completely changes how audiences experience the story.

For Caird, the challenge was never to recreate the novel word for word.

Instead, the goal was to preserve what makes Jane Eyre special while allowing theatre to do what theatre does best.

A novel allows readers inside Jane's thoughts for hundreds of pages. On stage, those inner emotions must become action, performance and music.

Sharing Jane's narration across the company preserves Charlotte Brontë's first-person perspective while creating something that feels inherently theatrical. (...)

One decision that particularly impressed us was the production's commitment to casting genuine young performers as Young Jane and Adèle.

Rather than asking adults to portray childhood, Emily-Rose Samuel and Poppy Jason bring an authenticity to the opening chapters of Jane's journey that helps establish the emotional foundation for everything that follows.

It is a reminder that Jane's resilience isn't born overnight—it begins with the experiences that shape her from childhood.

The Derbyshire Times lists places to visit in Derbyshire and the Lake District, before summer ends:

1. Hathersage

Hathersage has strong literary connections - having inspired Charlotte Brontë while she was writing Jane Eyre. The nearby North Lees Hall (pictured here) also became the main inspiration for Thornfield Hall. The Grave of Little John, Robin Hood’s second-in-command, can be found at St. Michael’s Church in the heart of Hathersage. While there is little evidence proving he is buried here, ballads suggest that he originated from Hathersage and settled there again later in his life. (Tom Hardwicke)

BookRiot has a list of historical queer gothic novels. Including

The Wives of Herrick Hall by Julie Lew

In 1799, a disgraced young woman becomes the companion to a Lady in the isolated Herrick Hall. Lady Blake suffers from nightly visions of her impending death, and Herrick Hall is haunted by its previous mistresses. If you’ve longed for a sapphic take on Rebecca or Jane Eyre, and if you like ghosts, family secrets, curses, and forbidden love, this is perfect for your TBR.

Times Now News recommends Wide Sargasso Sea:

A haunting prequel to Jane Eyre, imagining the life of Mr. Rochester's 'madwoman in the attic' before her confinement, a Creole heiress in postcolonial Jamaica. Rhys writes with lush, feverish intensity, turning a footnote of Victorian fiction into a devastating meditation on colonialism, identity, and erasure. Essential, and far richer than its source material. (Simran Sukhnani)

The history of summer readings in The Economic Times makes for a curious read:

In 1876, Publishers Weekly asked booksellers to identify their most saleable novels. [Blanche Willis Howard’s] One Summer ranked below Dinah Mulock Craik’s John Halifax and Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre but ahead of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

La Vanguardia (Spain) describes Yorkshire as a huge film set:

Más figuras literarias surgidas en Yorkshire han acabado en la pantalla. Por ejemplo, la pareja de Cumbres Borrascosas. Su escritora, Emily Brontë ambientó la obra en su paisaje natal, el parque nacional de Yorkshire Dales. Sus páramos cubiertos de brezos, entre verdes oscuro y púrpuras, según incida la luz de un sol casi siempre plomizo, aportan tenebrismo al relato. Y pasan a ser un protagonista más en la reciente cinta protagonizada por un tempestuoso Jacob Elordi y una Margot Robbie, tan hermosa como tóxica. (Armando Cerra) (Translation)

The New York Times Midi Crossword (August 21, 2026)  contains a Brontë question: "Jane, in a Brontë novel".