Today, September 26, the Birmingham Repertory Theatre premieres a new adaptation of Wuthering Heights written by April De Angelis:Birmingham Repertory Theatre Company presentsMore information on the
Wuthering Heights
Fri 26 Sep 2008 – Sat 18 Oct 2008
By Emily Bronte, Adapted by April De Angelis
Tickets £10 to £32, concessions available
A brand new adaptation brings Emily Bronte’s passionate and spellbinding tale of forbidden love and revenge to life on stage.
Set on the wild, windswept Yorkshire moors, Wuthering Heights is the tempestuous story of free-spirited Catherine and dark, brooding Heathcliff. As children running wild and free on the moors, Cathy and Heathcliff are inseparable.
As they grow up their affection deepens into a passionate love, but Cathy lets her head rule her heart as she chooses to marry the wealthy Edgar Linton.
Heathcliff flees broken-hearted only to return seeking terrible vengeance on those he holds responsible, with epic and tragic results.
April De Angelis is one of the UK’s most innovative dramatists. Her plays have included A Laughing Matter at the National Theatre, Hush at the Royal Court and The Warwickshire Testimony for the RSC.
Cast:
* Servant: Martin Allanson
* Heathcliff: Antony Byrne
* Lockwood: Simon Coates
* Edgar/Linton: Toby Dantzic
* Hindley/Hareton: Edmund Kingsley
* Isabella: Emma Noakes
* Cathy: Amanda Ryan
* Joseph/Old Mr Linton: David Whitworth
* Frances: Victoria Yeates
* Nelly Dean: Susannah York
Crew:
- Director: Indhu Rubasingham
- Designer: Mike Britton
- Lighting Designer: Chris Davey
- Sound Designer: Matt McKenzie
- Choreographer: Imogen Knight
- Associate Director: Neale Birch
- Fight Director: Bret Yount
- Dialect Coach: Neil Swain
- Composer: Paul Englishby
Birmingham Repertory Theatre website, including a promo clip. Metro presents the production like this:On paper, it looks like the grudge match of the century: April De Angelis, a bold feminist playwright, up against one of literature's most unpleasantly misogynist cads. Thanks largely to Laurence Olivier's 1939 screen portrayal, Heathcliff's uglier side has been airbrushed to the point that he's now regarded as the ultimate brooding catch.Picture: Susannah York and Simon Coates, ©Manuel Harlan, Source
De Angelis, a writer best known for Playhouse Creatures, her play about Restoration-era actresses, certainly won't be downplaying Heathcliff's capacity for brutality in her adaptation for Birmingham Rep. 'It's a very violent book,' she states. 'When you see Heathcliff beating Cathy to the floor there on the stage, it has a kick that you don't get from reading it.'
De Angelis's main beef, however, is with the fictional narrator, Nelly Dean. 'I don't think Heathcliff is the book's biggest sinner. Nelly, to me, seems far worse. She's the most repressive, the one who condemns Cathy more than anybody. I was really struck by just how destructive she is. What Heathcliff does seems a natural reaction to being made to feel an outcast since childhood. But what's Nelly's excuse?'
De Angelis's focus on Nelly is reflected not only by a truly head-turning piece of casting - she's being played by Susannah York - but also by the choices she's made in the retelling.
'The novel's been described as having a Chinese boxes structure, with lots of stories-within-stories, which I've found useful for structuring the play. But I was struck by how duplicitous Nelly is. As it became clearer that she's an unreliable narrator, I realised I needed to emphasise her role in the story.' (Jim Burke)
Keighley News talks about the Sew Near – Sew Far public art landscape exhibition at the Haworth moors:New public artworks are on display along the Brontë Way as part of the Brontë Parsonage Museum’s celebration of the bicentenaries of the Brontës’ births.La Voz de Almería talks about the Mujeres de fábula book+exhibition:
"Sew Near – Sew Far", a collaboration between textile artist Lynn Setterington and the parsonage, features large-scale artwork at three sites on the Brontë Way, near the Brontë Bridge and Waterfall, each celebrating the famous signatures of the sisters.
The works spell out the names Currer Bell, Ellis Bell and Acton Bell, the pseudonyms respectively used by Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë to disguise the fact they were women.
Lynn said: “I’ve been working with local people to develop the artworks and have invited them to add their own signatures to the piece. We’re also creating a film documenting the process, which will be shown later in the year."
On display from Saturday, (September 30) to October 14, Sew Near – Sew Far forms part of Brontë200, a five-year programme from Brontë Parsonage Museum celebrating the bicentenaries of the births of Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne Brontë.
Parsonage arts officer Lauren Livesey said: “While we have a long-standing reputation of working with leading artists, this project with Lynn is a first for us as we take the exhibition out of the museum and into the landscape that was so important to the Brontës." (David Knights)
“Un homenaje al arte como forma de vida, como fuente del pensamiento crítico”. De este modo define la escritora y colaboradora de LA VOZ Mar de los Ríos su último proyecto, ‘Mujeres de fábula’. Un libro, una exposición de ilustraciones y un cortometraje que, tras presentarse este verano en las IV Jornadas ‘Carboneras Literaria’, se adueñan hasta el 17 de octubre del Espacio de Mujeres de Diputación, en la Plaza Marín de la capital.Hyperallergic reviews the film Mother!
La artífice de la propuesta la da a conocer al público hoy martes día 3 a las 20 horas en un encuentro en el que estará acompañada por su hija Marina Hernández, realizadora del documental ‘La habitación hecha de fábulas’ y una de las diez creadoras que firman las ilustraciones que forman parte de la publicación y de la muestra, que podrá visitarse de 10.30 a 13.30 y de 18 a 20 horas.
‘Mujeres de fábula’ (Playa de Ákaba, 2017) es un libro sobre libros. Libros que han llenado la vida de Mar de los Ríos, que en sus 180 páginas brinda un triple homenaje: a las novelas, a sus protagonistas y a las escritoras que las idearon. Los títulos en los que la autora se mete de lleno -y con ella su protagonista, Rita- son ‘Mujercitas’ de Louisa May Alcott, ‘Mathilda’ de Mary Shelley, ‘Cumbres borrascosas’ de Emily Brontë, ‘La gaviota’ de Fernán Caballero (pseudónimo de Cecilia Böhl), ‘Orgullo y prejuicio’ de Jane Austen, ‘Puñal de claveles’ de la almeriense Carmen de Burgos, ‘La marquesa’ de George Sand (pseudónimo de Amantine Aurore Lucile Dupin), ‘La cabaña del tío Tom’ de Harriet Beecher Stowe, ‘Jane Eyre’ de Charlotte Brontë y ‘Dulce dueño’ de Emilia Pardo Bazán. (Translation)
Jane Eyre it is not: if Mother! could initially read as slow and delicate, dripping with passive-aggression and chilly aloofness between husband and wife, its final third is an epic shitshow to rival Polansky’s Rosemary’s Baby or del Toro’s Crimson Peak. (Eileen G'Sell)Flickering Myth reviews the latest episode of Star Trek: Discovery:
It’s something of a truism – or more accurately, it’s a truism that it’s a truism – that prequels rarely have any dramatic merit because audiences already know what’s going to happen next. Everyone knows Anakin Skywalker will eventually become Darth Vader, so there’s no tension. Everyone knows what happens in Jane Eyre, so why bother with Wide Sargasso Sea? And, of course, everyone knows that Kirk, Picard et al didn’t have this means of instantaneous transportation, so why bother with Star Trek: Discovery? (Alex Moreland)Columbia Metropolitan reviews Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca:
The plot is a familiar one, and it comes as no surprise that Jane Eyre was one of du Maurier’s favorite books. A young girl just out of school falls in love with and marries a wealthy, brooding, older man who has recently lost his beautiful, socialite wife, Rebecca, in a boating accident. (...)The Herald (Zimbabwe) talks about the guinea fowl and proverbs:
Unlike Jane Eyre, the novel contains no momentary hint of the supernatural at any point, yet the titular character –– dead a year before the novel begins –– still lives, breathes, haunts, and controls every page of the plot from start to finish. (Margaret Clay)
We identify with Emily Brontë’s Heathcliff and spit out his venom with him as he menacingly tells Catherine, the woman of his obsession, that if she should cross him she will discover practically that the dead are not annihilated. (David Mungoshi)Awesomegang interviews the writer MJ Gardner:
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?Buka (Bosnia) interviews Camille Paglia who makes a controversial statement:
Wuthering Heights, the Devil in the White City, Publish and Perish, and How to Survive on a Desert Island.
U povijesti umjetnosti, nijedna žena nije značajno utjecala na stilske tokove ili uopće imala ikakvog utjecaja. Uzmimo Emily Brontë, Emily Brontë je u ‘Orkanskim visovima’, zaista nanovo osmislila pojam novele, afirmirala modernističku narativnu strategiju, no nije imala apsolutno nikakvog utjecaja, ‘Visove’ je objavila pod muškim pseudonimom tako da nema ni govora o patrijarhalnoj represiji. Emily Dickinson također, reinventirala poeziju i čitav ritam, nikakav utjecaj. Čitava povijest umjetnosti, žao mi je što to moram reći, jest i ostat će napisana u kapitalnim stilističkim promjenama koje je kreirao muškarac. (Đino Kolega) (Translation)Blasting News (in Spanish) discusses the Harry Potter influences:
Snape en Cumbres Borrascosas24 Heures (Switzerland) interviews the film director Petra Volpe:
El personaje de Severus Snape, que llegó a convertirse en uno de los favoritos de los fans, podría estar basado en Heathcliff de Cumbres Borrascosas. Su aspecto físico es prácticamente idéntico y los dos están enamorados de una mujer ya fallecida, a la que conocieron siendo niños. Además, tienen el mismo carácter. (Amalia María Castellot de Miguel) (Translation)
Pendant longtemps, la jeune fille qu’elle était n’a jamais pensé que le cinéma pouvait devenir une activité professionnelle. Son «échappatoire» préférée, elle la trouvait dans la littérature. «Je volais les livres réservés aux adultes dans la bibliothèque de ma mère. C’était très important de lire. Je me souviens d’un camp de cheval où j’avais été envoyée ado et je détestais les chevaux. Chaque nuit, je lisais Les Hauts de Hurlevent à la lampe torche.» (Boris Senff) (Translation)Mangialibri (in Italian) reviews the book Cenere sulla brughiera (Francesca De Angelis):
Catherine Barret ha quindici anni, è nata nello Yorkshire, si chiama così in onore dell’eroina letteraria protagonista di Cime tempestose. Sua madre Elizabeth le ha trasmesso la passione per i libri. (Cinzia Ciarmatori) (Translation)The Daily Mail reports the problems with the law of Solomon Glave who played young Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights 2011. Social Periodico (Italy) has a brief post on Heathcliff and love. FluentU recommends The Eyre Affair as a funny story in English. Motley reviews Jane Eyre. Książkowir (in Polish) reviews Wuthering Heights. The Sisters's Room (in Italian) posts an article by Maddalena De Leo about the Brontës and the use of corsets.
Three more reviews of the Birmingham's Repertory Theatre production of April de Angelis's adaptation of Wuthering Heights, which is now being performed in Edinburgh. Wuthering Heights is so called, meaning atmospheric tumult. Thus, the scene is set high on the Yorkshire Moors for a story of stormy passions that has endured 160 years.The bad ones:
Joseph Earnshaw returns to his family, with a prize from his travels to China – a young orphan named Heathcliff. His older brother Hindley despises this intrusion, but between Heathcliff and younger stepsister Cathy an intangible bond is formed. As teens they roam together, wild on the moors. However, society abruptly interrupts these carefree days in the shape of the Linton family, and Cathy’s marriage to their son Edgar. Thus begins tumultuous years of lovelorn passion.
For Heathcliff and Cathy, their ardour burns forever bright, but they can never be united. Cathy famously expresses that her childhood companion is “…more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” In their passion, each seeks revenge for their heartbreak, and so the rift deepens. Eventually, Cathy is driven to insanity and starves to death.
For Emily Bronte’s readers this is half the story, but many productions finish at this point. However, the adapter April de Angelis valiantly continues to show the resolution of this turmoil in the next generation.
April de Angelis uses Lockwood (Simon Coates) to unlock Bronte’s complicated narrative. This pompous character interjects humour into this emotionally-heavy play, “God, the North is grim.” as he is expertly retold the sad tale by Nelly the housekeeper (Susannah York).
As the production is touring, the set is simple and clean, with excellent sound effects providing much of the atmosphere. The ten-strong cast play multiple characters, and each gives a worthy performance. The Yorkshire thang and annunciation seem real, and the accent does not detract from the romantic material.
This production is polished and avid watching. However, to give any criticism, Antony Byrne is vibrant, but perhaps a little senior to play the earlier youthful Heathcliff. There was fluidity and connection between the characters of Heathcliff and Cathy; however my heart did not flutter with theirs!
Well worth a visit! (Rebecca Venn in What's on Stage)
Beyond the projections on the tilted sky in the final moments, storm clouds aren't much in evidence in April de Angelis's version of Emily Bronte's bodice-ripper. That is quite a feat considering the self-destructive love affair between Cathy and Heathcliff we're asked to witness and assess. There's something old-fashioned about Indhu Rubasingham's Birmingham Rep production, which has to do with its application of "poor theatre" techniques to a well-resourced venture.
Everyone seems to be acting in inverted commas, which makes for levity, but an absence of throbbing passion. It's hard for anyone to avoid appearing highly-strung when putting flesh on material which, on the page, can leave histrionics to the imagination. But to appear anything other than attention-seekers, there needs to be sexual chemistry between the leads. There's little, alas, in Antony Byrne's Heathcliff for Amanda Ryan's Cathy to get worked up about.
Susannah York is a barometer of restraint as Nelly, who frames the play as its narrator and conscience. Even she, however, is left to hang around doing not very much while Simon Coates's Lockwood all but winks at the audience in preparation for the spoiled brat caricature that is Toby Dantzic's Linton. With the wooden doors of Mike Britton's design opening and closing like some psychological fortress, at best this can be viewed as a pop-up book primer, but with so little depth as to appear flat. (Neil Cooper in The Herald)
The atmosphere takes centre stage in this new adaptation for the stage of Emily Brontë's famous novel, which tours to the King's this week.Finally, the blogosphere has something to say too. On It's On. It's Gone:
So much so that the passion of the book is often lost. Which is doubly ironic in an adaptation that takes great store in being faithful to the key narrative details of its source material.
There is little problem on the storytelling count, however. Susannah York is excellent, if sometimes a just a little hesitant in her delivery, as Nelly Dean, the long-term housekeeper at the lonely Wuthering Heights, situated high up on a north Yorkshire moor.
Against her, Simon Coates plays Lockwood, the self-opinionated gentleman who lodges in the nearby Grange. After meeting his landlord Heathcliff at Wuthering Heights his encounters with its strange inhabitants lead him to demand of Nelly the story of who they are and how they came to be like that.
The two are rarely off stage, wandering in and out of the action. Lockwood nearly always as a detached observer, Nelly as both the narrator of what goes on and often an integral part in it.
It is York's skill that ensures the interweaving nest of stories, covering some 30 years, is coherently told, while the atmospheric lighting of the stage ensures that it is the latter which is brought to mind throughout.
What they have to tell, however, is a lopsided affair.
On one side there is Cathy Earnshaw, the beautiful daughter of the house at Wuthering Heights played with a generous mixture of vitality and malevolence by Amanda Ryan, and there is Edgar Linton, the effete and sickly son of the Grange, played by Toby Dantzic. Both create strong, credible characters.
On the other side is Heathcliff, played by Antony Byrne. A foundling taken in by the Earnshaws, he is supposedly Cathy's soul-mate who is devastated when she decides that because her brother has forced Heathcliff down into too lowly a station in life for marriage, she will marry Edgar.
For the story to work, Heathcliff has to be likeable in some way or other. He is, after all, the compelling presence who has a passionate hold over both Cathy and her sister-in-law, Isabella. Unfortunately Byrne's Heathcliff is about as likeable – and fearsome – as a half-baked toad.
There is also the matter – and no small one this – that most of the company seem to have lost their ability to convey emotion without resorting to hysterical shouting.
The overall result is not without its merits and there are some delightfully strong scene-setting moments. It will certainly please the novel's existing fans as it follows the novel's narrative on to the next generation after Cathy's death.
Unfortunately, as it rushes through the plot, picking up on Brontë's dialogue but not getting to grips with her carefully constructed descriptions, it's unlikely to get the novel many new fans. (Thom Dibdin in The Edinburgh Evening News)
(...) With a simple-yet-effective set and a fine supporting cast, this was a fine introduction to Wuthering Heights, the humour never overbearing or detracting from the drama at its centre. I’m not sure if I’ll be buying a copy of the novel anytime soon but it’s certainly piqued my interest in the full, unexpurgated version. (Jonathan Melville)EDIT: (07/11/2008)
HERE'S a message for anyone contemplating a stage adaptation of a classic novel: if you can't take your own literary heritage seriously, then for heaven's sake leave it alone. Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights is a grim story without a doubt, but it's also a towering achievement of 19th-century Romanticism, full of that passionate empathy with natural forces, and that fascination with the fierce, the inexplicable and the weirdly supernatural, that represented such a powerful reaction to the grinding economic rationalism of the industrial revolution. Its heroine, Catherine Earnshaw, is a woman laying claim to her own passionate desires in an era when respectable women were allowed no sexual feelings at all; and it has its own quiet humanity and humour in the voice of the old nurse Nelly Dean, a classic unreliable narrator.EDIT (09/11/08)
So why, given all this rich and romantic material, do writer April De Angelis and director Indhu Rubasingham contrive to put together a stage version that emerges as a cross between a half-hearted Hollywood film and an outright Cold Comfort Farm spoof? The stage is littered with sniggering camp buffoons who send the story up rotten. Antony Byrne's Heathcliff looks more uncomfortable than compelling, surrounded by so much giggling; Amanda Ryan, as a robust and witty Cathy, constantly seems on the verge of collapsing into pure comedy.
The production has just one significant asset, in Susannah York's quiet, beautifully observed Nelly; and Mike Britton's design features some good-looking moorland visual effects. But if you think the North country, its voice, and its weather, are the stuff of easy jokes, then you just don't get Emily Brontë; and you should have the decency to leave her great novel to speak for itself. (Joyce MacMillan)
Wuthering Heights im King’s Theatre von Edinburgh ist jedenfalls alles andere als das angestaubte Ausgraben einer literarischen Leiche. Das Stück basiert auf dem gleichnamigen Roman der Engländerin Emile Bronte, eine Geschichte von zwei Liebenden, die sich nicht haben können, und einer nach dem anderen (nebst fast allen Familienmitgliedern einer kaputten Sippe) dem Wahnsinn verfällt, säuft, spielt und - letztendlich - stirbt. Der Dramaturg hat sich wirklich größte Mühe gegeben, das Spiel permanent am Laufen zu halten, und selbst die kurzen Umräumphasen auf der Bühne waren so geschickt ausgeleuchtet und mit Musik untermalt, dass sie eigentlich mehr einem Szenenwechsel in einem Film glichen - fließend, reibungslos und atmosphärisch. Besonders der Soundtrack gab der Szenerie noch ein ganzes Stück Authentizität, so dass sich mir die Stimmung jeder Szene tief in mein Herz hineinbrannte. (John)EDIT (10/11/08)
Adapting one of the best-known works of literature into a stage production can be problematic on many levels – die-hard fans will inevitably complain, while a slavish following of every word can lead to accusations of a lack of inventiveness. April de Angelis’s interpretation struggles with neither of these categories, resulting in a sensitive and yet highly innovative production.Categories: Theatre, Wuthering Heights
Stark and brooding, the set reflects the mood of the performance; the distant whistling of the wind over the moors and the clouded sky are the only accompaniments required to the tumultuous lives explored. Perhaps the most controversial decision is the casting of Antony Byrne as Heathcliff – those wishing for a dark, handsome lead will find him lacking, but looks aside his performance is passionate and multi-faceted. Intimidating and brutal, particularly in his treatment of his wife, the audience can still feel sympathy for him as his portrayal of his character as a mistreated and abused child is so impassioned.
Amanda Ryan gives an impressive performance as Cathy but sometimes emphasises the peevish, childish nature of Cathy’s character more than is necessary. Bad-tempered and abusing those around her, this production brings out the full potential for Cathy’s cruelty and impetuousness.
The narration remains the same as in Brontë's novel, telling the story through the dual narration of Mr. Lockwood (Simon Coates) and Nelly Dean (Susannah York). Lockwood’s comic interludes, with his blustering charm and often-misguided views are a wonderful witty break in this otherwise cheerless tale; his constant presence on the stage reminds us that he, like the audience, is subject to a powerful story over which he has no control.
An intelligent and moving production, De Angelis's Wuthering Heights will not leave fans disappointed – while Brontë virgins might well find themselves converted. (Anna Fenton)
Metro.co.uk briefly reviews the play positively:Translating the wild landscape of Emily Brontë's novel to the stage is a daunting task, but one that director Indhu Rubasingham manages here with aplomb.Whatsonstage is not so thrilled:
A sparse set is variously transformed into the troubled Heights and lush Grange through fold-away props, set against an atmospheric background of clouds rolling over the dark moors. The tale is delivered via the recollections of lifelong servant Nelly Dean (played wonderfully by Susannah York), who moves seamlessly from detached storyteller into the action as her younger self.
Her audience is Simon Coates' Mr Lockwood, a well-meaning London snob offering light relief in the knotty narrative. Amanda Ryan blazes as the beautiful, petulant Cathy (and later simpers as her daughter, Catherine), turning in an intensely physical performance with Antony Byrne's Heathcliff, whose descent from wide-eyed raggamuffin to sadistic beast is believable and hugely moving. (Zofia Niemtus)
Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights is, of course, a behemoth of canonical English literature. To attempt to adapt this epic tome into a two-hour performance is ambitious enterprise, to say the least - if not an entirely misguided one. Not to be deterred, however, April De Angelis and the Birmingham Repertory Company have rolled their sleeves up and taken it on. Sadly, however, they’ve not really come out on top.EDIT: Spaghetti Gazetti gives also her opinion:
The simple fact is that some things just don’t translate well to stage. Bronte’s perennial love story of Heathcliff and Cathy up on the wild Yorkshire moors is rich, complex and epic, but when condensed into two hours just seems a little bit baffling and occasionally ridiculous. There is only so much wailing and collapsing that you can take without either wanting to cry or laugh yourself. Unfortunately, the audience seemed to plump for the latter; often at moments of high drama; which, presumably were not intended to be quite so amusing…
This adaptation lacks the psychological depth and complexity of the novel. Consequently, you feel like you’re just watching a handful of histrionic Northern sociopaths systematically wailing, fighting, collapsing and then dying. (Usually somewhat inexplicably: from standing on a table? From wearing a white nightie? From sitting on sofa too long?) Their behaviour just comes across as odd or extreme and it becomes difficult to relate to or engage with them.
The cast themselves gave reasonable performances considering the melodramatic nature of the play and the rather unimaginative direction. The best of the bunch is Susannah York as Nelly Dean; a plausible, likeable and sympathetic presence (albeit with a rather anachronistic funky hairdo). Simon Coates as Lockwood also suffers less from melodramatic direction and provides some good comedy value.
Other positives are the set and lighting design; from Mike Britton and Chris Davey, respectively. With a difficult remit of providing a sense of the two entirely different households huddled against the dramatic backdrop of the Yorkshire moors; some ingenuity has gone into the simple, dark, heavy walls of the set; with a swirling projected sky overhead and a whistling wind. There is some clever stagecraft too; with some well-thought-out, symbolic movement of both props and people.
It suggests that the elements of this production that work are the elements in which a degree of ingenuity have been applied and a keen understanding of the difference between book and stage. If you’re going to tackle something as immense as Wuthering Heights, you’re going to have to do something really different with it, rather than De Angelis’ two-hour, whistle-stop tour of the novel. Though never boring, the result, sadly, is a bit nonsensical, a bit farcical and a bit abrupt. (Fiona Handscomb)
Angel De Angelis’ adaptation of the Emily Bronte classic is a disarming mix of humour and menace and Indhu Rubasingham’s direction engages well with this interpretation, giving the play a visceral and physical re-telling.The Library Journal talks about last season's first novels. Syrie James's Charlotte Brontë's Secret Diaries, which will be published next year, is mentioned:
The setting is stark, with clever use of sound, shadow and sleight of hand striking an apparitional cord throughout.
Amanda Ryan’s Cathy is convincing, capturing the rebellious, vulnerable, spoiled and bad tempered heroine, although, Antony Byrne does not quite convince as the menacing, brooding yet ultimately ‘more sinned against than sinning’ Heathcliff.
That said, there was a commendable level of ‘goosebump moments’ and the notoriously difficult to stage work, which could have so easily fall into parody ultimately satisfied. (Sarah Flanagan)
The Rutland Herald celebrates the thirty anniversary of Rutland Free Library Book discussion program whose first discussed book was no other that Jane Eyre:James, Syrie. The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen. Avon. ISBN 978-0-06-134142-7. pap. $13.95.
An Austen memoir is discovered, revealing a secret love. At least that’s the premise behind this Discover find, also a 2007 LJ Editors’ Fall Pick. Published last winter, the book is now in its ninth printing, with more than 115,000 copies available. “Tantalizing, tender, and true to the Austen mythos” (LJ 9/1/07)—and so successful that James is coming out with Charlotte Bronte’s Secret Diaries next year.
Thirty years ago, an internationally successful form of book discussion was born at Rutland Free Library, when more than 50 women gathered to talk about Charlotte Brontë's "Jane Eyre" with scholar and local poet Joan Aleshire.Now some posts from our fellow bloggers: Critic Picks W/Alex Udvary reviews Jacques Tourneur's film I Walked With a Zombie. New Lits 2008 has rewritten (and condensed) Jane Eyre. Wuthering Expectations has posted recently several interesting articles: Heathcliff is a Monster and Obscure Emily Brontë and Rider Lawnmower Woman recommends Wide Sargasso Sea.
It was part of a series of discussions about women in literature that, at first, no one was sure would catch on with the public. (Stephanie M. Peters)
Less than an hour's drive from Leeds is Haworth, home to the Brontës, location that has inspired many of works by the Brontë sisters. The picture-perfect village is small but a haven to those interested in art, gourmet food and even better sights to see. The village is surrounded by scenic moorlands. The Bronte Parsonage Museum and the Keighley Worth Valley Railway are some of the attractions you must not miss when visiting Haworth.The York Press reviews the Oxford Shakespeare Company outdoor performance of Wuthering Heights in York:
Wilby and Conti have the all -essential physical bond, while expressing the changes that ultimately break both the wilful Cathy and wild Heathcliff. There is something of Nora in Ibsen's The Doll's House about Wilby's interpretation of de Angelis's characterisation, while Conti's Heathcliff pre-figures the doomed men of the kitchen-sink dramas of the late 1950s and Sixties.A ranking of zombie movies in The Guardian:
No less important are the performances of Dominic Charman, Thomas Fitzgerald, Rachel Winters and Christopher Laishley, each taking on two roles, with the contrasts and sometimes similarities adding to the production's impact.
As bird song dies out, and the night chill sets in, we leave Cathy and Heathcliff to roam the moors forever, beyond the boundaries of the Walled Garden. (Charles Hutchinson)
3. I Walked With a Zombie (1943)The Most Wuthering Heights Day is coming (July 13th). Bega Valley About Regional (Australia) is waiting for it:
This is one of the great zombie classics, and a creepy spin on Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. It features a nurse who travels to a Caribbean island to attend to a plantation owner, and encounters voodoo rituals and reanimated corpses. It is a fable satirising colonial guilt, the inheritance of slavery and paranoid fear of “the other” – an almost poetic zombie adventure. (Peter Bradshaw)
If you’ve never seen the music video for Kate Bush’s 1978 song Wuthering Heights, (and I hadn’t until now) the connections between the musician, flowing red dresses, free-form dancing, Emily Brontë’s 1847 classic and domestic violence might seem tenuous – at best.Le Monde vindicates the Italian genre film director Lucio Fulci:
But a global phenomenon, The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever, has sprung out of the song and for the second time, the Bega Valley is joining in – dancing like no-one is watching! (Elka Wood)
On pense encore à Vertigo, bien sûr, avec son bien sûr, avec son récit de dédoublement, mais aussi au livre Rebecca (1938) de Daphné Du Maurier, variation, à l'époque déjà « trivialisée », du Jane Eyre de Charlotte Brontë. Ce beau film définit allégoriquement ce qui a nourri le cinéma populaire italien : un sublime mélange de noblesse et de vulgarité. (Jean-François Rauger) (Translation)And, also in Le Monde, a review of Les Amers remarquables by Emmanuelle Grangé:
« Les Amers remarquables », d’Emmanuelle Grangé : le livre de sa mèreThe New Republic looks into Andrea Arnold's direction for the new season of Big Little Lies:
« Jane Eyre », de Charlotte Brontë, tient une place essentielle dans le second roman d’Emmanuelle Grangé, succession d’arrachements et de retours.
Elle a 7 ans. Ce n’est pas un livre pour son âge. Mais, ligne à ligne, elle s’y tient. Elle s’applique. La petite lit Jane Eyre. Pour cette enfant précoce qui trouve que les histoires que lui raconte sa mère sont toujours trop courtes, le texte de Charlotte Brontë ouvre un nouveau chemin. Il est des livres qui vous choisissent étrangement. Qui s’attachent à vous. Entrant en résonance avec votre vie. En écho troublant.
Emmanuelle Grangé n’a jamais oublié Jane Eyre et sa lecture de fillette. A un bout de prénom, et quelques détails près, elle se confond entièrement avec la narratrice de son dernier roman, Les Amers remarquables. Le livre de Brontë y occupe une place essentielle. Il en fait la structure (chaque chapitre porte en en-tête une citation). Moins à cause du destin douloureux, fait d’embûches, de l’héroïne que parce que, sans doute, il répète une succession d’arrachements et de retours. (Xavier Houssin) (Translation)
She has an active distaste for opulence that comes through in her work; even her recent remake of Wuthering Heights was less about the romance of the English moors and more about the terror running underneath Brontë’s text. She was the ideal choice to helm a season that slowly dismantles everything the first season built. (Rachel Syme)The Portland Press Herald also enters into the sprouting-of-horns-because-smartphones stupid news:
As a person who has a smartphone and is also a lifelong reader of books, I can attest that the reading posture would be the same for a more intellectually ambitious young person reading “Jane Eyre” on a tablet or an old-fashioned paperback. There’s no way the news media would try to scare people away from reading books. (Faye Flam)Thrive Global interviews the actress Laurene Landon:
Thank you so much for joining us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?The Australian has an article on Siri Hustvedt:
Insecurity. The “root” of all bottled blondes. Joking! When I was a kid growing up, my beloved father, Douglas, loved old movies and we watched them together a lot, such as Wuthering Heights, Random Harvest, White Heat and many Marlon Brando movies
She takes it everywhere, when it's not hidden behind copies of Don Quixote or Wuthering Heights.The Doylestown Reporter informs like this about a local exhibition:
The brightest natural object in the night sky, billions have looked up at it.La Nación (Costa Rica) talks about the female Gothic:
Carl Sandberg, Emily Brontë and Dorothy Parker wrote poetry about it, and it figured into the plot of Bucks County author James A. Michener's 1982 fiction novel "Space." One of Beethoven's beloved compositions is the "Moonlight Sonata."
The moon has provided countless other artists, photographers, scientists, and just plain old romantics a mystifying fascination for centuries. Inspired by the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, Doylestown's Michener Art Museum presents the exhibition "The Color of the Moon: Lunar Painting in American Art," featuring more than 60 paintings and works on paper. (Brian Bingaman)
Después de todo, de los diversos ámbitos literarios, el gótico ha sido tradicionalmente uno de gran presencia femenina, desde sus orígenes a fines del siglo XVIII, con Ann Radcliffe y Los misterios de Udolfo o, ya en el siglo XIX, con Mary Shelley y su Frankenstein. Incluso la literatura “culta” recibió su influjo en títulos como Cumbres borrascosas, de Emily Brönte (sic). (José Ricardo Chaves) (Translation)La Repubblica (Italy) interviews the film director Jane Campion:
Chiara Ugolini: Molti dei suoi film hanno una matrice letteraria, Lezioni di piano invece è una storia originale. Da dove era nata l'idea?Sheer De Luxe shares some wedding diaries and Brontë's iconic reader-i-married-him is mentioned.
"Anche se non è tratto da un libro ha sempre una matrice letteraria. Sono stata ispirata dalla letteratura del Novecento, penso a Cime tempestose delle sorelle Brontë, quel tipo di letteratura. Volevo fare un film che fosse in quell'atmosfera". (Translation)
A new amateur production of Wuthering Heights (in the April de Angelis adaptation) opens today, July 17, in Chellaston, Derbyshire:Chellaston Players presentComplete cast here.
Wuthering Heights
Adapted by April de Angelis. Novel by Emily Brontë
Directed by Elaine Lawrenson
Cathy – Louisa Ballard
Heathcliff – Matt Sharratt
Isabella – Clare Snape
Nelly – Cathy Wilson
"Wuthering Heights is diverse in this sense and we chose this particular script, an adaptation by April De Angelis, for this very reason," [Elaine Lawrenson] explains.
"Playing the parts of Heathcliff and Cathy, our two principal actors Clare Snape and Matt Sharratt have had to push their acting talents to the limits. They give striking performances of passion, desperation and despair."
The story is narrated by the Housekeeper Nelly, who is relaying her tale to the new tenant, Mr Lockwood.
"As their relationship grows there are some charming and light-hearted moments between them which really breaks the tension and might even get a few laughs. Overall though we aim to take the audience on a roller-coaster ride of emotion," says Elaine.
"Most of the scenes take place in either Wuthering Heights, or Thrushcross Grange but the moor has a presence."
Production assistant Emma Bridges reveals that set design was one of the group's biggest hurdles.
"The play runs continuously. There is very little in the way of scene changes so the audience can expect to see the household staff arranging furniture as the action continues on the stage," she says.
"We have gone for a very simple set, mostly black but with key pieces of furniture and a huge fireplace at the rear of the stage.
"We have stayed very true to the book and but the dramatic and tempestuous performances of our actors are very contemporary."
In St Albans, Alabama:Company of Ten presentsThe Herts Advertiser interviews the director:
Wuthering Heights
adapted by April de Angelis
Abbey Theatre
Main Stage
Thu 14 - Sat 16 Nov, 8PM
Sun 17 Nov, 2.30 PM
Wed 20 - Sat 23 Nov, 8PM
Directed by Tina Swain
Emily Brontë’s gothic tale of love and revenge adapted by April De Angelis for today’s audiences.
Cathy and Heathcliff are inseparable as children, and their friendship grows into a passionate love. But when Cathy chooses to marry the wealthy Edgar Linton, what will become of them both, and how will the decision influence the fate of the next generation?
Please note that there are no public performances on Monday 18 or Tuesday 19 November. The production on Thursday 21 November will be audio described.
“Wuthering Heights is a well-known novel, often set as a school text. There have also been several film and television adaptations, so the story and characters are familiar and almost everyone knows the Kate Bush song.And in Bristol, Rhode Island:
“What struck me when I first read this stage adaptation was that familiarity – the play really captures the essential elements of the novel and translates them into an exciting, fast-moving piece of theatre.
“De Angelis uses the two narrators, Mr Lockwood and Nelly Dean, to ensure that the plot is easily accessible, but she also captures the iconic characters we recognise. It’s surprising to discover that most of Emily Brontë’s novel actually takes place inside the two houses, Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange, and the play makes use of this to great dramatic effect. We’ve also had the challenge of portraying several of the disturbing or violent moments that Brontë wrote, which have caused gasps of horror even in rehearsal!”
Roger Williams University Theatre Season
Jane Eyre
Adapted from Charlotte Brontë's novel by Polly Teale
November 15-17; 21-23
(Main Season II)
For a Victorian woman to express her passionate nature is to invite severe punishment. Could it be that Jane and the madwoman at Thornfield are not opposites, but are parts of the same woman? Central to this adaptation is the idea that inside the sensible and proper Jane exists another self who is passionate and sensual. Bertha, locked way in the attic embodies the fire and longing which Jane must keep hidden.
“I have to come to see the novel as a quest, a passionate enquiry” –Polly Teale
EDIT:The Marine Theatre, Lyme Regis, DorsetA set of pictures of the rehearsals here.
Heavy Weather present Jane Eyre
November 15, 7.00 pm
A work in progress sharing as part of the R&D by the Sea development programme.
Heavy Weather is a dynamic theatre company with a passion for new and old writing, fresh perspectives on classics, and equality in the arts. Nature, the supernatural, folklore, folksong, child abuse, abandonment, insanity, arson, death, desire, devotion, religion, poverty, wealth, family, travel, youth, wisdom, experience – they want to tell the memorable story of Jane Eyre in a way that audiences have not seen or heard before. They want to take the spirit of the book, the feel of the characters, the taste of the landscape and turn these into our own theatrical language.
Via Yorkshire Business.Oxford Shakespeare Co. presents
Wuthering Heights
Adapted by April de Angelis
Directed by Michael Oakley
Original Music by Pete Flood
Castle Howard, York --- June 26th-30th
The Gardens of Wadham College, Oxford --- 2nd July, 17th August
In an exciting new venture, the team behind Lamplighter’s unanimously acclaimed The Life and Times of Fanny Hill, join the OSC to co-produce April de Angelis’ striking stage adaptation of Emily Brontë’s spell-binding Wuthering Heights.One of the most powerful love stories ever written by the great feminist writer of her age is brought to the stage by our leading feminist playwright.
April will be casting fresh eyes on her original text, originally commissioned by Birmingham rep in 2008 alongside director Michael Oakley (As You Like 2014 It and Private Lives 2018 for OSC) and composer Pete Flood (formerly of folk sensation Bellowhead) who both achieved excellent reviews for their work on Fanny Hill.Perhaps the most (in)famous romance in the literary canon this superlative tale of love and revenge - the tempestuous relationship of Heathcliff and Cathy from children to thwarted adults - is a timeless icon that continues to captivate audiences young and old to this day.
When Mr Earnshaw brings home the young “dark eyed boy” from unknown origins nobody is prepared for the astonishing relationship that unfolds between him and Earnshaw’s daughter Catherine – unleashing a tumult of passion affecting generations to come.This fast-moving exhilarating adaptation shows us that true love knows no bounds and holds the ordinary world in contempt.
April de Angelis is a highly acclaimed feminist playwright. Lamplighter are thrilled to be working with her again after the success of The Life and Times of Fanny Hill starring Caroline Quentin at Bristol Old Vic (touring 2021), one of the theatre’s fastest ever selling shows with a record number of first-time bookers under 30. The OSC are famous for their open air and site-specific productions in exceptional historic venues including Hampton Court and Kensington Palaces and the Tower of London.
It is with great pleasure then that their new co-production of this timeless Yorkshire classic will premiere at Castle Howard, the county’s finest stately home.
To prepare for presenting this account of Emily Brontë’s tempestuous story of the free-spirited Catherine and the dark, brooding Heathcliff on the wild, windswept Yorkshire moors, Charlotte headed to Castle Howard with April and Michael in March. “We first thought about the Walled Garden, but then we thought, ‘if you’re going to do an open-air theatre show, let the audience see the grounds, that lovely vista of Castle Howard’,” says Charlotte.
“We’ll be keeping the audience in one place, rather than moving around, as Oxford Shakespeare Company like to do immersive pieces where the actors are close to the audience, doing a very dynamic, fast-moving piece of theatre with the actors creating the environment from the setting and very few props.”
April was keen to experience Castle Howard at first hand before revising her script. “She said, ‘if you’d like me to look at the adaptation afresh, I want to adapt it for a Yorkshire setting for a Yorkshire story by having a look around first,” recalls Charlotte. “The reason is, when there’s no ‘fourth wall’ for outdoor theatre, there needs to be more direct contact with the audience to whip the action along.” (Charles Hutchinson)
Please note that the part of Nelly Dean will be played by Victoria Yeates this evening. Ms Yeates is standing in for Susannah York who has been struck down by acute laryngitis. We wish Ms York a speedy recovery.However, the reviews of this play continue trickling in. From The Times, which gives this production two stars out of five:
How do you condense 400 pages of Emily Brontë’s passionate prose into a play that doesn’t end up bouncing between brooding and histrionics?From the Sunday Mercury:
April De Angelis’s new adaptation does a good job of cramming in all the key scenes and fragments of dialogue from the 1847 original. But you want more than a good precis from a trip to the theatre, and Indhu Rubasingham’s professional but impersonal production doesn’t have anything to add to its source material.
That lack of an angle encourages some rather roughhewn performances. Well, nobody acts badly, exactly – but then nor does anyone really connect with anyone else.
That’s fine for Simon Coates’s Lockwood, the self-admiring London booby through whose eyes we see the story, or for Toby Dantzic as a Tony Blair-voiced Linton, the prig who tries to shut out Heathcliff from Cathy’s life once they are married. But it’s bad news indeed for Amanda Ryan, who is impressive as the young Catherine (Linton’s daughter) but whose headstrong Cathy lacks the same easy touch.
She shuns marriage with the lowly love of her life, Heathcliff, even though “he’s more myself than I am”. Yet whatever conflagration of actorly atoms is required to make you buy into such a passion, it’s not visible between her and Antony Byrne’s rude and nasty Heathcliff.
Without that, they both end up looking like drama queens, she histrionic, he brooding like some, well, like some would-be Heathcliff.
As Nelly, Susannah York does well with her character’s mix of defiance and economic dependence. But, hovering around scenes as she recalls events to Lockwood, she reacts just a fraction of a second too keenly to events – as if she’s taking her bearings from the script in her head, rather than from what’s happening on stage.
So the story is told, and a murky mood is created, but it’s hard to believe that these characters have a life offstage. There’s one moment, early on, where it looks as if the actors are going to have some fun.
Lockwood is chuntering away, there’s an incongruous, isolated fall of snow, then he adds: “And it’s snowing.”
Hooray, you think: it’s funny. But more than that, it’s “theatre”. For, however much an adaptation condenses, it also needs to add something to replace all those lovely lost words.
That glimmer of playfulness gone, Rubasingham’s production does nothing vastly wrong and nothing vastly right. But for a tale billed as “passionate and spellbinding”, it’s serving short measures. (Dominic Maxwell)
Kate Bush has a lot to answer for.Categories: In the News, Theatre, Wuthering Heights
Emily Bronte’s classic novel is about the passionate love affair between Cathy and Heathcliff set on the desolate Yorkshire moors.
The squeaky-voiced pop singer had a No. 1 hit in 1978 with her preposterous song of the same name which makes me guffaw every time I hear it.
April De Angelis is also treading on boggy ground with this over-long mish-mash of a stage adaptation.
Here, there is a ferocious (but invisible) dog; two babies consisting of sloppily-folded blankets; adults playing gawky children (badly); dodgy and often incomprehensible Northern accents; and lots of shouting masquerading as emotion.
To add to the woes, Heathcliff – always seen as tall, dark and handsome – is played by an actor who is short, stocky and bald.
To my shame, I thought the novel finished with Cathy’s death. But, true to the book, the second half of the show chronicles the next-generation relationship between Cathy’s daughter and Heathcliff’s son.
This is not only mind-numbingly boring but makes the play nearly three hours long. And it needs a narrator to explain all the twists and turns. Yuk!
Amanda Ryan as Cathy and Antony Byrne as Heathcliff are OK, while Susannah York is the on-stage story teller.
Wuthering Heights runs until Saturday, October 18. (Bob Haywood)
What would Emily Brontë have made of Wuthering Heights, her novel of bleak Yorkshire moors and even bleaker passion, being transported to the idyllic calm of Wadham College gardens? Perhaps the contrast would have amused her, but I think she would have approved. Under Michael Oakley’s assured direction, the Oxford Shakespeare Company and Lamplighter Drama are successful in transporting their audience elsewhere for the evening – to a darker time and starker place where tragedy, misunderstanding and passion rule.Variety reminds us how Kate Bush
This success due in part to April de Angelis’s script, liberally sprinkled with a humour that, given the somberness of the novel, is surprising and makes for an entertaining evening (though perhaps purists attached to the book may find it hard to adjust to!). Some humour is aimed knowingly at the audience – there is a sly reference to 'frittering your life away on silly trifles – like trips to the theatre' and a character’s desire to 'take a fifteen minute sojourn' announces to the audience that it’s interval time. (Fiona Bennett)
officially proved herself as a pioneer when, at 19, she released her literary first single, “Wuthering Heights” — based on Emily Brontë’s gothic romance — which topped the U.K.’s charts for an entire month. In so doing, Bush became the first female artist to score a No. 1 hit that she wrote herself. (James Patrick Herman)Lake Mills Leader celebrates the new novel by Margo Peters:
Her doctoral dissertation was on Charlotte Brontë, so it was natural for her to write her first biography about the author.Unlikely Brontë references today presents Security Boulevard:
“I had read every book she and her sisters ever wrote,” she said. “Biographies are fun but scholarly.”
The book, “Unquiet Soul: A Biography of Charlotte Brontë,” was accepted by two major publishers. She went with Doubleday, publishing in 1975. (Sarah Weihert)
Shakespeare. Brontë. Dickens. In literature, the classics have long been a staple of summer reading lists. Computer security has its own share of classics – reference points that serve as a foundation for understanding the field’s ever-changing chessboard of attack and defense. (dmurphy)The Irish Times interviews the songwriter Aldous Harding:
She says that frequently-attached labels like “mysterious”, “introverted” and “eccentric” don’t bother her. I tell her that one comment on a YouTube interview said “She’s what I imagine Emily Brontë to be like”. (Lauren Murphy)Screen Rant makes a D&D reading of Star Trek: Voyager with the occasional Brontë mention:
Janeway has a natural talent for leadership and spent several years training to be a Captain, and study is the providence of Wizards. She has a talent for literature, especially the dark Romantic Period that gave us artists like Byron, Shelly, and the Brontë sisters. (Kristy Ambrose)Who lists gifts for book lovers:
The Eyre Affair by Jasper FfordeThe Sun Daily (Malaysia) interviews author Carol Jones:
This alternate-history novel follows a ‘literary detective’ named Thursday Next, who travels through different novels and literary universes in pursuit of a criminal who has been kidnapping characters from classic literature. Lovers of classic books and poems like Jane Eyre and The Raven will enjoy meeting famous characters in this universe-hopping adventure. (Rhys McKay)
“I have always loved those star-crossed lovers’ stories like Romeo & Juliet and Wuthering Heights,” Jones admitted. “The two lovers are separated by insurmountable odds. (S. Indra Sathiabalan)Brief mentions to Wuthering Heights 2011 and Jane Eyre 2011:
Suo anche il più bel film tratto da “Cime tempestose”, con Heathcliff trovatello di pelle scura nella brughiera, come lo aveva immaginato Emily Brontë. (Mariarosa Mancuso in Il Foglio) (Translation)
Olivier is in seething, feral form as Heathcliff, the brooding romantic hero of William Wyler's adaptation of Emily Bronte's "Wuthering Heights." His windswept period film (1939), chilled by the Yorkshire moors and mental cruelty, shares an all-Brontë triple bill [in the SFOMA "Haunted! Gothic Tales by Women,"] with Andrea Arnold's brutal 2011 interpretation. With hand-held camera work, spare dialog and a barely suppressed savagery only hinted at in Wyler's movie, it's an unflinching depiction of racial violence, socio-sexual politics and thwarted desire. Cary Fukunaga's superb, exceptionally moving version of Charlotte Brontë's "Jane Eyre" (2011) features simmering chemistry between a tortured Rochester worthy of romantic obsession (a taunting, sexy Michael Fassbender in one of his best performances) and the orphaned, independent-minded Jane. She's played with spine, vulnerability and a combination of tenderness and wariness by the phenomenal Mia Wasikowska, who radiates the character's emotional intelligence in every frame. (Sura Wood in Bay Area Reporter)Also, N S Ford reviews Jane Eyre 2011.
Lean Lluvia fina. Lean Jane Eyre, una gran novela feminista que Charlotte Brontë nos legó en defensa de la verdad como forma de rebelión. Lean los Ensayos esenciales, de Adrienne Rich, recién publicados por Capitán Swing, que nos enseñan lo que se esconde bajo las apariencias de muchas formas de cultura. De nuevo, la verdad. Escapemos por un rato del acartonamiento político que nos rodea y, mientras les dejamos entretenidos en sus faroles, busquemos la realidad literaria como forma superior, muy superior, frente a la procaz realidad que debemos afrontar. Si se dan cuenta de que no les hacemos caso en su absurdo teatrillo, tal vez avancemos. (Berna González Harbour) (Translation)The latest book by Alejandro Varderi is discussed in ViceVersa Magazine (in Spanish):
El mundo después de Alejandro Varderi, es el quinto volumen que bajo el título Origen final trata de los diferentes temas en los que el ser humano en la sociedad actual se encuentra inmerso y que mencionaré más adelante.ANP Panamá (in Spanish) quotes from Wuthering Heights:
Desde el punto de vista formal la obra está dividida en tres partes que las abren las citas de tres grandes: Charlotte Brontë, Winston Churchill y Robert Musil. (Alicia Aza) (Translation)
En la novela "Cumbres borrascosas", Emily Brontë escribió: "Es una tontería lamentarse de una desgracia con veinte años de anticipación". A lo que añado hoy: y una causa más de la epidemia actual de ansiedad. (Ismael Cala) (Translation)The actual quote is: "And would it not be foolish to mourn a calamity above twenty years beforehand?"
Non è un caso, a questo proposito, che il libro preferito della protagonista sia Jane Eyre, che è uno dei capisaldi della letteratura di formazione britannica. Sfumature di Charlotte Brontë, dunque, ma a cui non guasta anche un pizzico di Oliver Twist perché le disgrazie capitate alla protagonista sono talmente numerose, profonde e sconvolgenti che l’ombra di Dickens non può non incombere, prima o poi, durante la lettura. (Cristina Vitagliano) (Translation)Barometern OT (Sweden) talks about Rigmor Gustaffson's cover of Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights:
Ett annorlunda inslag stod Rigmor Gustafsson för, när hon framförde Kate Bush Wuthering Heights, mästerlig ekvilibristik med rösten, men jazztonen återkom i Allt under himmelens fäste i Mathias Algotssons arrangemang: pianointro i fugastil, övergående i parti till jazz-mode med unisona röster på aaaaa. (Translation)One Man Book Club reviews My Plain Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows; Stirling Castle shares a peek behind the scenes of the recent Chapterhouse Theatre production of Wuthering Heights in the Great Hall at Stirling Castle.
June 11, 02:00 AM
An exploration of the BBC's long love affair with the lives and works of the Bronte sisters - Charlotte, Emily and Anne. For over half a century, the ill-fated literary dynasty has proved irresistible to drama and documentary makers alike, keen to reinvent their novels for new audiences. So we get Bronte heroines reimagined for each emerging generation, first as classic 1950s housewife material, then wild child '60s 'chicks', Gothic waifs and, finally, empowered modern women. The Bronte males, meanwhile, are restyled as assorted prigs, wife-beaters, even brooding prog rockers and, of course, wouldn't you know it, new men. Wonderful stuff.
Ms. Brennan, then a 41-year-old college writing teacher and Brontë scholar in a biggish city in the Midwest (its real name is not hard to guess from the book), met Paul, a freelance photographer, in 1991 at a party and was impressed by his worldliness. (Andy Newman)San Jose's Metroactive reviews Wide Sargasso Sea 2006:
Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre has proven so enduring a story that a new adaptation emerges every few years, mostly recently, in 2006, from the BBC with Toby Stephens as brooding Rochester. And thanks to Jean Rhys, the characters even have backstories. Her 1966 novel Wide Sargasso Sea imagines the early days of Rochester in Jamaica, where he marries his first wife, who later languishes in the tower at Moor House setting fires and keening. This 2006 version of Sargasso, also from the BBC, stars Rafe Spall (from Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead, and son of actor Timothy) as the callow Edward Rochester, who visits the English colony of Jamaica in the early years of the 19th century and is smitten by a Creole woman, Antoinette (Rebecca Hall, soon to be seen in Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona). After some moments of ecstasy, their marriage goes sour. Trapped in a remote, dilapidated plantation, surrounded by cranky, spying servants who mutter about voodoo, Edward and Antoinette bicker incessantly. When a local Iago type whispers some dirt from Antoinette's past into the young man's ear, he becomes obsessed with the possibility that his wife's family is cursed. The romance between the leads never really convinces, either in their early passion or their later bouts of hatred, and the story ends somewhat abruptly. (Michael S. Gant)Several UK regional papers announce that apparently, the new Wuthering Heights stage adaptation (by April De Angelis) to be premiered next September at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre will also be performed during the Autumn season of the Chichester Festival Theatre:
Also coming up in the season will be Amanda Ryan – police officer Verity in Channel 4’s hit drama Shameless – starring as Cathy in a stage version of Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights (November 12-15).The Age says in an article about the choreographer Natalie Weir:
Bronte’s only novel has been adapted for the stage by award-winning playwright April de Angelis – the story of the wildly-passionate but doomed love between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw. (Shoreham Herald quoting from The Chichester Observer)
She is working on a version of Wuthering Heights for the Queensland company. (Jo Roberts)We suppose that she is working on her already-presented Wuthering Heights dance piece which has been featured on BrontëBlog previously.
If there were a Desert Island Discs collection of the most love-livid ballads, at least one of Winehouse's "poor me, pour me another drink" wails would be on there. For those of you, right now, feeling like Heathcliff without Cathy, like Winehouse without her Blake incarcerated or Michael Barrymore without a TV show, you could perhaps start out wallowing in Leonard Cohen's Bird on a Wire, cry headlong into Nina Simone's I've Got It Bad and That Ain't Good, but at some point you'd owe it to that cad Cupid to steam into Winehouse's Wake Up Alone.The Little Professor posts about Maryse Condé Wuthering Heights retelling: Windward Heights. BookPaths briefly mentions the Brontë Parsonage Museum. Blog de Libros talks about Jane Eyre (in Spanish). Top Cine 10 devotes a post to Wuthering Heights 1939 (in Portuguese). Somewhere Quiet is reading Jane Eyre and South in Winter has just finished it. A Lancashire Lass Dreaming has some icons of Jane Eyre 2006.
Patrick Brontë arrived in Dewsbury on 5 December 1809. To celebrate this event there will be special services in Dewsbury Minster on 6 December 2009. Dewsbury wishes to involve the Brontë Society and so a meeting was arranged in the Minster on 28 July 2008. (Read more)Categories: Books, Dance, Movies-DVD-TV, Patrick Brontë, Theatre, Weirdo, Wide Sargasso Sea, Wuthering Heights
Some have struggled to describe Rego’s work as feminist, pointing to her depictions of women in the thrall of overbearing, physically powerful men—the glowering Mr. Rochester, for example, in her series of pictures inspired by Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (2001–2002)—none of which, incidentally, appear here, suggesting an attempt to move beyond any idea we might have of Rego as merely an illustrator of gothic fairytales. (Lucy Scholes)Craig Brown recommends summer reads in The Mail on Sunday:
Other books I plan to pack are Ben Macintyre’s The Spy And The Traitor (Penguin £8.99), because Macintyre is a master non-fiction storyteller, and I keep hearing good things about it, and Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (Penguin £5.99), which, I’m ashamed to say, comes into the category Books You’ve Always Pretended To Have Read And Now It’s Time To Sit Down And Really Read Them.The Greenville Reflector recommends:
Here is a sampling of the South Central Reading List - the so-called “trash.” Maybe you should read some of them, especially Fahrenheit 451, written just for you-BYH: How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, 1984 by George Orwell and either Frankenstein by Mary Shelley OR Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë.The Stuff (New Zealand) interviews the writer Laura Southgate:
As Southgate points out, the bad boyfriend has appeared in literature for centuries – Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights, Darcy from Pride and Prejudice, Jay Gatsby from The Great Gatsby... Today, we have Perry (husband to Nicole Kidman's character) from Big Little Lies as TV's charismatic love interest with a dark side. In her soon-to-be released book, Southgate's male protagonist, Donny, makes Heathcliff look like a nice guy. (Sarah Catherall)The Hidustan Times would love to see The Mill on the Floss adapted to cinema:
The passionate, intelligent, sensitive and deeply loving Maggie Tulliver is a heroine I greatly admire and I would love to see a film based on this book directed by an equally fierce and modern director like Cary Fukunaga, whose Jane Eyre was wonderful.” (Tanuja Chandra)Dawn (Pakistan) and fame or anonymity:
Some authors initially used pseudonyms to hide their true identity — Johnathan Swift, Sir Walter Scott, Jane Austen and the Brontë Sisters. Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi used the name Panj-darya and Anga for his columns. Mushfiq Khwaja used Khama Bagosh. Others are known only by their pseudonyms — George Elliot, Lewis Carroll, Henrik Ibsen, Moliere, Tristan Tzara and Voltaire. Closer to home we have Ibn-i-Insha, Munshi Premchand, Shaukat Thanvi and Ibne Safi. (Durriya Kazi)Il Manifesto (Italy) has an article about both Emily Brontë and Kate Bush, that as you know share anniversary:
Al numero 72 di Market Street a Thornton, nello Yorkshire occidentale, c’è Emily’s, un caffè che serve panini alla nduja, gorgonzola e mozzarella. Il venerdì sera c’è la Pizza Night e seduti ai tavolini «al fresco» si beve birra italiana. Ma se dalle brughiere dovesse arrivare pioggia o vento – dopotutto a dispetto del cibo siamo pur sempre nello Yorkshire – potete accomodarvi dentro. In questo caso vi troverete nel salotto di quella che all’inizio del 1800 era la casa del curato perpetuo del paese e tra un’oliva e un prosecco potrete rifocillarvi nel luogo esatto dove il 30 luglio 1818 nacque Emily Brontë.Página 12 (Argentina) reviews Olga by Bernhard Schlink:
Centoquaranta anni dopo, il 30 luglio 1958, a Bexleyheath, poco fuori Londra, nasce Catherine Bush che solo per coincidenza porta lo stesso nome dell’eroina di Emily Brontë. Difficile stabilire se il 30 luglio c’entri qualcosa, ma Emily e Kate sono entrambe le autrici di Cime Tempestose, un romanzo e una canzone come nessuno li aveva mai scritti prima. Strabordante di passione e violenza e senza finalità edificanti, lo «strano» romanzo diventato un classico della letteratura mondiale ebbe un’accoglienza controversa: per Dante Gabriel Rossetti era «un libro demoniaco, un mostro incredibile (…) L’azione si svolge all’inferno, anche se i luoghi e le persone sembrano avere nomi inglesi». (Paola D'Angelis) (Translation)
En un calco hiperbólico de Cumbres Borrascosas de Emily Brontë, aquí hay que esperar no una sino dos generaciones para que las relaciones humanas se parezcan en algo a lo que hubieran querido los primeros protagonistas. (Márgara Averbach) (Translation)Agnes Lidbeck says in an article about English literature in Dagens Nyheter (Sweden):
Systrarna Brontë skrev om den utifrån ett ideal, inte utifrån erfarenhet. Of these högspända bilder av känslor är farliga att ha sound karta för det egna själslivet. (Translation)Sensacine (Spain) lists their favourite zombie movies
En Yo anduve con un zombi (1943), a cargo del genial Jacques Tourneur, hay ecos de Jane Eyre, el clásico de la literatura de Charlotte Brontë, y de la Rebecca (1940) de Alfred Hitchcock –no en vano ambas fueran producidas por Val Newton)–, pero más allá de referencias y vínculos, se trata de uno de los trabajos más poéticos del género. (Translation)Well, Val Lewton was a production assistant and script editor (one of many) in those David O. Selznick productions.
