Mr Charlotte Brontë - A review

Our thanks to McGill-Queen's University Press for sending us a review copy of this book.

Mr Charlotte Brontë
The Life of Arthur Bell Nicholls

Alan H. Adamson

McGill-Queen's University Press
Cloth (0773533656) 9780773533653
Release date: 2008-02-28
CA $29.95 | US $24.95 | UK £13.99
6X9
216pp
19 b&w photos

The three key men in the Brontë saga have been maligned since their own time until relatively recently. And because Charlotte Brontë's death took place after her marriage to Arthur Bell Nicholls but before she could make it clear whether she would continue with her literary career - though the answer to that riddle is pretty clear to us - Mr Nicholls has been 'fair game' even since before his death.

Most modern biographies try and look at his own acts instead of relying on the clearly biased accounts of 'witnesses' such as Mrs Gaskell or Ellen Nussey or Charles Hale (who actually was a close friend of Mrs Gaskell's). Published in 1999, the Cochranes' My Dear Boy was the first stand-alone biography of him where they vindicated the figure of this Irish curate who married Charlotte Brontë and who, were you to trust some accounts, always took the wrong decisions and made the worst moves.

Now nine years later, Alan H. Adamson provides us with another biography of this seemingly obscure man who hated fame so much that he didn't even bother to try and defend himself from many untruths and falsehoods. Mr Charlotte Brontë is the title of this new biography - a title which we personally find totally fitting. Mr Adamson, apart from a historian, has family connections which link him to Mr Nicholls' aunt and uncle, who adopted Arthur and his brother Alan.

Mr Adamson makes a point of trying to establish as far as possible Arthur's personality and what made him the man he became. This adoption and separation from his parents - who he never saw again judging from the evidence we have - is, according to the author, a key factor in Arthur's psychological makeup, causing him to be wary of strangers, yet - once the ice had been broken - attaching himself passionately and deeply to a happy few.

Mr Adamson differentiates three clear-cut periods in Arthur's life. Facts from the first period, his Irish formative years, are scarce but just enough to have a glimpse of the young Arthur and to gather where he might have got his High-Church, Puseyite religious ideas which brought him so to clash with both the Brontës and with the villagers of Haworth at times. Mr Adamson is able even to fill a gap in Arthur's superior education: the man whose intellect was written down as not so bright because of his taking extra time to complete his studies according to the Cochranes is now the man who took a year off from University in order to teach. The author also makes use of his family papers to try and describe the home and family Arthur would have known. The well-known Cuba House where Arthur grew up is unfortunately - and unbeknownst to us up until now - sadly in ruins these days, as a couple of pictures in the book show.

Short parts of the biography are written somewhat fictionally, such as Arthur waking for the first time in Haworth to the sound of Patrick's gunshots out of his window at the Parsonage. But this might indeed have been the way in which the second - and most brief and well-known - part of Arthur's life began after about a year in Ireland where his whereabouts are a mystery. Mr Adamson's sympathies clearly lie with the young, foreign curate who finds himself in an idiosyncratic northern village. And perhaps to make the reader share this feeling he tips the balance a little too much in painting Charlotte Brontë a little more unsympathetic than she probably was. Her every mention of the Irish curate is scanned for meaning which might or might not have been there. However, we find the quick, stereotyped summary of the Brontës' lives up until that point somewhat unnecessary, as most people coming to this biography will be quite familiar with the Brontë story. Perhaps - for the few people coming from other directions - that summary could have been left to a footnote.

Arthur Bell Nicholls wasn't definitely one for first impressions. Charlotte Brontë was famously not impressed by him, probably due to a natural callousness when it came to her father's curates - and we all know where she ended up. However, Charlotte's lifelong friend Ellen Nussey seems to have liked him at first, as did Elizabeth Gaskell when she met him for the first time after Charlotte's death. Of course, we know where these two ended up as well: profiting from every chance to criticise Arthur and his attitude and to lean toward the exact opposite direction from where he leant. But, as with Charlotte, we find Mr Adamson to be a little too willing to highlight Arthur's good points by looking at these women's so-called faults through a magnifying glass. Elizabeth Gaskell is accused of leaving England after the Life of Charlotte Brontë was published to 'avoid the controversy', ignoring the fact that Mrs Gaskell always fled from England whenever one of her books was published. Ellen Nussey's possible reasons for constantly wanting to print Charlotte's letters against Arthur's wishes are repeated time and time again with more than hints about her just wanting her proverbial 15 minutes of fame. A few other minor, hardly relevant mistakes appear in the book as well, despite Mr Adamson's extensive and aptly-used bibliography.

This interesting second period, which has been looked into ad infinitum, is naturally the less interesting within the biography. Still, it is sympathetic and moving and, for anyone who likes Arthur - as you will after having read the previous pages of the book - and who likes Charlotte it is simply a pleasure to read up until when Charlotte's condition worsens, and a drama to read up until Patrick dies. Oh the struggle to defend Charlotte's reputation, to ward off gossips and to try and lead a normal life. Both dramatic and hilarious the 12-letters-in-10-days exchanged by Patrick and Arthur with Harriet Martineau are, for us, one of the highlights of this period, as Mr Adamson comments them both seriously and inevitably jokingly.

This period ends with Arthur's 'dismissal' by the Haworth board of trustees after Patrick's death. Mr Adamson tries to reach conclusions as to why the trustees voted against him and treats the painful subject in-depth and with compassion.

The third and last period in Arthur's life is his return to Banagher, Ireland, with his Aunt and cousin Mary Anna - who would later become his second wife, although Arthur is supposed to have told her that he had buried his heart with Charlotte - is the most interesting and the one to include most new things. Not only does Mr Adamson pepper the text with lively, vivid anecdotes of family folklore but he also brings us Mr Nicholls at his most charming and relaxed, on his way from Charlotte Brontë's 'dear boy' to the elderly, much-loved particularly by children and animals, 'dear baboo Nick'. But the Brontë connection was impossible to leave behind. He was now great friends with the Brontës' old servant, Martha Brown (who hadn't liked Mr Nicholls at first either), with whom he kept in touch by letter and by her frequent stays in Banagher. He once went back to Haworth even! And his home at the Hill House (now a bed and breakfast called Charlotte's Way) seems to have been a Brontë shrine. Even though the stories of his precious Brontë items stored in cupboards is well-known, many other valuable items were cherished and displayed prominently inside the house. Arthur's life after the Brontës is also the afterlife of Brontë items, which is always interesting to read, despite the cringe-worthy dealings of T.J. Wise.

This biography of Arthur Bell Nicholls reads like a grabbing novel and closes like one, too, with that mixture of satisfaction and sadness which reigns at the end of a good story. Mr Adamson provides us with a perceptive, fresh new approach and in telling the life of Charlotte Brontë's husband poses some very interesting - albeit unanswerable - questions concerning the Brontës themselves. What's more important, it shows - hopefully for once and for all - that Charlotte Brontë didn't marry a monster, but a highly private man who, above all, loved his wife Charlotte Nicholls but who also cared about Charlotte Brontë's literary reputation inasmuch as that was strictly restricted to her books, not her private affairs.

Let us finish with his own words on the controversial subject of Charlotte Brontë's married happiness:

There is also another misconception, which I am told by a Literary Friend, prevails--'that her [Charlotte Brontë's] married life was unhappy'--I should have thought that her own words written from her deathbed had made such a statement incredible but I am told that it exists.
~ Arthur Bell Nicholls to Mrs Humphry Ward, 28 November 1899

Categories: Biography, Books, Review

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Mr Charlotte Brontë

As we have previously informed on BrontëBlog, Alan H. Adamson's new biography of Arthur Bell Nicholls has been published by McGill-Queen's University Press:

Mr Charlotte Brontë The Life of Arthur Bell Nicholls
Alan H Adamson

A biography of Charlotte Brontë's husband that highlights his protection of her literary reputation.

Cloth (0773533656) 9780773533653
Release date: 2008-02-28
CA $29.95 | US $24.95 | UK £13.99
6X9
216pp
19 b&w photos

Few people seeking to avoid the glare of publicity have had more of it turned on them than Charlotte Brontë's husband, Arthur Bell Nicholls. Some critics have implied that he not only put a stop to her writing but might even have inadvertently caused her death.
Alan Adamson's biography takes recent scholarship into account and adds new material about Nicholl's family, education, and early life in Ireland to give a more balanced view. The book explores why Brontë, cool and often hostile towards Nicholls in the early days of his curacy at Haworth, came to respect and love him, and how Patrick Brontë, her difficult father, grew to rely on him after her death.
Drawing on Nicholl's correspondence with, among others, Elizabeth Gaskell, Ellen Nussey and Harriet Martineau, Mr Charlotte Brontë: The Life of Arthur Bell Nicholls presents a compelling picture of Nicholls' efforts to emphasize Brontë's literary reputation and curtail speculation about her private life.
Alan H. Adamson is distinguished professor emeritus of history, Concordia University, and the author of several works, including Sugar Without Slaves.

This is the table of contents:

Abbreviations ix
Acknowledgments xi
Preface xiii
Illustrations xv
Family Tree xxvi

1 The Irish Background 3
2 Mr Macarthey 21
3 Macarthey in Love 35
4 Tomkins’ Brief Triumph 64
5 Her Will Be Done 83
6 Return to Banagher 127
7 The Struggle over Copyright 138

Epilogue 158
Notes 165
Bibliography 179
Index 185

Categories: Books, Biography, Brontëana

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Brontë Society Gazette. Issue 71

The latest issue of The Brontë Society Gazette is now out (Issue 71. January  2017. ISSN 1344-5940).

ARTICLES

Letter from the Editor by Belinda Hakes
Letter from the Chairman by John Thirlwell, Chairman of the Brontë Society
Articles of Association of The Brontë Society by Jan Lee, John Thirlwell
The Brontë Society Bicentenary Conference 2016 by Bob Gamble
White Rose Awards
William Scoresby, Jr. Scientist, Explorer and Vicar of Bradford by Sarah Fermi
The Legacy of Maria and Elizabeth Brontë by Mary Robinson Adamson
Bicentenary events in Brussels organised by the Brussels Brontë Group by Mary Robinson Adamson, Brontë Society member and Parsonage Museum volunteer
Brontë Society acquires Charlotte Brontë envelope at auction
Charlotte Brontë at the Morgan Library and Museum. New York: Charlotte Brontë - An Independent Will 
The Brontë Staircase by Imelda Marsden
The Brontës in Beverley by Belinda Hakes
New Responses to the Brontës: Andrew McMillan on Branwell
Membership News: 
   Members' survey / To Walk Invisible / Tips to hep you get the most out of your membership / Dates for your diary by Linda Ling, Membership Officer / In Memoriam: Katherine M. Reise
Looking for Jane Eyre's mad woman in the attic: a visit to Norton Conyers in North Yorkshire by Marina Saegerman
Percy Smith 1882-1948: Artist, Calligrapher, Letterer, Typographer, Etcher by Marion Delf.
Tracking the Brontës at Kirkstall Abbey 1152 Club by Val Crompton
Typhus and Typhoid 

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Charlotte Brontë's ring in Australia

An alert from the Australian Brontë Association for today, May 12:

Saturday 12th MAY 10:30am at the SMSA (Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts)

Professor Christine Alexander:
Charlotte Brontë’s Engagement Ring and Newly Found Brontë Memorabilia

Christine Alexander has recently uncovered a link between Ireland and Canada and discovered some Brontë relics.

More information can be found in the following paper published in Brontë Studies (Volume 31, Issue 3, November 2006):

Arthur Bell Nicholls and the Adamson Saga: New Discoveries of Brontë Memorabilia
pp. 194-209(16)Author: Alexander, Christine
Abstract
An account of some Brontë memorabilia given by the Revd Arthur Nicholls and his second wife to their relations, including an exploration of provenance Adamson / Bell family relationships, and a story of Irish emigration to Canada.

Categories: Brontëana, Charlotte Brontë, Talks

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Brontë Studies. Volume 31, Issue 3

The new issue of Brontë Studies (Volume 31, Issue 3, November 2006) is already available on-line. We provide you the table of contents and abstracts:

Editorial pp. iii-iii(1) Author: Duckett, Bob

ARTICLES
'Always at my Post': The Letters of the Revd Patrick Brontë
pp. 179-193(15) Author: Green, Dudley
Abstract
An account of the compilation of the Letters of the Reverend Patrick Brontë by the editor, with extracts illustrating Patrick's concern with a wide range of public, religious, social and personal issues.

Arthur Bell Nicholls and the Adamson Saga: New Discoveries of Brontë Memorabilia
pp. 194-209(16)Author: Alexander, Christine
Abstract
An account of some Brontë memorabilia given by the Revd Arthur Nicholls and his second wife to their relations, including an exploration of provenance Adamson / Bell family relationships, and a story of Irish emigration to Canada.

The Many Faces of Frances
pp. 210-219(10) Author: Marutollo, Anna
Abstract
This essay explores the evolution of the female psyche in the early works of Charlotte Brontë. It traces the feminine concept in her poem Frances from a dependent, spectral figure at the mercy of an uncaring lover to the individual, but still dependent, female in the novel The Professor. However, this latter dependency is a dependency controlled by Frances Henri herself.

Wuthering Heights As a Childlike Fairy Tale
pp. 220-229(10) Author: Piciucco, Pier Paolo
Abstract
Many of the difficulties we experience in understanding Wuthering Heights are removed when it is regarded as a fairy tale. Yet, even then, the novel does not fit the standard structures proposed, for example, by Vladimir Propp. Some of the difficulties which have prevented previous critics from seeing fairy-structures as central to an interpretation of Wuthering Heights are removed when we combine this perspective with the well-established narcissistic framework of the story. Kristin Wardetsky's practical study of fairy tales written by children, and especially by girl-children, may prove to be the crucial link enabling us to see the fairy tale as the pervasive structure, rather than as an incidental feature, in Wuthering Heights.

Branwell Revisited
pp. 230-239(10) Author: Cheney, Phyllis
Abstract
This article provides further reflections on the contention that Branwell Brontë had an illegitimate daughter, Mary Ann, by Martha Judson (née Feather). The author is a great granddaughter of Mary Ann Judson.

That Wind from the West
pp. 240-247(8) Author: Arnedillo, Óscar
Abstract
Wuthering Heights is about the knowledge and study of passions and emotions, yet there is more Irish background in Emily's work than generally accepted. In this article parallels are made between the writings of Emily Jane Brontë and some aspects of Irish history. The possibility that Emily made use of different events in Irish history in the composition of her novel are explored, many of which were related to her by uncle James while he was visiting the Parsonage during the time of Irish famine.

REVIEWS
Reviews
pp. 248-270(23)

Categories: Journals, Scholar, Brontë Society

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Brontëmania is buzzing this week

Reviews of Jane Eyre 2011:

Muveez:

Using both the vistas of Derbyshire and a strikingly dark tone, director Cary Fukunaga (directing his follow up to the excellent Sin Nombre) brings a darker and angrier interpretation of the story than perhaps anyone before him. It is not quite the revolutionary, modern style the trailers implied, but the slow-burning tension is handled brilliantly. It is at it’s heart a costume drama, and has moments where the pace begins to sag, but it is nonetheless well executed. (James Luxford)

Hertfordshire Mercury:

Elegantly adapted for the screen by Moira Buffini, Jane Eyre condenses the source novel into two hours of yearning and regret.
Wasikowska and Fassbender lead an exemplary ensemble cast including Dench as a bustling maternal figure and Hawkins as a tight-lipped lady of the manor, who can turn a room icy cold with a single withering glance.
Fukunaga's camera sweeps over the foreboding locations, lashing his lead actress with enough wind and rain to match the emotional battering meted out by Mrs Reed and Mr Brocklehurst.

Whataculture!:

It isn’t really my job, though, to say why the movie does not achieve the greatness of the novel; this is practically a given. That Fassbender’s Rochester is nothing like the Rochester I have always imagined isn’t a fair criticism either. But on its own terms the movie needed to have a stronger central relationship and Rochester needed to be more than just a poor sap. After two scenes with Jane, we know how he feels about her. At no point does it  ever feel like he could be dangerous, and the difference in social positions never feels as important as it ought to. The film is certainly worth seeing, particularly for Wasikoska’s Jane, and for the many little details it gets just right. It’s surprising then that it falters when it comes to the dark gothic romance and melodrama for which the story is best remembered. (Adam Whyte)

News Shopper:

Derbyshire has never looked so bleak. Director Carey (sic) Fukunaga has shot it in washed out grey, a beautiful yet ultimately barren landscape where the wind howls and briars threaten every step.
Interiors are just as bleak: you can practically hear the creaking of the old timbers; this is a house in which the chill goes to the bone.(...)
The pace is impressively brisk (even if the running time still clocks in at two hours) but the abridgement does rob it of the emotional punch that its climactic scenes should have.
Nevertheless, this adaptation is a classy and well acted piece and well worth every rain-lashed thunderstorm. (Jez Sands)

Other reviews: Allentown DVD Examiner,  Life On the Breadline, Sew White,

My Daily interviews Jane Eyre 2011's costume design, Michael O'Connor and shows some of the original designs:

What inspired you when you were creating the costumes for Jane Eyre?
"Inspiration came firstly from Charlotte Brontë's novel and Jane's personal struggle. Inspiration also came from artists of the time including Ingres, Winterhalter and Mary Ellen Best also early victorian photographers such as Robert Adamson. i also found looking at original costumes to be very inspiring."  (...)
And when you're working on something like Jane Eyre, how important is historical accuracy?
"Historical accuracy was important to the project because it helped to keep a rule in terms of patterns of costume, making and the technique of making. The fun of projects like Jane Eyre is trying to understand the past. This doesn't mean that it restricts one totally but knowing how something was achieved and why can help with understanding the society of the time."
Lastly, what's your own favourite costume from the film?
"One of my favourite costumes is when, at the end of the film, Jane returns to Thornfield and wears a brown with ribbon print dress which was made from an imported american cotton print fabric based on prints of the time. She wears a bonnet made from a combination of antique and modern straw, fabricated in an openwork design to give it a lightness." (Philippa Warr)

Cinema Blend makes some Oscar nominations predictions. About Jane Eyre 2011:

This is more wishful thinking on the part of those of us who love this movie-- it's a really wonderful adaptation of a spooky and very affecting novel, but doesn't seem to have stuck much in the public consciousness. Both stars Michael Fassbender and Mia Wasikowska have other projects coming this fall, and the best hope for Jane Eyre seems to be Costumes or Cinematography-- a hope I'll cling to as long as I can.  (Katey Rich)

Beauty And The Dirt gives away a Jane Eyre writing set + book.

The Birmingham Mail visits Scarborough:

I started one from Anne Brontë's burial place in St Mary's Churchyard, headed across Scarborough Castle and spent a few hours, walking across the sands. (Jasbir Uthi)

The Telegraph & Argus describes this very Brontë week:

Brontëmania is buzzing this week, with new film adaptations of Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, and the opening of a new play about the literary sisters by Skipton-born writer Blake Morrison. (Emma Clayton)

And The Independent analyses the British creative industry looking at the Brontës:

When a Yorkshire parson gave his children a set of wooden soldiers, he can't have known what he would unleash. First, there were games, then there were stories, and then hundreds of handwritten books. There was a kingdom called Gondal, and then a gypsy called Heathcliff, and then a governess called Jane. And then, 154 years after two books were published by two sisters under the names of two men, there was yet another film of Wuthering Heights, and yet another film of Jane Eyre, and yet another play about the daughters of the parson, all in the course of a week. (Christina Patterson)

The Huffington Post reviews the latest Paul Morrissey film, News from Nowhere.

In one of the films more memorable scenes, he asks her what she's reading, and she tells him "Jane Eyre - it's about a girl who's very unhappy, so she marries and older man." Looking away, she follows by asking what he thinks of younger women who wed men much older than them, and the camera panning between them makes for a few terrific frames of discomfort, longing, delivered in silence. (Michael Vazquez)

E Grade needs a classic in The Independent (Ireland):

To keep myself awake I lean backwards towards the 'literature' section and grab a novel. A nice classic to keep my mind occupied is what I need. Wuthering Heights or a biog.

The Jewish Journal is too optimistic when it says:

England in the 19th century had the Brontë sisters, but we’ve got the Ephrons. (Jonathan Kirsch)

The Yorkshire Post talks about the increasing problem of the theft of lead and other materials from churches over England. And Haworth is no exception:

In Haworth, historic home of the Brontës, the parish church and other heritage buildings have been targeted so often that the priest in charge fears that tourism and jobs could be put in jeopardy.

Just One More Page... reviews The Tenant of Wildfell Hall; badinage posts about Jane Eyre; Le Labo des expérimentations littéraires de Marc Ancel reviews Wuthering Heights (in French); The Squeee continues her Jane Eyre week with a post about North Lees Hall, a review of The Forbidden Innocent and an eyes Eyre quiz;  Maddalena De Leo has uploaded to YouTube a dozen or more short videos of different moments of the recent Brontë Society Conference held in Cambridge.

Categories: Brontë Society, Jane Eyre, Haworth, Movies-DVD-TV, References, Wuthering Heights

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Last newsround of 2007

You might have seen on our sidebar that a new biography of Arthur Bell Nicholls is scheduled to appear around April 2008. It is written by a family descendant, Alan H. Adamson, as was announced over a year ago by Christine Alexander. Today, Salamander Hill Design posts what could be the definitive cover for this biography and, we must say, it looks really good to us. We like the accompanying description of Arthur Bell Nicholls too:

Few people seeking to avoid the glare of publicity have had more of it turned on them than Arthur Bell Nicholls. (Picture source)

Oh, absolutely! And very bad publicity at that too.

Speaking of descriptions. The BBC News alphabet of the political year includes Prime Minister Gordon Brown as Mrs Rochester of course.

Rochester (Mrs) - Labour MP Frank Field cast doubt on the then chancellor's suitability for the top job, when he said: "Allowing Gordon Brown into No 10 would be like letting Mrs Rochester out of the attic." For those of a literary bent, Mrs Rochester is the loft-bound madwoman in the Charlotte Bronte novel Jane Eyre who goes on to burn down the house, killing herself and blinding her husband. Ouch, Frank.

The Chicago Tribune has an obituary on philanthropist Rhoda Pritzker who belonged to one of Chicago's wealthiest families and died on December 23 at 93. She seems to have been a Brontëite.

Mrs. Pritzker was also famous among her relatives and friends for taking in stray animals.
In 1983, in an interview with the Tribune, Mrs. Pritzker said her terrier, Emily Bronte, and three cats, Lucky, Heidi and Kitty, gave her a sense of peace."
I come home at night, and it's very nice to see eight happy eyes," she said. "They really don't care what you have in a material sense." (Sara Olkon)

The Brontës would have been delighted to have such a fan, of course.

Jane Eyre 2006 is still very successful on the blogosphere. Two Swedish blogs talk about it, given that the first part was broadcast in Sweden only yesterday: Nina Blogg (who also talks about previous adaptations of the novel) and En Boktoks Tankar. Journeys into Submission also comments the original novel, but beware of adult content on that website.

On another note, Cogito Cogito Ergo Sum looks at the similarities between Jane Eyre and Maria Von Trapp from The Sound of Music. This half of BrontëBlog has indeed pondered about this complex similarity in the past too. We say complex because Maria Von Trapp as depicted in the movie is not totally accurate to the real-life Maria but of course is highly similar. Although the similarities with the entirely fictional Jane are sometimes remarkable, we don't think they are there on purpose, although comparison is all too tempting.

Categories: Biography, Books, Brontëites, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, Weirdo

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Eliot and Lewes over Jane

More news outlets publish obituaries of Robert Barnard: Keighley News and The Telegraph:

Barnard’s hero Perry Trethowan returned in The Missing Brontë (1983), a reflection of Barnard’s fascination with Emily Brontë, a biography of whom he published in 2000. (...)
Barnard was chairman of the Brontë Society between 1996 and 1999, and again from 2002.

The Halifax Reader (Canada) also posts an obituary.

Margaret Watson gives a detailed synopsis of her talk at the first North Kirklees Literary Festival in The Dewsbury Reporter, The Reporter and Editor Mr WW Yates:

On Saturday I was speaking at a literary festival in Red House Gomersal, where a great deal of history surrounding the Brontë family is stored.
Visitors were eager to know what this area was like in the early 1800s when Patrick Brontë first came here to become curate of Dewsbury Parish Church.
I was pleased to tell them that much of what had been written about Patrick’s stay here had come from the pen of a local journalist, William W Yates.
Willliam was editor of the Reporter for 36 years and in 1897 published a book about Patrick’s life entitled The Father of the Brontës.
The book had been painstakingly researched by William over a period of 20 years and he had interviewed people who had known the Brontës while living in this district.
The book contains not only details of Patrick’s stay in Dewsbury but also details of what Dewsbury was like when he arrived here in 1809. (Read More) 

Robert Crampton tries hard to be funny and unprejudiced on his column in The Times, but we are afraid it feels only just a bit stupid:

Jane Eyre I have read. All of it. I can't remember a word.

The New Jersey Star-Ledger reviews the theatre production A Most Dangerous Woman by Cathy Tempelsman and reveals a crucial scene of the play which features Jane Eyre:

Crucial to the performance is [Geroge] Eliot’s chemistry with [G. H.] Lewes, whose failed open marriage and reputation as a womanizer made him an outcast. Ames Adamson portrays him engagingly, so that he comes across as sensitive and with a lust for life, but far from flawlessly heroic.
Particularly charming is the couple’s first onstage meeting, in which they go tête-à-tête over "Jane Eyre" and end up enacting a fake "women’s novel" in which, as Eliot describes it, ladies weep their sorrows into embroidered handkerchiefs and faint on the finest upholstery. (Ronni Reich)

Flavorwire lists some of the most bizarre literary myths and conspiracty theories. Number one is:

Branwell Brontë, not Emily Brontë, wrote Wuthering Heights
So Branwell goes out drinking with his friends one evening, has a few pints (or whatever they drank in Victorian England), and read parts of his novel in progress to them. Later on, when his sister Emily’s book became well known, those drinking buddies swore they recognized parts of it as the novel their pal had read to them. (Jason Diamond)

The New Zealand Herald discusses the new Bond novel by William Boyd and, of course, if you want to give credibility to literary spinoffs you should mention Wide Sargasso Sea:

And literary continuation is nothing new either. Perhaps the finest example - a novel arguably as good as, if not in some ways better than, the original - is Jean Rhys' 1966 Wide Sargasso Sea.
Inspired by Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, this was the story of the first Mrs Rochester, set in the Caribbean; an extraordinarily powerful work of alienation, delirium and insanity. (Sinclair McKay)

The Yorkshire Post publishes a list of Yorkshire's Hot 100 and remembers how

Anyone who has studied the Bronte sisters’ novels will know that Yorkshire has deep-rooted links with the arts.

Delia Ephron writes on MacLean's about her biographical book Sister Mother Husband Dog (etc):

Nora wasn’t the only Ephron in Delia’s life who demanded secrecy. Her mother, Phoebe, a Hollywood screenwriter, told Delia, “I hope you never write about what happens here.” Her mother was referring to the late-night drunken brawls with her husband. Delia shared a bedroom wall with her mother, whose demented ramblings sounded like the lunatic wife in Jane Eyre except she wasn’t in the attic.

The infamous words of David Gilmour (not the Pink Floyd one) are discussed by The Huffington Post which lists other heterosexual writers who were not afraid to love women writers:

Henry Miller not only had a literary friendship with Anais Nin, an erotica writer who he occasionally collaborated with in and outside the bedroom, but he also listed Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights as one of his must read books. (Beulah Maud Devaney)

Another article in the Canadian edition of the Huffington Post also reacts to Gilmour's words with a list of favourite women writers which includes Charlotte Brontë.

The Globe and Mail reviews Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries:

The books of similar length and scope (Brothers Karamazov, Moby-Dick and, among contemporary examples, Roberto Bolaño’s 2666) and works of Victorian literature (the Brontës, in particular) that have most deeply infiltrated my thinking are often flawed and raw, with raggedy edges that excite the imagination. Scenes from these novels reside alongside my own memories, and I recall their characters as I might old friends – or enemies. (Pasha Malla)

The followers of TV series like Homeland will be amused by this comment on Frontpage Magazine:

In the name of charity, perhaps the appalling ignorance about Islam in Washington, DC, is more real than feigned. Yesterday, Fox News Channel's Bill Hemmer interviewed former CIA and FBI analyst Philip Mudd on "America's Newsroom" about Islamic terrorism in relation to the Nairobi attacks. Mudd stated categorically that "public opinion in the Muslim world does not support terrorism and jihad." Really? Perhaps Mr. Mudd should stick to deconstructing Jane Eyre (he has a BA and MA in English literature) and leave the analysis of the Islamic world to those of us with more relevant, and frankly better, training. (Timothy Furnish) 

This columnist of the Leesburg Daily Commercial remembers how

Unlike some of my peers I was delighted in High School when we were introduced to authors like Shakespeare, Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Pearl Buck, Edgar Allen Poe. I did my book reports and my sister’s and my cousin’s book reports as well because I liked to do them. (Nina Gilfert)

Both the Daily Mail and the Daily Beast share their highlight from Isabel Marant's catwalk at the Paris Fashion Week: Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights:

The Isabel Marant show got off to a jumpy start today, when the soundtrack literally jumped -- right at the crescendo of Kate Bush’s "Wuthering Heights" (That song is such a winner with the fashion pack that we all let out a collective sigh when it cut out). (Alice Cavanagh)

Bang Style reviews the new album by Pretty Girls Make Graves, The New Romance:

“Something Bigger, Something Brighter” works as a piece of Gothic fiction, mirroring the darkest images found in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. (Danny De Maio)

24Sata (Croatia) brings up the therapeutic power of novels:

Romani mijenjaju životnu perspektivu, tvrde znanstvenici sa Sveučilišta York. Pogled na svijet očima Jane Eyre britanske spisateljice Charlotte Brontë može vam pomoći da poboljšate obiteljske odnose, dodaju stručnjaci. Čitanje je i svojevrsna psihoterapija jer smanjuje stres učinkovitije od glazbe i videoigara, tvrde britanski istraživači. (Sanja Rapaić) (Translation)

Augmented Reality in a Brontë novel. It's just a question of time. The journalist of Svenska Dagbladet (Sweden) is surprised:

På årets Bokmässa tycks motsättningen mellan det digitala och det analoga, eller om det är ett gemensamt famlande, ställd på sin spets. I en sektion som kallas Molnet finner jag ett seminarium som syftar till ”förhöjd verklighet”: glasögon som kan förvandla papper, video som inkarneras med ögonen. Här vandrar det också unga män, klädda som om de flytt ur en Brontë-roman, och delar ut lappar som visar sig leda till ett ytterst modernt videoverktyg. (Translation)

A new (paranormal/historical romance) author, Harper E. Brooks is a Brontëite according to The Sandpaper;  The Prose of the Powerless shares a Jane Eyre paper by Kaylie Hayter; Picture Me Reading posts a music set list for Jane Eyre; two Celebrate Musicals Week posts devoted to Gordon & Caird's Jane Eyre. The Musical on Regency Delights and Yet Another Period Drama Blog; Covered in Flour has a nice post about Little Miss Brontë's Jane Eyre; grande_caps posts a bunch of new caps from the webseries The Autobiography of Jane Eyre.

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Happy 2008!

The BrontëBlog Team would like to wish everyone a very happy new year!

Only in the Brontë field we can almost guarantee that it's going to be a good year. Take a gaze into the crystal ball with us:

Let's first direct our glances to the centre of the Brontë universe: the Brontë Parsonage Museum will reopen in February after its usual closed period displaying the most recent acquisitions (such as these items) and we have heard rumours that Emily's presence will be very strong in her former home too, since 2008 marks the 160th anniversary of her death.

As for books, it looks like we'll have a handful of new and exciting releases. To name just a few in chronological order: Justine Picardie's awaited new book, Daphne, is coming out around February/March and it will explore Daphne du Maurier's work on Branwell's biography, as the Guardian reminded us only a few days ago (but last year already!). Around that time too, in March, Laura Joh Rowland's new novel, The Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë, will be published. By April we hope to see the definitive (or as definitive as these things get) biography of Patrick Brontë in print, as told by Dudley Green, whose knowledge of the Brontë father is very well founded after compiling and editing his letters a couple of years ago. Scheduled for the same date (though perhaps subject to change) is yet another biography of a key man in Brontë history: Arthur Bell Nicholls's story will be told by a family descendant, Alan H. Adamson, and whose possible cover we have only just discovered today. On a more lighthearted, though equally serious, note, Classical Comics is expected to release their Jane Eyre with artwork by John M. Burns and adapted by Amy Corzine around May. These are, of course, just a few. Stay tuned to BrontëBlog and you'll see how many more are released, both directly and tangentially Brontë-related.

The Brontës will be present in other formats as well. A new stage adaptation of Jane Eyre by N.G. McClernan will open in New York on February 14. And the successful adaptation of Jane Eyre which went on stage at the Guthrie Theatre will reopen again on March 8. On April, BBC4 will broadcast Judith Adams's Monsieur, I Believe I Have Genius.

And there are a few things that might or might not see the light in 2008. Will the re-think of Caird and Gordon's Jane Eyre The Musical go on stage before the end of the year? We certainly hope so, for we are rather curious. Will there be a new musical by Norman and Simon named Heathcliff? Will we hear the Wuthering Heights music project, Cime Tempestose in its Italian version, by Fabio Zuffanti? Will the Canadian playwright Vern Thiessen give birth to his own take on Wuthering Heights (Somewhere at Vimy)? And Sean Cannon's theatre play on the Brontë Irish origins? Will the ITV broadcast a brand new version of Emily Brontë's only novel? Or will the French channel FR3 do so instead? Will we watch the hard-to-imagine Brontë sitcom? Will we read Sheila Kohler's Brontë-inspired book? And Syrie James's? Siân Griffiths's novel Borrowed Horses? What about the always-to-be-done Brontë movie? Will it at least start actually shooting in 2008? Which will be the cast? Will Shirley make it onto the silver screen? And The Brontë Project? And ...?

At the end of these twelve months we will have all the answers and, we are sure, more questions regarding other future projects. In the meantime, we hope, we will have enjoyed a very Brontë year.

Categories: Biography, Books, Brontë Parsonage Museum, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, Music, Shirley, Theatre,Wuthering Heights

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Arthur Bell Nicholls returns to the Parsonage

An alert from the Brontë Parsonage Museum. In some days, next Saturday December 2 exactly, it will be the centenary of the death of Arthur Bell Nichols:

Arthur Bell Nicholls - A Reassessment:

Talk to commemorate the anniversary of Arthur Bell Nicholls’ death, by Stephen Whitehead of the Brontë Parsonage Museum and author of The Brontës’ Haworth

West Lane Baptist Chapel - 2.00pm - £2.50 - For further information contact Audience Development Manager, 01535 640194/ andrew.mccarthy@bronte.org.uk

More information about The Brontës' Haworth on this old post of ours.

We can only hope that this reassessment will be positive. As many men in the Brontës story, Arthur Bell Nicholls has been maligned over the years. Arthur Bell Nicholls was just a man of his time. Whatever his proceedings, we must bear in mind that he belonged to a different time and - especially - that everything he did - however unjust and narrow-minded we may find it today - was done out of love for Charlotte Brontë. Wrongly or rightly so is a wholly different matter, but the man deserves all the credit for his good intentions. Of course we know he would frown upon the idea of such a thing as BrontëBlog :P

Apart from this reassessment, a few years ago Margaret and Robert Cochrane published a biography on him called My Dear Boy and some time next year it is to be expected that Christine Alexander will publish her new book Mr Charlotte Brontë: The Life of Arthur Bell Nicholls (*). Little by little, the Brontë men are regaining their true selves.

The picture is just a low resolution copy. But you can read the original 1906 article on Meredith Birmingham's The Brontë Family website, where a high resolution scan can be found.

EDIT:
(*) Our mistake. Mr. Charlotte Brontë: The Life of Arthur Bell Nichols it's not written by Christine Alexander but by Alan H. Adamson (great-grand-nephew of Arthur Bell Nicholls himself) next year (that is, in 2007) by McGill/Queen's University Press.


Categories: Alert, Talks, Brontëana

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Kick Ass Heroine

The Telegraph & Argus talks about the acclaimed current Parsonage exhibition, The Silent Wild:

Late June at the Parsonage saw the installation, preview and opening of The Silent Wild, the latest addition to our successful Contemporary Arts programme.
Yorkshire-based artist and curator Diane Howse has collaborated with a team of creatives to produce a unique and thought-provoking artistic response to lives and legacies of the Brontë family, and we’re thrilled that it’s now in place.
The exhibition examines how the silent processes of reading and writing – conjuring the silent shapes of the written word on a page – have the power to conjure whole worlds of sound, noise and commotion, which echo down the years. (Read more) (David Knights)

The Haworth Parish Church has to postpone the building work closure as we read in Keighley News:

Haworth Parish Church this week announced its three-month closure – originally intended to take place from this summer onwards – will not happen until next spring.
It had been hoped all the arrangements to complete the repair and refurbishment of the north-facing roofs would be in place in time for the church to be closed from this month until September.
However, custodians of the Main Street building confirmed a number of factors have led to the programme needing to be put back until next year.
Following a series of discussions with funding agencies, contractors and the church’s architects, Haworth Parochial Church Council has taken the decision to instead complete the rebuilding works from April to June 2016.
The Rev Peter Mayo-Smith, rector at Haworth Parish Church, said: “It has been unfortunate we couldn’t undertake the repair work this year.
"In the end, it was not going to be practically possible to complete the work before the worst of the winter weather arrived. (Miran Rahman)

Marie Claire lists 'kick ass' heroines, including Jane Eyre:

At first glance you might not think of mousy Miss Eyre as a ‘kick ass’ heroine, but look again. This fiercely independent young woman stands her corner, values herself and ultimately, gets her man, but only when she knows that she is his financial, intellectual, and emotional equal. What makes me love Charlotte Brontë’s most compelling character is this quote: “I can live alone if self-respect and circumstance require me so to do. I do not need to sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld or offered only at price I cannot afford to give.” If that’s not a 'kick ass' attitude, albeit wrapped in sturdy Victorian prose, then I’m... (Kate Griffin)

On the other hand The Hindustan Times puts together 'forgotten literary classics for a rainy day':

Every book lover knows their Brontë sisters, or do they?
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë is practically on the ‘must read’ list of any bookworm while Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights is the novel that readers usually begin their literary journey with.
Anne Brontë, the lesser known of the Bronte sisters, failed to get the recognition that is enjoyed by Charlotte and Emily. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall thus qualifies not only as a forgotten classic but also a literary work by a ‘forgotten’ author.
The novel, when released under the pseudonym ‘Acton Bell’ in 1948, was actually an instant success which was followed by a drop in its sales after its author’s demise.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall holds the distinction of being one of the very first works of feminist fiction and follows a unique narrative pattern (okay, no spoilers) which is sure to make you wish for more rainy days ahead. (Simar Bhasin)

Do you remember the case of the missing staircase which was finally located in Long Island (with the ghost of Anne Brontë included)? Well, it is now on the market. Keighley News also reports more properties on the market as this shop in Main Street, Haworth.

One-hit literary wonders in The Irish Examiner:

Although now considered a literary success, this wasn’t always the case. Upon its release in 1847, the novel was criticised as being depressing and morose — those who studied it for the Leaving or Junior Cert might well agree.
Part of literature’s first family including sisters Ann(scic) and Charlotte, Emily also wrote poetry but Wuthering Heights would be her only published novel, lucky for Kate Bush fans that she at least got around to producing one. (Brian Moss and Lorraine Murphy)

Virginia Blackburn on not having children in The Daily Express:

It is often commented on that our greatest female authors – Jane Austen, George Eliot and the various Brontës among them – never reproduced yet it didn’t stop them creating a few masterpieces.
Why shouldn’t that apply to politics too? Even in these so-called enlightened times women are judged on whether they have pair bonded and reproduced and for a would-be prime minister, Labour at that, to indulge in this is disgraceful.

Midland Reporter-Telegram describes like this the recent Wuthering High 2015:

Teenage soap opera in the fashion of the classic “Wuthering Heights” shows an update wasn’t necessary. (Nancy Adamson)

Le Croix (France) reviews Journal (1987-2012) by Michel Chaillou

Pour cette recherche incessante, exigeante, source pour lui de solitude, il plonge dans les textes de Montaigne, de Sterne, de Diderot, des sœurs Brontë, les mémorialistes du XVIIe siècle, les récits de marins du XVIIIe siècle. (Francine de Martinoir) (Translation)

ABC (Spain) covers the Paris Fashion Week and the Maison Margiela show in particular:

Al comienzo del desfile, presidió un estilo siniestro y minimalista, herencia evidente del fundador ya retirado, Martin Margiela: era una sucesión de vestidos negros pensados para una Jane Eyre del siglo XXI, austera y monacal. (María Luisa Funes) (Translation)

Saarbrücker Zeitung (Germany) reviews Kate Beaton's Hark! A Vagrant!; Marjolein Reads reviews Re Jane by Patricia Park.

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Patrick Brontë: Father of Genius - A Review

Our thanks to The History Press Ltd for sending us a review copy of this book.

Patrick Brontë: Father of Genius
by Dudley Green
£16.00
Publication Date : 01 Apr 08
Imprint : The History Press Ltd
Binding :Hardback
Page :284 pages
ISBN-13: 978-1845886257

As we have written before, the Brontë men have been considerably maligned and mistreated in this century and a half of Brontëana. Branwell, the black sheep of the family, was from the very beginning vindicated by his friends (Grundy, Leyland...)⁽¹⁾ and more recently by biographers such as Winifred Gérin or Daphne du Maurier. Arthur Bell Nicholls, the oppressor husband, is a more marginal figure associated with Charlotte Brontë's final years but has also received some rehabilitation from recent biographers⁽²⁾.

But if a Brontë figure has been misunderstood and ill-treated from the very beginning then that is Patrick Brontë. It is well known how Gaskell's The Life of Charlotte Brontë which did so much to rehabilitate the author of Jane Eyre in the Victorian eyes, did so much more to convert Patrick Brontë in a tyrant, irritable and eccentric creature. The effects of such a description can be traced even to our days. It's frequent to see how from time to time a book, an article, a newly-discovered letter serve as excuses to once again vindicate the real figure behind the grotesque Gaskell mask. One of those moments was forty years ago when the pioneering work of Lock & Dixon: A Man of Sorrow: The Life, Letters and Times of the Rev Patrick Brontë was published. That was a huge landmark and an enormous step forward in the knowledge of Patrick Brontë. Another was the 2005 publication of The Letters of Patrick Brontë by Dudley Green who now publishes this new biography which integrates all the new documents and evidence which have been brought to light in the last few decades.

Dudley Green's ambition is clearly stated in the preface of the book:

It has been my aim to present a fair and accurate account of Patrick's life and ministry, based on the considerable documentary evidence which is available. I hope that the picture here presented reveals a kindly and loving father who took a keen interest in his children's development and an able and faithful clergyman who was ever sensitive to the pastoral needs of his parishioners.

In order to do so, Mr Green relies basically on Patrick Brontë's own words. It is through direct quotation from his letters (and from the letters of other members of the family and friends) that this biography usually progresses. When the records are scarce or unavailable, Mr Green tries to base his statements on first-hand sources and avoid speculation. An example of this approach can be seen in the first chapters devoted to Patrick's Irish. Other biographers (Lock & Dixon, for instance) relied almost entirely on the controversial account by William Wright in The Brontës in Ireland which Dudley Green, as others before, considers altogether questionable and hardly reliable. Consequently, his account of these years is less detailed and meticulous than Lock & Dixon's⁽³⁾ but what is lost in the description of the legend is gained in credibility.

The book tries to maintain a balance between the more familiar aspects of any Brontë biography and Patrick's Church of England ministry over 55 years, 41 of them serving as incumbent of Haworth. Therefore the biography is divided into two first parts covering the biographical events from 1777 until 1846, before Branwell's death. The third part: A Varied Ministry devotes several chapters to Patrick's varied personal interests and ecclesiastical campaigns: his literary efforts, his continuous quarrels with the Haworth Dissenters because of the Church rates, his fight for the establishment of a National School and the improvement of the water facilities in Haworth. What this structure allows - without stopping a particular chapter - is for events which expand over several decades to be developed more in depth but it inevitably causes repetitions and reexpositions of quotes or events previously explored⁽⁴⁾.

A final section covers the events from 1847 until his death in 1861. The death of his children, Charlotte Brontë's literary career (and Patrick's pride for it), the problems with his curate Arthur Bell Nicholls over the wedding with his daughter, Charlotte's death, the comission and development of Gaskell's biography of Charlotte and his final years.

This last section reveals that Patrick Brontë's condescension with Elizabeth Gaskell's portrait of himself probably is one of the reasons why Patrick's distorted image still perdurates:

"I have no objection, whatever to your representing me as a little excentric [sic], since you, and other learned friends will have it so; only dont [sic] set me on, in my fury to burning heathrughs, sawing the backs off chairs, and tearing my wifes [sic]..." (Patrick Brontë to Elizabeth Gaskell, 30 July 1856)

He only complained bitterly and vehemently about his alleged denial of meat for his children at the Parsonage⁽⁵⁾.

The book is enhanced by several appendices including an account (based on a previous paper by Ann Dinsdale) of the dismissed nurse from the Parsonage whowould go on to be the source of many, if not all, of the misconceptions about Patrick so eagerly relayed by Elizabeth Gaskell, a chronology, the list of Patrick's curates, a couple of new letters⁽⁶⁾ discovered after his edition of Patrick's letters, extracts from Gaskell's Life, etc⁽⁷⁾...

Dudley Green's portrait of Patrick Brontë shows once more (and for all?) that Patrick was no bigot⁽⁸⁾ but a man firm in his beliefs, not always diplomatic and sometimes a little too impulsive. A loving father who encouraged his children in their endeavours, who was proud of their triumphs and sympathetic in their failures. A fighting clergyman, always at his post, indefatigable in the many battles of his ministry at Haworth.

It can be argued that Patrick's life and virtues are not so different from many other contemporary clergymen and with all certainty without the literary efforts of his daughters, his life would just have been a footnote in a clerical directory. But the fact is that he was the father of the Brontës and a key figure in their world. As we have also said before: Sometimes the boundaries of history are as definitory of an era as the Big History of great men/women and Big Events. And Dudley Green's biography of Patrick Brontë is a shining proof of that.


Notes
(1) Francis Leyland, The Brontë Family (2 volumes) by Francis A. Leyland (1886); Pictures of the past by Francis H. Grundy (1879).
(2) Cochrane, Robert & Margaret, My Dear Boy: The Life of Arthur Bell Nicholls, Highgate Publications 1999; Adamson, Alan H., Mr Charlotte Brontë. The Life of Arthur Bell Nicholls, McGill-Queen's University Press, 2008 (read our review here)
(3) The verbal excesses of Lock & Dixon's book are, happily, not repeated here. In Green's approach there's no room for statements like the following:

Those first days of June 1861, were hot, almost sultry days, and in his bedroom Patrick was murmuring to himself as his mind wandered. What did he see in his imagination as he lay there dying? Was there the preacher galloping along the lanes of Ireland (...)? (Lock & Dixon, A Man of Sorrow, Nelson, 1965, pag 524)

And furthermore we tend to like more the positive title of Green's book: Patrick Brontë, Father of Genius than the more mournful one of Lock & Dixon's.
(4) Some other minor mistakes have to be pointed out. Note 4 in Chapter 8 is missing, a Mr Ramsbottom is rebaptized Mr Robinson in page 157 and figures 33 and 34 are, as a matter of fact, the same figure. The Illustrations are frankly disappointing, not including practically anything not seen ad nauseam in other recent biographies. Lock & Dixon's list of plates were much more exciting.
(5) A fact that is clearly contradicted by Emily and Anne Brontë's diary paper of 24 November 1834: “We are going to have for Dinner Boiled Beef, Turnips, potato’s and applepudding.”
(6) One of them, Patrick Brontë to Bishop of Ripon, 10 April 1855, was first published complete on BrontëBlog and can be read here.
(7) The book also contains a Foreword by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Curiously, Lock & Dixon's biography also features a Foreword by the Archbishop of York. It seems that if you don't have an archbishop you cannot publish a biography of Patrick Brontë.
(8) Some examples quoted by Green: In April 1826, he had to appoint a new parish clerk. Two candidates applied for the position. Considering that those were times of need, Patrick gave the position to the both of them in alternating months. How he didn't hesitate to hire Eliza Brown, sister of Martha Brown, even knowing that she had been a natural mother. Or how he aligned with the Haworth wool-combers in strike in 1846 in spite of his strong and unbending Tory convictions...

Categories: Biography, Patrick Brontë, Review

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Never a false step in Wise Children's Wuthering Heights

We have several reviews of Wise Children's Wuthering Heights today. The Times gives it 5 stars:

Published in 1847, the year before she died, and set on the Brontë siblings’ beloved Yorkshire moors, the novel is commonly read in adolescence, when one’s sensibilities may be particularly susceptible to its intoxicating highs and lows.

The director Emma Rice
did just that, and Brontë’s book left a lasting mark on her. The latest production by her company Wise Children is her adaptation of it, and it’s a corker — superbly cast, delivered with gusto and evincing the kind of rough-hewn yet fluid and economical theatrical invention (including live music, dancing, puppetry) that enhances the story’s dark, grim grip and locates pockets of welcome humour within it. Lasting nearly three hours, this intensely absorbing show (a co-production with the Bristol Old Vic, the National Theatre and York Theatre Royal) deepens as it unfolds.

The performance commences with the crack of a whip and a mad cackle that together signal a storm. There is certainly no dearth of tempestuous feelings in the saga that follows as Rice and a 12-strong ensemble trace, with sometimes startling clarity, a legacy of elemental desire and monumental pain spanning two generations. Their take on the haunted bond between Cathy (played by the abrasively charismatic Lucy McCormick as a lifelong wild child) and the foundling Heathcliff (Ash Hunter, whose telling characterisation is like a resolutely unforgiving bruise) works as a compelling and occasionally laugh-out-loud funny romantic melodrama. Yet enjoyable as it is as a knowing period piece, Rice’s astute script and staging are also shot through with thorny, relevant ideas about gender, class and racial divides. [...]

Perhaps Rice’s most inspired decision was to have a handful of actors embody the moor itself. Led with warmth and generosity by Nandi Bhebhe, “The Moor” is chorus and narrator, helping us to keep track of who’s who in Brontë’s convoluted plot and acting for several characters as a sounding board.

And it is Brontë’s characters — abused or abusive, needy and conflicted — who count the most here. Plaudits to Sam Archer (agile and droll), Tama Phethean (brutish then pathetic), Witney White (vibrant) and especially Katy Owen (utterly delightful as Cathy’s hyper-silly sister-in-law and Heathcliff’s mewling male offspring) for making strong impressions in multiple roles. But then everyone involved is reaching for the heights in this emotionally epic entertainment. (Donald Hutera)

Daily Mail gives it 5 stars too.

A giggly, ungodly ragamuffin wanders on to the stage, opens a clothbound book and cracks a whip — expertly — breaking loose a hellish storm.

Once again, director Emma Rice has thrown away all the rulebooks and harnessed the beating heart and slippery soul of Emily Bronte's unwieldy gothic monster, Wuthering Heights, in a wildly imaginative, exhilarating piece of theatre.

Gone is the housekeeper narrator, Nelly. 

Instead an all-singing, all-dancing chorus sounds every note of the novel, raising it into the realms of Greek tragedy and making a magnificent character of the Yorkshire Moors — which stretch from the haunted, forbidding crags of Wuthering Heights to the sunlit pastures of Thrushcross Grange.

Led by Nandi Bhebhe, majestic in a crown of twigs, the Moors howl up a hurricane, warning: 'Be careful what you seed.' 

Lucy McCormick's compelling Catherine dominates the first half, torn between two lovers: the soulmate of Ash Hunter's brooding, untameable Heathcliff but drawn to the softness of pampered, pampering Edgar Linton (Sam Archer).

Words pour out of her until finally, as a Tina Turner-like rock goddess, she sings: 'I am earth, I am sky.'

The story emerges with remarkable clarity. Characters are introduced, their names chalked on slates which become gravestones on their deaths.

Rice finds comedy where there was none: a character arrives in a deerstalker, blown in by the storm, leaning at an acute angle to suggest the hurtling wind.

A skull with ears fixed on the blade of a scythe becomes a hilariously savage puppet hound. 

As Heathcliff's wife, Isabella, Katy Owen flits with elastic daintiness; as her son, she is reborn as the lisping sibling of Just William's Violet Elizabeth Bott.

Inevitably perhaps, with Catherine gone, the intensity slips in the second half, but with young Cathy finding happiness, Rice embraces sunshine and hope.

Just as the books fastened at the ends of bendy sticks conjure the quivering birds on the Moor, so Rice has given glorious dramatic wings to Wuthering Heights. (Patrick Marmion)

The Fix Magazine gives it 4 out of 5 stars.

Her interpretation of Emily Brontë’s novel of love, revenge, class and greed is no exception; this is a relentlessly entertaining piece, delivered with such brio that it easily masters a potentially onerous three hour running time.

The ingenuity of Rice’s presentation is clear from the moment Mr Lockwood, a new tenant at Thrushcross Grange, negotiates a windswept Yorkshire Moor and pays a visit to his landlord Heathcliff (Ash Hunter), who resides at the eponymous stately home. A large screen in the background depicts dark clouds and changing conditions, a live band provide a faultless and unremittingly moody sense of drama, a manoeuvrable set of doors brilliantly, and economically, denote the shifting between locations, and manipulated branches and sound effects nicely evoke the ferocity of the storm. [...]

Elsewhere, McCormick is fantastic as the increasingly unhinged and yearning Catherine. As well as a dynamic singing voice – the second act momentarily turns into a music gig as she belts out some Courtney Love style angsty rock – her manic, heavily kohl-eyed expressions convincingly depict her character’s descent into madness. Also, the live band are a performance highlight; Sid Goldsmith on guitar, Nadine Lane on drums and percussion and Renell Shaw on bass provide a soundtrack – one moment a subtle, simmering backdrop, the next a high-register production number – that never makes a false step. (Scott Hammond)

What'sOnStage is less enthusiastic, giving it 3 out of 5 stars.

It ticks off the classic Rice tropes that those of us who admire her have fallen for, puppetry, gender, and colour-blind casting, songs, some unexpected production choices. Yet it lacks the originality of her best works: the transcendence of A Midsummer Nights Dream, the unexpected chocolatey sweetness of Romantics Anonymous, the sheer love breaking beyond the buttoned-up society of Brief Encounter: here nothing takes you by surprise or throws a different perspective on the piece. Rice may be a victim of her success, doomed if she doesn't vault ever higher poles. For completists, it feels inessential. For those new to her work or wanting to watch a stage production that ticks off every narrative beat, this may read better.

What Rice does do very well is bring the elemental wildness of the novel to the stage. The love story of Heathcliff and Cathy, brought together by erotic force, broken apart by class and society is big on atmosphere and in act one particularly there are moments she is supported in this by Lucy McCormick's Cathy, bringing the wide-eyed edge of her Post Popular character to one of literature's most famous wild children. With her doe-eyes and unruly hair, she brings a sense of innocence and danger to all her stage work, and she plays it up to the hilt here, a girl lost in a world of love and eroticism slightly beyond her comprehension. When she grabs a microphone and wails like a banshee, wind machine throwing her hair back, we see the theatre that Rice at her best can produce. There just aren't enough of that here.

Brontë's novel is a tricky ask for actors, requiring them to age from childhood into middle age and adapt from fire to curdled middle-aged disappointment. Ash Hunter's Heathcliffe is thrilling in the first half, an orphan thrown into a class that he can't quite break into until spurned by love and family he returns a gentleman avenger. However, in the second half, he struggles to show the vulnerability beyond the ice-cold revenge, the man who "cares too much, and yet cares not at all." Whether it's Brontë's writing or the production as a whole, the second half of hauntings and a slight tinge of madness doesn't quite land. (Kris Hallett)

The Stage gives it 4 out of 5 stars:

The production doesn’t overlook the abusive nature of Heathcliff’s relationship with Cathy, persisting even after death with his insistence that she never rest – he essentially forces her to haunt him – but it shies away from the full horror of this, as if a little too susceptible to the romantic power of Emily Brontë’s novel.
Nor can the production fully counteract the novel’s imbalance, the hole that Cathy makes in the narrative after she expires, but it ultimately doesn’t matter. After the theatrical drought of the past year and a half, Rice’s particular brand of theatrical magic is incredibly welcome, like wine after a period of abstinence. (Natasha Tripney)

Offaly Express and other Irish news outlets feature Pauline Clooney's novel Charlotte and Arthur.

What was to become Charlotte and Arthur, the novel, started life as a PhD subject. But - following the guidance of her advisor to ‘get it out before someone else writes the story’, Pauline left the academic programme just before lockdown and turned her attention full-time to the novel. [...]

Pauline, whose mother is from Banagher, noted that the couple’s wedding and Irish honeymoon has received scant attention from biographers.

“We have six letters she wrote from Ireland, so using those six letters, and what Arthur wrote, I put an itinerary together of those trip,” she said.

The book imagines the honeymoon trip from Charlotte’s point of view, to reveal something about who she was. The author also juxtaposed the idea of the honeymooners taking a trip around the country, including Cork and Trinity College in Dublin, with the reality and poverty of post-Famine Ireland.

“They spent nearly a week in Banagher with his relatives,” said Pauline. She says that the work of Alan Adamson, a Canadian academic with links to that family, provided her with invaluable biographical material with which to flesh out the story.

“I dip into a bit of Irish history at the time as they travel around. As Arthur was an alumni of Trinity, they visit Trinity when in Dublin, the Book of Kells and the Long Room feature in teh book. I’m not sure if they went to the Botanic Gardens, but I couldn’t resist a visit.”

Charlotte’s happy marriage was to be cut short by her death from pregnancy complications the spring after her honeymoon.

Arthur cared for the Brontë patriarch, Patrick, after her passing - her three siblings had predeceased her - but returned to Offaly after Patrick’s death, when he didn’t get the Haworth Parsonage incumbency he had expected.

He married his cousin Mary-Anna - ‘she always had a romantic fondness for Arthur’, believes Pauline - and lived out his days as a small farmer in Banagher, even while the Brontës’ reputations grew in the years after their deaths.

“The sadness of it is that he’s not buried with Charlotte, he’s buried with Mary-Anna in the churchyard of St Paul’s in Banagher,” said Pauline.

The Portlaoise native describes her novel as ‘a real labour of love’. “In one sense, there’s a relief as well that I’ve done it and it’s out there now and I should really move on,” she said.

Pauline says the reception from friends and fans, particularly in Newbridge and Portlaoise, has been extremely supportive.

“I’m also getting some nice responses from people who are Brontë enthusiasts. One of the first reviews said that it is addressing a gap in their story which has never been fictionalised before, and barely documented.” (Laura Coates)

The Times reviews The Life of the Mind by Christine Smallwood.

(When Dorothy hears people singing Wuthering Heights at a karaoke night, “it sounded like feral cats being raped — in a fun way”.). (John Self)

The Concord Insider reviews Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno Garcia.

This book embodies the strongest gothic characteristics usually seen in works from the likes of Emily Brontë, Bram Stoker, and Shirley Jackson. Garcia Moreno gives a fresh take to the genre by imbuing the story with additional unsettling evils not rooted in the supernatural: racism, classism, and the ghosts of colonialism. 

The New York Times looks back on the birth of The New York Times Book Review in 1851 recalling the time when

The second half of the 19th century was filled with riches: [...]

“Villette,” by Charlotte Brontë, was hailed as “a first class work.” (Tina Jordan)

The Telegraph and Argus reports that the Brontë Parsonage will look purple at night for a week for a good cause.

The Rotary Club of Haworth & Worth Valley has teamed up with Haworth Parish Church and the Brontë Parsonage Museum to throw a special light on Haworth during World Polio Day this Sunday.

The Rotarians have gained permission from their partners to bathe both the Church and the world-famous home of the Brontës in the campaign’s colour of purple during every evening for a week when their floodlights are switched on after World Polio Day.

When Rotary and its partners launched the Global Polio Eradication Initiative in 1988, there were 350,000 cases of polio in 125 countries every year.

Great progress against the disease has been achieved since then. Today, polio cases have been reduced by 99.9 per cent, and just two countries continue to report cases of wild poliovirus: Afghanistan and Pakistan. And Rotarians worldwide remain committed to the end.

Ian Park, the Immediate Past President of the Rotary Club of Haworth & Worth Valley, said: “Up until July there were just two cases of wild poliovirus reported in the world, one each in Pakistan and Afghanistan which is amazing given the political situation in that part of the world.

“We want to play our part in raising awareness of the continuing campaign to eliminate this awful disease and we’re grateful to Haworth Church and the Parsonage Museum for their help.” (Mark Stanford)

The Carmen Mola affair in Spanish literature continues being discussed and the Brontës mentioned as writers who hid behind pseudonyms in newspapers such as Financial Times and El sol de México.

Finally, news from the Brontë Society fundraising campaign towards securing the Honresfeld collection:

Our #JustGiving campaign to #SaveTheHonresfieldLibrary is almost half way there, thank you so much. If you can help us cross the finishing line, you can do so here: https://t.co/XJeonvIWFV Thank you all for your support.

— Brontë Parsonage (@BronteParsonage) October 21, 2021

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