Tue 18 Aug, 10:00amBrontë Event Space in the Old School RoomThis workshop series explores the Brontë siblings' relationship to the Gothic. We’ll explore the Gothic influences that shaped their fiction, dive into their juvenilia and its use of Gothic elements from murder to necromancy to tragic ghosts, and look at how they changed the Gothic forever.The day also includes a visit to the Museum's Research Library to examine collection materials. It is worth noting that the Museum will be closed on this day.
10 - 11am Introducing the Juvenilia: In this session we’ll explore Charlotte’s accounts of their fantastical imaginary world’s construction. We’ll also use extracts from Branwell and Charlotte to explore how the siblings constructed different versions of the same world. 11am - 12pm Influencing the Brontës Juvenilia: In this session, we’ll explore some of the authors and works that inspired the Brontës’ juvenile writing: from Edinburgh magazines, to Gothic novels, to Byron’s poetry, to contemporary geographies, and the Arabian Nights. We’ll look at the tiny magazines that the siblings produced in their imaginary world and what they reveal about the wide-ranging interests and reading of all the Brontë children. 12 - 1 pm Lunch break 1 - 2pm Introducing Our (Anti-)Heroes: In this session, we’ll dive into the interlocking worlds of the juvenilia by exploring some of the key figures and their ever-changing and evolving stories. 2 - 3pm Evolving from the Juvenilia: In this final session, we’ll explore the ways in which story points, themes and characters that are famous from the Brontës’ later work come out of the juvenilia. We’ll trace the development of ideas and question some of our assumptions about the novels and what influenced them by looking at how very early several tropes and concerns appear.
with Dr Murray TremellenIn-person 2pm. Brontë Space at the Old School RoomFree with entry to the Museum and for residents in BD20, BD21 and BD22Online 7:30pm £6 On Zoom: a link will be sent before the eventThe Brontës are famous for their Yorkshire roots, but they were well aware of events in the wider world. In the 1820s, when they were still children, Britain went to war with the powerful Asante Empire in West Africa. In connection with our new exhibition, The Colonial Brontës, Parsonage curator Dr Murray Tremellen explores the history of the First Anglo-Asante War and shows how it became a key source of inspiration for the Brontës’ juvenile writings.Dr Murray Tremellen has been a curator at the Brontë Parsonage Museum since May 2023. He previously worked as curator of social history at York Museums Trust. He co-curated this year’s temporary exhibition, The Colonial Brontës, in collaboration with principal curator Ann Dinsdale and guest curator Prof. Corinne Fowler.
Tue 5 May, 7:00pmOnline via ZoomThis 5 week course, delivered by Dr Sam Hirst, takes a deep dive into the world of the Brontë Juvenilia, exploring the fantastical worlds they created. Weekly topics are: Creating Worlds: An Introduction to the Juvenilia in context; Branwell's Angrian Imagination; Charlotte's Gothic Africa; Charlotte's 'Farewell to Angria' and Untangling Gondal: Emily and Anne's shared world in poetry. The course will explore what the Brontës' juvenilia reveals about their attitudes towards empire and desire and map how the sisters' writing develops across their juvenile work and lays the groundwork for their later fiction. After reading short stories and poems from the juvenilia, you may see the Brontës in a new light!
‘I wish I were a girl again, half-savage and hardy, and free’ – Emily and Anne Brontë Online Talk
Wed 6 May, 7:00pmOnline via ZoomElizabeth Gaskell’s famous biography, The Life of Charlotte Brontë, went a considerable way to creating the myth of the famous writer living up on the moors. But what of the image of Charlotte’s two groundbreaking literary sisters, Emily and Anne Brontë? How has our view of these trailblazing writers changed over the years?Emily Brontë’s enduring classic Wuthering Heights makes her the author of one of the finest novels in the English language and shows her to be a woman of great passion. What was she like as a person, and how was she depicted outside the family? Her sister Anne has been overshadowed by both siblings but her debut novel, Agnes Grey, and feminist masterpiece The Tenant of Wildfell Hall are now critically acclaimed. Compared with Charlotte, both sisters left little behind beyond their work, creating a vacuum others have been happy to fill with their own theories, and this has sometimes obscured our understanding further.So, what did Elizabeth Gaskell discover about Emily and Anne in her research? How have opinions on their trailblazing works changed over the years, and how has our image of them changed? Sue Newby, Education Officer at the Brontë Parsonage Museum, reveals all the answers.The last in the Charlotte Brontë and Elizabeth Gaskell mini-season, in partnership with Elizabeth Gaskell’s House.
The Brontë Birthplace in Thornton is giving free admission to anyone named Charlotte on Saturday, April 25 and Sunday, April 26, in celebration of Charlotte Brontë’s 210th birthday.Charlotte Brontë, author of Jane Eyre, Shirley, Villette and The Professor, was born at the house on Market Street on April 21.Thomas Haigh, audience development and marketing lead at the Brontë Birthplace, said: "It was here in this very house that Charlotte’s story began, long before Jane Eyre and long before her name became famous across the world."We want to mark this special day by doing something a bit unexpected."We would love to get as many Charlottes as possible to step inside the place where her life began and to be part of a shared, living tribute to her legacy."The house will be open from 11am to 4pm, with visitors invited to explore the museum, bring family members, and enjoy the on-site café.Visitors will also be entered into a prize draw to stay in Charlotte’s room, which is now an Airbnb. (Harry Williams)
One morning in early June, 1850, Charlotte Brontë finally met her literary hero, William Makepeace Thackeray. To do so, the 4ft 8in writer - recently unmasked as Currer Bell, the author of Jane Eyre, published in 1847 - chose to wear her “power gown”, a vibrant blue-and-white floral print dress made in a fine alpaca fabric woven in her native Yorkshire.The meeting took place in the drawing room of her publisher George Smith. Thackeray was impressed, later recalling: “New to the London world, she entered it with an independent, indomitable spirit of her own.”From experience, Charlotte knew that appearance and favourable first impressions mattered. She had been stung by criticism when she joined the stylish young ladies of Roe Head School in Mirfield in 1931, told that she was “very ugly” by one pupil, Mary Taylor, who later described her as wearing “very old-fashioned clothes, and looking very cold and miserable”.A surviving drawing by Charlotte, of a young woman wearing a highly fashionable, early 1930s-style puff-sleeved gown, shows how much she had noticed and been influenced by the Roe Head girls.This is highlighted by historian and costume consultant Eleanor Houghton, whose new book, Charlotte Brontë’s Life Through Clothes, examines how surviving pieces from the author’s wardrobe give remarkable insight into her experience, her feelings and her work.The book is illustrated by Eleanor’s own beautiful drawings which capture the detail of the dresses, shawls, bonnets, boots, combs, corsets and more.Charlotte made her own clothes, with housekeeper Martha Brown, using fabrics from Yorkshire mills. The gown that later became known as the “Thackeray Dress” was made in a cloth called Alpaca Orleans, a blend of alpaca and cotton, woven by Sir Titus Salt who had mills in Bradford just nine miles from Haworth (Salts Mill in Saltaire opened later in 1953).ir Titus was a fabric pioneer, and managed to transform fine alpaca fleece into a lustrous but hardwearing fabric that quickly became a rival to silk. Printed (probably in Accrington) in a vibrant blue and white pattern of leaves and flowers, Charlotte bought the fabric around 1848 - and the blues retain their bright quality to this day.Charlotte left most of her wardrobe to her husband, Arthur Bell Nichols, and some also to Martha. Pieces were acquired by fans down the years, but many found their way home to the Brontë Parsonage Museum at Haworth, which now looks after around 150 items.The Thackeray dress was given to Martha’s niece, who made significant alterations, adding a brown collar and removing fabric from its full skirt.Charlotte’s clothing reveals a woman more body and fashion-conscious than suspected. In Brussels, she bought a corset measuring just 18.5 inches around the waist. It became a staple, and later caused concern to her publisher George Smith. Eleanor Houghton writes: “Nearly forty years after her death, still impacted by what he had seen, Smith told his friend, the novelist George Gissing, that Charlotte was ‘very vain of her narrow waist … and laced herself so tight as to injure herself’.”Pointing out that tight lacing at the time was the practice of a minority of women, Eleanor suggests that Charlotte, always conscious of her perceived lack of beauty, was “deliberately and blatantly exhibiting her femininity”. The corset might also have served as an armour as she sought strength and protection while nursing a heart broken by her unrequited love for M Heger in Brussels.On display now at the Brontë Parsonage is a paisley print dress Charlotte wore in the 1840s, exotic and vibrant in shades of duck egg blue, mint, red and black. One Haworth resident, who recalled seeing them many times in the village, said: “I don’t know that I ever saw them in owt but print - I’ve heard it said they were pinched - but it was a nice print … They looked grand.”Born on April 21, 1816, this Tuesday marks the 210th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë birth. The Brontë Parsonage Museum and the nearby Brontë Birthplace in Thornton are hosting special events, including performances and talks.Eleanor has been a consultant for many TV and film historical dramas including the BBC’s To Walk Invisible, written and directed by Sally Wainwright, and Frances O’Connor’s 2023 biopic, Emily.In 2022, in collaboration with the Brontë Parsonage Museum, she curated a large exhibition of Charlotte’s surviving wardrobe. “The museum has become a second home. The staff have been endlessly patient and helpful and always willing to clamber to the back of the Bonnell Store or to upend the library in search of a particular garment or record,” she says.“I considered why Charlotte had chosen each piece, what it revealed of her taste, the challenges she faced, and the sartorial conventions and codes of 19th‑century society.”She traced how and where the clothes were worn, how they were changed, and how they shaped Charlotte’s daily experience, studying them alongside letters and diaries, to uncover a rich, complex picture of Charlotte and her ever-changing world.“The village’s surviving mills and weavers’ cottages are reminders, too, that Charlotte lived in a landscape shaped by the Industrial Revolution and by the textile economy that produced so many of the fabrics in her wardrobe.“These gowns, bonnets, bags, and boots have presented to us a very different Charlotte Brontë,” she says. “She is a woman who is more rounded, more three-dimensional and braver, bolder, and yet somehow more vulnerable. She is less isolated and more globalised. She is more fashion-conscious and defies long-held preconceptions.“She shows herself to be very self-critical, but also provocative and tenacious. By hearing the clothes’ testimonies, we encounter Charlotte not simply as a writer but as a real, thinking, feeling, breathing woman.“Yet these clothes reveal more than Charlotte alone. They bring the world she inhabited vividly into view — nineteenth-century Yorkshire, with its rugged moors and sprawling villages; the networks of makers, merchants, and markets; the drive and creativity of industrial innovation; and the global routes that brought fabrics, fibres and influences from France, Peru, Mexico, Canada, and the United States to a little parsonage in the West Riding."They allow us to see how Charlotte navigated her social and material world, balancing expectation, personal comfort, and self-expression — and in doing so, they let us step closer to the woman behind Jane Eyre, behind Lucy Snowe, and to see beyond them to the life she really lived. (Stephanie Smith)
A lost manuscript which had been hidden for more than a century has uncovered a teenage Charlotte Brontë's fascination with "very naughty" Parisian society.The Journal of a Frenchman was the missing part of a series of The Young Men's Magazine, which Brontë edited and wrote aged 14.It belongs to the Brontë Parsonage Museum and has been analysed for the first time by the University of Chester's Professor Deborah Wynne, who said she was honoured to be chosen.On reading the magazine Wynne said she discovered aspects to Charlotte Brontë she "hadn't really encountered before"."It's written as though Charlotte herself is a French young man who's a dandy. He gets drunk and disorderly."So you've got this Yorkshire clergyman's daughter, who seems so respectable, but she seems to know all about being drunk and disorderly in Paris in this journal entry."And you realise she had this sense of humour, which doesn't always come out in quite the same raucous way in her novels."She's more ladylike in the way she writes in her novels, whereas she gave herself this freedom to write as a man and really went to town with that," she said.In 2019, the magazine was discovered and purchased by the Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth, where the sisters lived and wrote their novels, such as Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.The museum had all other issues of The Young Men's Magazine and bought the September 1830 issue when it appeared in a Parisian auction house.The museum set up a fundraising campaign, which Wynne donated to, and it returned to Haworth where it has now been examined and preserved.Six scholars were invited to analyse the work the results of which were published in The Journal of the Brontë Society last year.Wynne said discovering the manuscript was "fitting together this piece into a jigsaw"."It was an amazing experience to see that manuscript and know it had been hidden away for over a century," she said."To know I was the first person to actually push all of that jigsaw together, as it were, it was really exciting. So it's been one of the best projects I've ever worked on."She said themes in the manuscript reappear in Brontë's later more well-known works, such as Jane Eyre and Villette."She really presents the aristocratic characters in France negatively. And later in her novels, a lot of the aristocratic characters are presented negatively too," she said."So you can sort of see how she's already a little bit disapproving of her Frenchman. And in the end, he loses all of his money and he becomes a tavern keeper. And he says he's much happier drawing pints for the people who come into his tavern."There is this sense that France is a very naughty sort of place. It's a place where things go on that don't in Yorkshire parsonages."Measuring just 3cm by 6cm the magazine is part of a series of works the Brontë children wrote on scraps of paper because of the high cost of paper in the Victorian era.Principal curator at the Brontë Parsonage, Ann Dinsdale, explained the little manuscripts were meant to look like printed books and magazines produced at the time."These tiny little books have got title pages, they've got contents pages, they contain all the kinds of stories, reviews, poetry that you'd expect to find in Blackwood's magazine."Some of them have even got advertisements in the back. So these were the first publications by the Brontës really."She said the children would have created them using quill pens."It would have taken a fair amount of practise to kind of devise this almost sort of italicised style of writing that they developed for the little books," she said."It became like a secret code among the siblings because they must have realised that if their father or their aunt came across any of these tiny manuscripts they wouldn't have been able to read them."Which is probably quite a good thing because some of the content is not the kind of thing you would expect from the minister's children." (Grace Wood)
Alongside the biblical references are literary greats: the figure of Jane Eyre, less straightened than sturdy, as well as the young and handsome Mr Rochester; Orpheus and the maenads, wild and free; Germaine Greer sitting with her knees apart and the soles of her feet together. (Chloë Ashby)
Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar is weighing in on Jacob Elordi’s rapid rise and questioning whether the actor has yet proven his full range. [...]Almodóvar acknowledged Elordi’s growing star power, saying he believes the Australian actor is “without doubt” on track to become a major star. Still, he admitted he remains uncertain about how to define him, raising the question of whether Elordi is primarily a sex symbol or a performer with deeper dramatic range.“I’ve been wondering whether he’s just a sex symbol or a respected actor,” Almodóvar said, adding that he would need to see Elordi in a role that demands more before reaching a clear conclusion.The director also critiqued some of Elordi’s recent projects, arguing that they do not fully showcase the actor’s abilities. He pointed to “Wuthering Heights” and “Frankenstein,” suggesting the material limits the opportunity for more layered performances. Almodóvar candidly characterized “Wuthering Heights” as “very bad,” while noting that neither Elordi nor his co-star Margot Robbie were to blame. (Kennedy French)
3 Wuthering HeightsWhere? Yorkshire DalesYorkshire’s raw, wild, moody moors are as much a character in Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel as Cathy and Heathcliff. So where else could filming for Emerald Fennell’s movie version take place? The production used spots around rippling Swaledale, one of the loveliest and least-touched valleys in the Yorkshire Dales National Park. Scenes were shot amid Low Row’s comely stone cottages and in the untamed moors above, around Old Gang Smelt Mill and Surrender Bridge – which, incidentally, also starred in the opening credits of All Creatures Great and Small. There’s great walking country all around. (Sarah Baxter)
Ever watched a movie and wondered what the main character would smell like? [...] Margot Robbie’s Barbie would go for a sugary pink gourmand scent, while her Catherine Earnshaw in Wuthering Heights would reek of mud, rain and zero closure. (Kritika Kapoor)
Authors from Yorkshire and Ghana have produced a set of short stories inspired by the imaginary worlds the Brontës created as children.As part of Bradford City of Culture 2025, Wandering Imaginations saw two authors from Yorkshire and two from Ghana create stories inspired by the fictitious land Angria – which maps on to West Africa - created by the Brontë siblings.Four writers, Kristina Diprose and CM Govender from Bradford, and Akorfa Dawson and Peggy Kere Osman from Ghana, took part in workshops in Accra and Haworth before the stories went on display at the Brontë Parsonage.Author Ms Diprose, who described herself as a "Brontë fangirl" said the project had been "a dream come true"."I've read all the Brontë novels, so when I saw this project I couldn't believe it was a real opportunity. Even more so, when they actually picked me to be part of it," she said."To see my work up in the foyer of the place that celebrates the writing of my literary heroines is incredible."Ms Dawson from Ghana, whose work includes Afro-futuristic themes, said this was her second time in Yorkshire."Yorkshire is like a scene out of a book or movie, everything is so vintage and it's been a great experience," she said."The first time I walked into the Brontë Parsonage, it felt like walking in the steps of the Brontë sisters. That was so heartwarming."Ms Govender, from Manningham, said working with the Brontes' juvenilia – the work they wrote as children – had helped her work through her feelings of imposter syndrome.She said: "A 10-year-old Charlotte Brontë created one of these books and put her name on that page as a declaration that as an adult she was going to be published, and that is so humbling to someone who struggles with imposter syndrome and is really struggling to aspire that way."To have a child who is so determined to make her mark in a world where women are supposed to be quiet, as a child she went there."They are so beyond their time, so it's incredibly humbling to be associated with their legacies."Ms Osman said the project was her first time writing a short story, as she mainly writes poetry."I took Wuthering Heights for A-levels so that's why I applied for the project," she said."It's a pinch-me moment. It's a dream come true for me because I'm a Heathcliff fangirl. I'm happy to be in the environment the Brontë siblings lived in."The story I wrote finished on a cliff hanger, so it has encouraged me to keep on writing. It's a fire beneath me to keep me going." (Grace Wood and Olivia Courtney-Ashton)
My personal gripe with the upcoming adaptation is not simply that Heathcliff is being played by a white man, but that he is played by a white man whilst Edgar Linton, Cathy's other love interest, is played by a man of mixed Pakistani, Scottish, and English descent. Shazad Latif as Linton is a peculiar decision that confuses a fundamental issue in the novel, the choice between the two men and the diverging worlds they represent.Described as having "light hair and fair skin", Linton is Heathcliff's exact opposite, and Cathy marrying Linton is a rejection of her wild, unrestrained childhood. I am not the sort to immediately devolve into raging paroxysms about race-blind casting, but in this film, the consequences of it are that the key ideas in the novel are lost. And, once they are lost, what are we really left with beyond a vague historical romance where the characters have the same names as some Emily Brontë characters from 1847?(I won't even deign to comment on Hong Chau as Nelly; I daresay you get my general angst)Marketing can make or break a film. In our era of social media, it is more important than ever before to curate a decisive promotional campaign, something that plays to the algorithms that dictate our feeds and lives with ease.So when billboards popped up with phrases like "Drive me mad" and "Come undone", I was left only wearily dismayed. This sort of marketing is befitting of Colleen Hoover novels, highly eroticised but otherwise stale.Naturally, these billboards are deliberately vague, existing to create mystery about potentially taboo love beyond mortal boundaries like death. The absence of the actual film title on all the posters is effective in provoking curiosity, but there is nothing particularly Wuthering Heights about the marketing, as a direct result of the shock factor being prioritised.And nothing is more shocking than the unreleased Charli XCX's songs lined up for this film; this one's more odd than truly offensive, revealing a deeply strange creative vision.The film is also scheduled to be released on the 13th of February next year, otherwise known as Valentine's Day. If that does not suggest there is some serious genre confusion here, I don't know what does.I don't mean to suggest for a moment that pandering to fan wishes is a better way of making a film; in fact, doing so has been the cheapening of lots of other franchises. However, antagonising the fanbase is hardly any more sensible, and that is exactly what we have seen so far from Wuthering Heights.The aforementioned casting director, Cochrane, has coined the novel by Emily Brontë "just a book". Dismissive and far too giddy in its anti-intellectual sentiments, this has only served to alienate the very people whose support this film could have enjoyed.For fans of Wuthering Heights, it is certainly not "just" a book (as if being a book is somehow insufficient if you want to matter) and is instead an infamously subversive story that could only be published under a male pseudonym, Ellis Bell, and garnered moral controversy on publication. The filmmakers would do well to recognise how daring the book was in its own right, despite not being a 2025 BookTok dark romance. [...]Either way, the film has raised interesting questions about the role of adaptations and, if it gets more people reading Emily Brontë's gothic romance (even out of morbid curiosity or as preparation to watch the new film), I'll be glad for its existence. (Zaara Arif)
Averse to personal publicity, we veiled our own names under those of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell; the ambiguous choice being dictated by a sort of conscientious scruple at assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because – without at that time suspecting that our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called "feminine" – we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice; we had noticed how critics sometimes use for their chastisement the weapon of personality, and for their reward, a flattery, which is not true praise.” [our bold]
Favourite person?In the real world I have a group of favourite people, and in the imaginary world, Emily Brontë, because her novel Wuthering Heights has had such a big impact on me both as a writer and as a reader. (Louise Flind)
We meet in a BBC conference room on a boiling hot, sunny day, which feels wrong for the Brontë of broadcasting: we should be in a whitewashed farmhouse as rain wallops the windows. There should at the very least be a pot of tea. (Alice Jones)
Charlotte BrontëEdited and Translated by Francesca RizziMondadoriCollana: ClassiciISBN: 9788804793281February 2025Due fanciulli diversissimi per nascita e destino – un neonato abbandonato e un erede al trono – stanno al centro di questi racconti adolescenziali di Charlotte Brontë: Il trovatello narra infatti le peripezie di Edward Sydney che, adottato da un ricco proprietario terriero, alla sua morte parte alla ricerca delle proprie origini nel mitico regno di Verdopolis; la trama de Il sortilegio è invece incentrata sugli intrighi e i misteri che circondano il re Zamorna dopo la morte del figlioletto, il marchese di Almeida, che lascia senza erede i due regni di Wellingtonsland e Angria. Vicende di amori, passioni, gelosie, complotti e ambizione ambientate in un mondo immaginario nelle quali si riconosce già il talento dell’autrice di Jane Eyre.
A celebration of 'collective joy and creativity' inspired by Emily Brontë and Kate Bush will feature as part of Bradford 2025's UK City of Culture programme.Wondering Heights invites everyone to join a free, playful celebrationInspired by Emily Brontë's imagination and Kate Bush's pop anthem 'Wuthering Heights', the event seeks to engage people from all walks of life in a simultaneous celebration of place, dance, and song.People can participate from anywhere they choose - whether at home, in the workplace, or amidst the rugged beauty of the Bradford moors.Wondering Heights is described as a 'tiny project with a big hopeful heart' focuses on togetherness through activities like walking, dancing, drawing, or simply imagining.There will be two free workshops for people to learn the Kate Bush-inspired dance routines on July 5 and July 23.The event encourages everyone to participate in their own creative way, be it dancing, drawing, waving a dramatic tea towel, or walking one of the mapped routes.Artist Lucy Barker is the brain behind Wondering Heights.The project aims to welcome everyone to create and share their own moments of 'collective effervescence', a term defined by modern sociologists to signify the joy of moving or feeling together.Routes on the event map include Lucy's Dream, starting near Denholme Gate, Thornton Village, Ogden Water, and Denholme.Full access guides are available for select routes on Lucy Barker's website.The Wondering Heights map, designed by Chris Goddard, is available online or in limited-edition risograph print form at venues, including the Bradford 2025 Ticket Office, The Brontë Parsonage Museum Reception, and South Square Centre Café.The map can be used as a guide for a walk on the moors, a prompt for a dance, or a 'spark for something entirely your own'.When finished with it people can recycle it, pass it on, or repurpose it creatively.The event is free to participate in and encourages everyone to share their creative responses on social media using a QR link or by tagging Lucy Barker on Instagram.The initiative is said to be inspired by the words of Priya Parker, from 'The Art of Gathering', who said: "Gatherings have the power to temporarily transport us to a world created for a specific purpose—where we feel we belong to something larger than ourselves."For more information, visit Lucy Barker's website or follow her on Instagram. (Gavin Engelbrecht)
From the outside, this modest stone cottage in England looks like the perfect escape for those seeking peace and quiet.But the house is next door to a world-famous tourist site that attracts 70,000 people each year.The Brontë Parsonage, located just 50 metres down the road, is a magnet for literary tourists.It is here that Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë penned some of English literature’s most famous works, including Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.In their day, the Yorkshire village of Haworth was a grim place where sewage flowed down the streets and sanitation was poor.It was also a time when the average life expectancy in the village was just 25.Today, Haworth is a peaceful country town with a bustling tourist trade.There are two one-bedroom cottages, one two-bedroom cottage and a small studio on offer.The cluster of buildings will go to auction at the end of July with a guide price of £350,000 ($732,000).The listing by SDL Property Auctions suggests the cottages could be used as holiday accommodation.“The building would lend itself to Airbnb or could potentially be redesigned, internally, to accommodate any number of functions, i.e. guest house,” the listing reads.“This is all subject to the necessary consent.”The cottages are ideally positioned between two of the town’s biggest tourist sites: the house where the Brontë sisters lived and the church where their father preached.The idyllic ivy-covered buildings have traditional stone walls, chimneys and mullioned windows.Three of the four cottages are currently rented out to private tenants, while the other is vacant. (Orana Durney-Benson)
Pupils from across the Castleford Academy Trust held their annual arts showcase in June, taking inspiration from local figures such as Barbara Hepworth, Charlotte Brontë, and Simon Armitage to create Yorkshire-themed poetry, catwalks, singing, visual art and physical theatre. (Catherine Gannon)
A Book of Ryhmes by Charlotte BrontëNearly 200 years since the then 13-year-old Charlotte Brontë handwrote her miniature book in Decembe 1829, A Book of Ryhmes [sic] has been published for the first time by The Brontë Society and Tartarus Press, an anthology of 10 transcibed poems (including The Beauty of Nature and On Seeing the Ruins of the Tower of Babel) with a foreword by singer Patti Smith. The original manuscript was bought by the Friends of the National Libraries in 2022 at the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair and donated to the Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth where it was originally written.
A cash-strapped local authority is planning to offload more of its assets in order to bring in £6m.Kirklees Council was faced with a £47m black hole in its budget in 2023-24.The authority has already raised nearly £1m after four assets were sold off in May and June.Seventeen new assets have been earmarked for disposal including a plot of land at Grasscroft in Almondbury, despite several objections. [...]It has already auctioned off of the former Red House Museum at Gomersal, which sold for £650,000.The Grade II listed property, which was once the home of Charlotte Brontë's friend Mary Taylor, was previously a museum which closed in 2016 and a plan to turn it into holiday accommodation and wedding venue fell through. (Abigail Marlow)
4. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë‘Jane Eyre’ remains a timeless exploration of emotional strength, morality, and self-worth. Through Jane’s voice, Charlotte Brontë crafts a narrative that merges gothic drama with a profound inner journey. Jane’s resilience in the face of abuse, neglect, and heartbreak reflects a fiercely independent spirit determined to define her own value. Benedict Cumberbatch has expressed admiration for the character’s emotional depth and the novel’s enduring relevance. As someone who often portrays psychologically rich roles, it’s clear why he would be drawn to such a work.
There were several dance routines, which were very varied, almost none of which were appropriate for the Austen era and which made the scenes even more humorous. The cast were clearly well rehearsed in what superficially were chaotic scenes. In Sense and Sensibility, Emily and JR danced to Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights before Rosie pointed out that was by Emily Brontë, not Jane Austen. (Charles Essex)
In early 19th century Yorkshire, a 13-year-old girl named Charlotte wrote a tiny book of poetry in a manuscript no bigger than a playing card.She inscribed the creation “‘Sold by Nobody, and Printed by Herself’.”Nearly 200 years later and the teenager who created that endearing miniature book has been proved wrong many times over.She was Charlotte Brontë, and her novels, of course, have been sold and printed thousands of times since their publication, with Jane Eyre in particular giving Yorkshire arguably its most famous heroine.Now, that tiny manuscript - A Book of Ryhmes [sic] – will join Charlotte’s other works on the shelves of Brontë lovers across the world after it has been published for the first time.(Victoria Finan)
In “My Plain Jane,” [a tale in which the fictional Jane Eyre meets up with the real Charlotte Brontë for a ghost hunt], I wrote the Charlotte character. One thing about her is that she hated to wear her glasses. She had them attached to a little stick of wood, like a wand. When she absolutely had to see, she would hold up the wand and look through the lenses. I wear thick glasses, myself, so I could relate. In writing these characters, I’ve had so much fun finding the small historical details like these and weaving them into our stories.
With an invigorating voice that sounds like it could belong to a 1950s starlet, she’s been compared to everyone from Dolly Parton, to Kesha and Kate Bush (Thompson is one of the few artists who can pull off the high warbles in ‘Wuthering Heights’, often working a cover of the song into her live shows). (India Lawrence)
The Lancashire Evening Post announces the July date for the Most Wuthering Heights Day event at Preston. Finally some links still exploiting the Wuthering Heights 2026 nonsense controversy (you know some random people (aka Wuthering Heights "online fan experts") saying random things (aka too old, too white, too tall, too thin, too wrong, too whatever) about some other people who are working in a new adaptation of Wuthering Heights): Elle, What Culture, Metro, newser, Comic Sands, Grazia Daily, Movieweb, Pedestrian, The News, The Nightly, Cinemablend, CBR, Paloma & Nacho, Mamamia (which actually argues for artistic freedom), Bestmovie, ComingSoon, TaxiDrivers, Movieplayer, CiakGeneration, Everyeye, Eco Del Cinema, ..
We look at just why Haworth was such an unhealthy place at the time Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë and Anne Brontë lived there, and uncover some startling, horrific facts about life, and death, in Haworth.
A Book of Ryhmesby Charlotte BrontëWith an Introduction by Patti Smithand essays by Barbara Heritage and Henry WessellsPublished by the Brontë Society and Tartarus PressPublication date: 21st April 2025
Extent: 105 pps
Jacketed hardback: ISBN: 978-1-912586-64-6, £45
Jacketed paperback: ISBN: 978-1-912586-66-0, £20
Charlotte Brontë’s ‘A Book of Ryhmes’ published for the first time, almost 200 years after it was written
Today (22 April 2025), almost two centuries after it was written by then 13-year-old Charlotte Brontë, ‘A Book of Ryhmes’ [sic] will be published for the first time. The hardback anthology of ten poems has been carefully transcribed and is accompanied by a foreword by legendary singer, songwriter, poet, painter, author and photographer, Patti Smith
“Though written nearly 200 years ago it has maintained the freshness of youth. It is not simply a handful of juvenile verses, but the manifestation of an ambitious dreamer.” – Patti Smith
The original miniature handwritten ‘book’ is smaller than a playing card, with a brown paper cover and is dated December 1829. This was the last Charlotte Brontë miniature manuscript book known to be in private hands before it was bought by the Friends of the National Libraries (FNL) in 2022 at the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair and donated to the Brontë Society’s Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth, where it was originally written.
Rebecca Yorke, Director of the Brontë Society, said: “When Charlotte created the original collection of these poems, she inscribed it as being ‘Sold by Nobody, and Printed by Herself’. How thrilled she would be – as we are – that so many years later, it is being published and available for anyone to have their own copy; it’s a very special way for us to mark the 209th anniversary of Charlotte’s birth (21 April).”
The Brontë Society has partnered with independent Yorkshire publisher Tartarus Press to publish ‘A Book of Ryhmes’. The book includes a transcript of 10 poems (including “The Beauty of Nature” and “On Seeing the Ruins of the Tower of Babel”) alongside images of Charlotte’s original manuscript and essays by Barbara Heritage, Associate Director of the Rare Book School, and bookseller Henry Wessells, who worked on the acquisition in 2022.
The original ‘A Book of Ryhmes’ is on display at the Brontë Parsonage Museum and the new publication is available to buy from www.bronteshop.org.uk.
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A Book of Ryhmes was produced by Charlotte when she was just 13 years old.The original, handwritten work is smaller than a playing card, with a brown paper cover, and is dated December, 1829.It was the last Charlotte Brontë miniature manuscript book known to be in private hands before it was bought by the Friends of the National Libraries in 2022, at the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair.The book was then donated to the Brontë Society’s parsonage museum at Haworth, where it was originally written when the building was the family home of the literary siblings.Now the work has been carefully transcribed and published as a hardback anthology of 10 poems, including The Beauty of Nature and On Seeing the Ruins of the Tower of Babel.It also features images of Charlotte’s original manuscript and essays by Barbara Heritage – associate director of the Rare Book School – and bookseller Henry Wessells, who worked on the acquisition in 2022.A foreword has been written by Patti Smith – a singer, songwriter, poet, painter, author and photographer.She says: "Though written nearly 200 years ago, the book has maintained the freshness of youth. It is not simply a handful of juvenile verses, but the manifestation of an ambitious dreamer."The Brontë Society partnered with independent Yorkshire publisher Tartarus Press on the project.Rebecca Yorke, director of the Brontë Society, says: "When Charlotte created the original collection of these poems, she inscribed it as being ‘Sold by Nobody, and Printed by Herself’. How thrilled she would be – as we are – that so many years later, it has been published and is now available so anyone can have their own copy; it has been a very special way for us to mark the 209th anniversary of Charlotte’s birth." [...]The original A Book of Ryhmes is on display at the Brontë Parsonage Museum. (Alistair Shand)
She sits writing at the kitchen table as the surrounding countryside is assaulted with heavy wind and rain. Beyond her home, a bleak parsonage is the overcrowded village of Haworth, close neighbour of the industrial sprawl of Keighley. The unsanitary village is a place of suffering and disease, where life expectancy is low, and half the children die before the age of six.Yet on 26 October 1829, 13-year-old Charlotte Brontë wrote nothing of this. Nothing of the horrendous odours. Nothing of the empty cupboards, the endless chores. Nothing of the deaths of her elder sisters and mother. Nothing of the fear of losing her father, who had agonised for months with a lung ailment. Instead, on tiny, precious scraps of paper, she composed a contemplative hymn to beauty. Seeking to define it, despite cruel circumstances, she takes a mental stroll in a welcoming forest where the elements blossom in perfect harmony. Then as the revelation of nature’s beauty dissipates, she resorts to the burgeoning terrain of her own imagination.Charlotte channels the reflections of one of her own characters, striding through a Canadian forest. Through him, she portrays with mysterious accuracy, the majesty of the great trees that rise like the masts of tall ships. In late November she unpredictably re-imagines the time of Babel, expanding the Genesis tale. Wrestling with an unbridled passion for words she evokes the atmosphere and those doomed souls attempting to pierce the whereabouts of God with the construction of a forbidden tower.Her description, mixing the unexpected with the prosaic, suggests panels of the Babel tower painted by Bruegel. Suddenly she drops down to Earth and offers a quiet, lucid little piece, 14 lines that she identifies as a sonnet. She heralds the magnificence of nature yet reminds us of the jewels of the seemingly commonplace. “Lovely is the bright rainbow but lovelier still the swan’s neck of snow.” Simplicity so acutely articulated, it brought me to tears.I was privileged to personally view this tiny miracle, Charlotte’s chapbook, on her birthday. Though written nearly 200 years ago, it has maintained the freshness of youth. It is not simply a handful of juvenile verses, but the manifestation of an ambitious dreamer. The sight of it spun me into the realm of my own childhood.Like Charlotte, I was the oldest and could often be found scribbling little stories to amuse my younger siblings. I could access that feeling, when solitude surges into a thousand visions, coupled with the unspoken desire to one day create books read by others. Though I had neither her vocabulary nor precocious literary skills, I recognised the energy, the concentration, the power of invention that a young writer wields as a benevolent weapon.The Brontë siblings created worlds filled with heroes and produced strange maps of new lands known only to them. Collectively and feverishly the four sat at the wooden kitchen table, constructing their own Game of Thrones. But in 1829, from October to December, Charlotte was compelled to create her solitary effort.Again, I picture her sitting, the parsonage bleak, the night ominous, warmed by her own creative impulse. In the last precious scraps, she returns to the rich tapestry of her boundless imagination. In the centre of December, with frost obscuring the view, and the wild wind causing the heart to tremble she writes of dead winter mystically transformed. But Charlotte, as if rudely awakened from her own spell, produces her last words in “Autumn Song”, stunned by the reality of the harshness of decay, nature’s waning day.How amazing the scope of the mind of this adolescent girl who would later pen the classic Jane Eyre and the masterpiece Villette at that same wood kitchen table. She possessed the rare ability to open herself to the darker elements and transform them. For through all loss and hardship, she forever harboured the secret knowledge of her own powers, that at 13 she laboured to nourish and express in the tiny Book of Ryhmes, Charlotte’s young season.Today, almost two centuries after it was written by then 13-year-old Charlotte Brontë, ‘A Book of Ryhmes’ will be published for the first time. The hardback anthology of 10 poems has been carefully transcribed and is accompanied by a foreword by legendary singer, songwriter, poet, painter, author and photographer, Patti Smith. The original book is on display at the Brontë Parsonage Museum and the new publication is available to buy from www.bronteshop.org.uk
The Brontës by Anita Rani: Sisters of Disruption will look at the influence of Anne, Charlotte, and Emily Brontë on readers over the years - including Anita Rani herself.The programme is partly autobiographical, tracing Rani's relationship with the Brontës as she returns to her hometown of Bradford.She recalls her first encounter with the sisters at school and her experience of growing up with the landscape of Haworth and the moors on her doorstep.Rani also meets fellow Brontë fans and literary experts to discuss how and why these sisters became ground-breaking 'literary disruptors' (in the words of a spokesperson), whose work still feels relevant and influential today.Executive producer Mark Robinson said: "The legacy of the astounding work of Anne, Charlotte, and Emily Brontë continues to reverberate around the world - they were challenging the patriarchy two hundred years ago."The worlds the sisters created have influenced culture across the centuries - from Kate Bush to Taylor Swift, Game of Thrones to Saltburn."As well as looking at how they inspired her, Anita will also discover just what made them so subversive – and very different to the timid image so frequently associated with them."Rani said: "These strong, unearthly sisters fed into my psyche and made me think anything was possible."I related to the darkness and tragedy in the Brontës’ lives...they had as much impact on me as Neneh Cherry, The Smiths, and Goldie."In this film I’m going to explore how these women - so full of rage - changed my life, and the world."Growing up, romance wasn’t on the cards."Bollywood felt distant."But Heathcliff...well, he could have been Indian - dark hair, dark features...why would he not be?"Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture and Sky Arts have announced a free screening of the programme on May 7 as part of the Creative Cities Convention.This will be followed by a panel discussion with Rani and Shanaz Gulzar, creative director of Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture.The programme will then be available to watch on Sky Arts, Freeview, and streaming platform NOW from May 20.Tickets for the free screening, which will take place at Pictureville Cinema, are available at https://my.scienceandmediamuseum.org.uk/0/413178The free screening event begins at 7pm, with a 6.30pm arrival time. (Will Abbott)
Tue 22 Apr, Doors - 5:45pm; Welcome and reading - 6pmBrontë Space at the Old School RoomPlease join us in celebrating the publication by the Brontë Society and Tartarus Press, of Charlotte Brontë's 'A Book of Ryhmes'.Donated to the Brontë Parsonage Museum in 2022 by the Friends of the National Libraries, 'The Book of Ryhmes' is a rare, unpublished work by Charlotte. This exciting new publication is the first time Charlotte's manuscript has been transcribed and available for the public to read. The launch party is an exclusive chance to hear from those involved, including a special reading and to celebrate the release with us.There will also be the opportunity to see the original manuscript on display in the Museum and to buy a copy of the book.
Who is the Yorkshire person that you most admire?The Brontë Sisters, these three talented sisters writing the classics including Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights still have a huge impact on the literary world. You can really see how the Yorkshire countryside impacted their work.
Have you ever wondered at what age authors like Dame Jacqueline Wilson and the Brontës started writing? If you think it all started when they were adults, with classics like Tracy Beaker, Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre, you would be wrong!The Brontës began writing way before that, creating imaginary worlds and compiling their own work when they were just children. Likewise, Dame Jacqueline knew she wanted to write from just six years old.Now, these literary legends are coming together in one place in the form of an exhibition and festival to celebrate and recognise the genre of children’s literature - fittingly taking place at the Brontë Parsonage in Haworth, Yorkshire, where the family lived.Dame Jacqueline will be a guest speaker at this year’s Brontë Festival of Women’s Writing, which focuses on children’s literature and takes place Friday 20 - Sunday 22 September 2024. Her books have been on the shelves of thousands of libraries across the world, with her stories often sticking with readers from childhood through to adulthood. [...]Ann Dinsdale, principal curator at the Brontë Parsonage Museum, said “The exhibition tells of how Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne Brontë lost their mother and two elder sisters in early childhood and how they sought refuge in an imaginary world.”Toy soldiers bought for Branwell became the inspiration for several plays and stories written by the children. Ann added: “They produced miniature books and magazines, intended to be ‘read’ by the toy soldiers, and then hand-stitched into covers made from scraps of wallpaper or packaging." The books are tiny indeed, with some as small as 36 x 55mm (1.42 x 2.17 inches). [...]The Brontë Parsonage Museum’s programme office Angela Clare understands the influence that reading as children can have on people as they grow older: “We always hope to inspire people to read more, write more, and try something new."The Brontës enjoyed drawing as well as writing, having lessons from an early age. They often had to copy engravings in books, resembling characters from their stories.While putting together the exhibition, Ann discovered something: “The Brontës often doodled on the margins of their books. While deciding what objects to display in the exhibition we found tiny pencil sketches in one of the Brontës’ books which we’d not noticed before.”
I'd heard so much about the Brontë sisters during my school years that I had become immune to their greatness.I was ignorant to what these young women had achieved and continue to achieve through their literary masterpieces, namely Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights among others.The books are set in the stunning backdrop of the West Yorkshire moors and the more I have learned about them, the more I have become intrigued to go on my own journey exploring the romantic landscape which inspired the novels. [...]These striking green buses run hourly between Keighley and Hebden Bridge. Fortunately I was in luck as a bus was due as I entered Keighley bus station which proudly flies the Yorkshire Flag at full mast.The Brontë buses transport people from Keighley through Brontë Country to Hebden Bridge.It cost me £2 to board the bus which would take 15 minutes to Haworth. These single decker buses are clean, modern and even show off maps and share Brontë facts.I was apparently the only excited tourist on the bus as I snapped photos of the Brontë signs and gazed out of the window to take in the stunning views which cascaded around me. (Sophie Mei Lan)
Burton is, of course, far from the first creative to explore the gothic aesthetic. It flourished in the 19th century, when writers such as Edgar Allen Poe, Wilkie Collins, Mary Shelley and Emily Brontë produced masterpieces of the genre. (Lauren Cochrane)
A nationwide drawing project backed by artist David Hockney is among the events unveiled on Thursday for Bradford's tenure as UK City of Culture 2025.The first part of the year-long programme will also include the Turner Prize, an outdoor event created by magician Steven Frayne - formerly known as Dynamo - and tributes to the Brontë sisters. [...]Bradford is also the birthplace of writers JB Priestley and Andrea Dunbar, while Haworth, the home of the Brontes, is in the district. (Noor Nanji)
The Bröntes [sic] feature heavily in this first programme announcement.Four fantasy writers and illustrators from Ghana and the north of England will revisit the sisters’ imaginary world of Angria for a new collection of stories and animations.These will be published as part of the annual Brönte Festival of Women’s Writing, usually taking place in September.The wide skies and expansive moorland that spurred Emily Brönte’s Wuthering Heights is the stage for Wild Uplands, four new contemporary visual artworks created by national and international artists placed across Penistone Hill Country Park from May. (Brad Deas)
Imagine Jane Eyre or Rebecca as rewritten by Virginia Woolf. (Neil McRobert)
Anne Brontë: The First Feminist Novelist?In her classic novels, Anne Brontë fearlessly championed women’s issues, challenging not only Victorian social mores but English law and Church of England theology.In just two novels, Anne Brontë took on the plight of governesses and married women’s legal rights (or lack thereof), as well as putting forward her own theory of universal salvation, which, at the time, was considered blasphemous and highly controversial. Yet today, her fame has yet to reach the heights of her two older sisters, Charlotte and Emily. Here, we will look into why that is the case – and why it is an unfair reflection on Anne as a writer – by exploring her life, work, and values. (...)Anne’s reputation, then, has suffered through unfair criticism, neglect, and poor editorial decisions, the effects of which can still be seen in accounts of the Brontë family. However, since the 1990s, biographies of Anne have helped question the narrative of Anne as “the other Brontë” and there has been a concerted effort to reevaluate her work in a manner that recognizes its radical politics. Through her classic novels, Anne Brontë sought to challenge social injustices and to improve the lives of others, and it is as such that she deserves to be remembered. (Catherine Dent)
Paula becomes both the lady of the house and the madwoman in the attic, to borrow a phrase usually applied to Victorian novel Jane Eyre. In Jane Eyre, which, as it so happens, was also turned into a 1944 film, Jane’s stay at Mr. Rochester’s home quickly sees strange things happening. As his governess, she hears noises and voices in the attic, to say nothing of the fire that mysteriously starts in the middle of the night. Later, as she’s set to marry Rochester, there is a scandal at the altar: He is already married. His wife Bertha fell victim to congenital madness, you see, so he kept her locked and hidden in his attic. It was the only thing he could think to do. Jane runs away in the middle of the night, but returns later in the novel. Bertha has since burned the entire house down and died, and Rochester is disabled in the process. Jane agrees to marry him, and they look together toward the future—one that presumably doesn’t end with Jane in the attic.Of course, there’s no guarantee that won’t happen, just as there was never a guarantee that the man Paula quickly married wouldn’t try to drive her to madness. While Gaslight isn’t a straight adaptation, this influence, and the Jane-Bertha dichotomy, plays out in the single character of Paula. She must hold both realities and both experiences because the man she was supposed to be able to trust has thrust them upon her. (Drew Gillis)
Es curioso, además de triste, pensar que encontré una novela como Cumbres borrascosas a los pies de un cubo de basura. Es también poético saber que ese cubo de basura es el que recoge los deshechos de los habitantes de la Casa de las Flores, lugar en el que vivió Neruda, y en cuyos ladrillos se guarda el recuerdo de los encuentros entre los grandes poetas de su generación. Qué habrían pensado ellos al ver una obra, sea cual sea, despreciada hasta el ridículo, solitaria entre la suciedad, anhelando unos ojos que se posasen sobre ella y la salvasen de tan terrible destino. (...)Quizás el cuerpo desalmado que cometió tal injuria no llegó a leer la que sería la mayor obra de Emily Brontë, su única en solitario. Sería alguien que no entendió lo que ella escribió: que “el mundo es para mí una horrenda colección de recuerdos diciéndome que ella existió y yo la he perdido”. En realidad, es reconfortante pensar que leyó esas palabras y no fue capaz de comprenderlas, porque quien las lee y ha experimentado el dolor de una pérdida no puede evitar sentirse herido por el cortante filo de su significado. (...)Pero, el final. Emily Brontë, cómo vas a escribir una combinación de palabras tan bella como lo hiciste en el final de Cumbres borrascosas. Tan sentido, tan sutilmente bello y a la vez tan poco comentado por los críticos. Se han resaltado muchas frases de esta obra, pero nunca la que pone el punto final, y no hay ninguna como esa. Por los mismos motivos éticos que me impiden tirar un libro a la basura, no me permito escribir aquí esas palabras, pues es un final que debe ser leído en exclusiva por el lector que descubra la novela al completo. Solo puedo decir que yo sí me detuve al lado —del libro— bajo el cielo sereno, siguiendo con los ojos el vuelo de las libélulas entre las plantas silvestres y escuchando el rumor de la suave brisa. Aquel que tiró el libro a una basura frente a La Casa de las Flores, sepa que no ha de tener inquietos sueños porque su libro duerme ahora en un lugar tan apacible como el estante más alto de mi librería. (Natalia Loizaga) (Translation)
Ante la imposibilidad de firmar con su nombre, muchas escritoras del pasado se vieron obligadas a buscar formas alternativas de publicación, como es el caso de las hermanas Charlotte, Emily y Anne Brontë, célebres autoras de obras como “Jane Eyre”, “Cumbres Borrascosas” y “La inquilina de Wildfell Hall”, usaban los seudónimos masculinos: Currer, Ellis y Acton Bell.Hacerse pasar por hombre para publicar: un rotundo no negociableEsta elección se debió a lo controversial que podían ser sus temas, que incluían romances desafiantes, alcoholismo y violencia, considerados inmorales para su época. Hoy sus novelas se valoran como obras de arte innovadoras en la historia de la literatura. (Juan Sebastián Ramos) (Translation)
Gondal provided Brontë with a great deal of practice in profiling varieties of extreme behaviour. This is a world in which people routinely conduct themselves with Byronic abandon, regardless of gender. But there’s also evidence to suggest that even as she immersed herself ever more deeply in that world she was already imagining alternatives to it. In September 1838, at the age of twenty, she got her first (and only) full-time paid job, as a teacher at Law Hill, a girls’ school at Southowram, near Halifax. It was hard, isolating work, from six in the morning until eleven at night, with a single half-hour break. The speaker of a poem titled ‘4 December 1838’ in the 1850 edition attempts to relieve her ‘harassed heart’ by allowing herself a choice of ‘places’ to visit in her mind. First up is the garden at the Haworth parsonage:The mute bird sitting on the stone,The dank moss dripping from the wall,The garden-walk with weeds o’ergrownI love them – how I love them all!These lines prospect methodically, inching forward through parallelism and internal rhyme until they have identified the exact shape and size of the feeling that originally gave rise to them. Scenting bathos in the weeds, perhaps, the speaker then seeks out ‘Another clime, another sky’: one which, while not altogether incompatible with the moors around Haworth, clearly owes the ‘dreamlike charm’ of its wandering deer and rim of blue mountains to Gondal (always as much Scotland as Yorkshire). But something has changed in the method of description. The attention paid to bird, moss and garden-walk coaxes feeling into form. The blue mountains, by contrast, are a token of scenic grandeur cashed in for off-the-shelf solace. One passage is a rehearsal for a novel, the other a resort to fantasy. (David Trotter)
Structuralism In Jane Eyre: Interaction Of Binary Oppositions In BuildungsromanCEMJP, 32(1), 83–91This paper explores Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë via a structuralist perspective, paying special attention to the idea of binary oppositions and how they help Jane navigate the constraints of Victorian society and develop her identity. By carefully dissecting these conflicting components that keep coming up, the study seeks to reveal the societal commentary that is subtly present in the story.The study will break down the novel's key binary oppositions. These contrast the desire for freedom (Lowood/Moor House) with the actual confining areas (Gateshead/Thornfield). We will examine how these disparate environments symbolize the social and physical restrictions that women face. The dichotomy of agency connected with the masculine domain and passivity associated with the feminine sphere will also be analyzed in light of Jane's interactions with Mrs. Reed and Mr. Rochester, among other characters. Here, we shall witness Jane's brilliance, tenacity, and steadfast spirit as she defies these accepted standards.The relevance of recurrent motifs and symbols within the narrative framework will also be covered in this session. For example, the investigation of fire and light will be examined as metaphors for Jane's own emerging self-reliance and curiosity. This symbolism will be contrasted with the darkness and entrapment symbolized by confining spaces like Gateshead, where Mrs. Reed embodies the oppressive nature of Victorian expectations.Utilizing a structuralist methodology, the essay will contend that Jane Eyre is more than just a tale of coming-of-age. It develops into a powerful indictment of women's limitations and Victorian societal conventions. The story promotes the search of self-discovery and individual autonomy, especially in the face of oppressive society limits, via Jane's unrelenting defiance of the established binaries. This disobedience becomes a challenge to the fundamentals of a constrictive social structure rather than just a personal conflict.In addition to examining how these binary choices affect Jane, the study will also look at how they influence the story as a whole. The recurring pattern of Jane's experiences—from imprisonment to a brief moment of optimism, then back to another setback—can be interpreted as a mirror of the cyclical nature of the social norms that she consistently challenges.In the end, the essay will make the case that reading Jane Eyre via a structuralist lens reveals a nuanced and intricate story. It is a story of personal growth intertwined with a powerful social commentary, all masterfully woven through the utilization of binary oppositions and symbolic motifs.
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| An edition of Charlotte's juvenilia with her copy of William Finden's The Maid of Saragoza from Finden’s Landscape and Portrait Illustrations of Lord Byron’s Life and Works. |
If you like poetry let it be first rate, Milton, Shakespeare, Thomson, Goldsmith Pope (if you will though I don't admire him) Scott, Byron, Camp[b]ell, Wordsworth and Southey Now Ellen don't be startled at the names of Shakespeare, and Byron. Both these were great Men and their works are like themselves, You will know how to chuse the good and avoid the evil, the finest passages are always the purest, the bad are invariably revolting you will never wish to read them over twice, Omit the Comedies of Shakespeare and the Don Juan, perhaps the Cain of Byron though the latter is a magnificent Poem and read the rest fearlessly
All too soon he would be dead, leaving behind brokenhearted friends and lovers but also a new literary archetype: the proud, moodily introspective and sexually magnetic Byronic hero, half Apollo, half Satan. Examples range from Alexandre Dumas’s dark avenger, the Count of Monte Cristo, and Emily Bronté’s tempestuous Heathcliff to the myriad bad boys and brooding heroes of modern romance novels. (Michael Dirda)
After five years in Bude, Cornwall, Rhys moved to Cheriton Fitzpaine in 1960, and it was there that she returned to the public eye as a writer, most notably with Wild [sic] Sargasso Sea. Written as a prequel to Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, Wild [sic] Sargasso Sea imagines the background to Mr Rochester's marriage from the point of view of his wife, later the 'madwoman in the attic'.The book won the WH Smith Literary Award in 1967, and has grown in reputation ever since, including being named by Time as one of the '100 best English-language novels since 1923. It was included on the 'Big Jubilee Read' list of 70 books by Commonwealth authors, selected in 2022 to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II.
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