Packed programme for Brontë200

Keighley News unveils many of the activities organised by the Brontë Society as part of the Brontë200 celebrations.

Staff at the Brontë Parsonage Museum, run by the society, have prepared a year-long programme dedicated to Charlotte, writer of classic novels including Jane Eyre.
The programme begins on February 1 with the opening of a new exhibition at the museum entitled Charlotte Great And Small, which explores the contrast between the novelist’s constricted life and her huge ambition.
The display has been created by novelist and Brontë enthusiast Tracy Chevalier, who is the museum’s Creative Partner throughout 2016.
Highlights include her child-size clothes, tiny books and paintings Charlotte made, and a scrap from a dress she wore to an important London dinner party hosted by Thackeray.
Tracy has also edited a new collection of short stories influenced by the writing of Charlotte Brontë, entitled Reader, I Married Him, featuring the work of writers like Helen Dunmore and Susan Hill.
Tracy said: “I have long loved Charlotte Brontë and am thrilled to be involved in the celebration of her bicentenary.
“The Parsonage is a unique house; it’s incredible to see the place where so much creativity arose. I’m hoping to sprinkle some surprises in amongst the dresses and writing desks – including a Twitter tour of the house and exhibition, and even a knitted Jane Eyre!”
The museum’s writer in residence will be award-winning novelist Grace McCleen, while popular children’s author Jacqueline Wilson will be an ‘Ambassador for Charlotte’ during 2016.
Jacqueline said: “Jane Eyre is my all-time favourite novel. Jane continues to be an inspiration to us all, especially women.
“I first read the book when I was ten and have reread it many times since with increasing enjoyment. Perhaps there's a hint of Jane in several of the child characters in my own books.”
Charlotte’s 200th birthday falls on April 21, and will be celebrated throughout the day in Haworth as well, as Charlotte’s birthplace of Thornton.
There will be talks on different aspects of Charlotte’s life; an opportunity to view some of Charlotte’s letters, manuscripts and personal possessions; a birthday party with tea, cake and surprises.
There will be a wreath-laying ceremony for invited guests the following day at Westminster Abbey.
Other highlights of the year will be lectures by renowned Brontë biographers Juliet Barker and Claire Harman, a new TV drama about the Brontë family, and a new ballet version of Jane Eyre.
Writers Maggie O’Farrell, Lucy Hughes-Hallett and Charlotte Mendelson will join Claire Harman and Tracy Chevalier for the Great Charlotte Brontë Debate.  
Items from the Brontë Parsonage Museum’s collection will be on display at the National Portrait Gallery before transferring to the Morgan Library in New York. (David Knights)

On the Brontë Society website we read somehting more about Jacqueline Wilson's role on Brontë200:

 On accepting the role, Jacqueline said:
"I think it's wonderful that the Brontë Society is celebrating the bicentenaries of all the Brontës in turn and I'm delighted to be a special ambassador for Charlotte during 2016.  Jane Eyre is my all-time favourite novel.   I first read the book when I was ten and have reread it many times since with increasing enjoyment.  I've devoured more Brontë novels and many biographies, visited the Parsonage Museum half a dozen times and walked across the moors breathing in the bracing air.  I shall be doing everything in my power to spread the word about Charlotte Brontë and encourage everyone to read her brilliant novels."
Rebecca Yorke, spokesperson for the Brontë Society said:
"Dame Jacqueline Wilson is a perfect Ambassador for Charlotte.  Like Charlotte, she began writing at a very young age and there are echoes of the motherless, neglected and resilient Jane Eyre in several of Jacqueline's most-loved characters, such as Tracy Beaker and Hetty Feather.  We are thrilled to be working with Jacqueline during 2016 and with her help we hope to engage new and younger audiences with Charlotte Brontë and her work."
Jacqueline Wilson will return to Haworth for an event in October. 

The Brontë Society has also announced the following on Facebook:

The Brontë Society will be hosting a festival of contemporary poetry in the grounds of the Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth this summer. Poetaster will be a two-day extravaganza of performance and entertainment, celebrating the talents of young and up-and-coming poets, lyricists, spoken word artists, storytellers, rappers and street rhetoricians of every form and flavour from Yorkshire and the north of England. The event will take place on the weekend of the 2nd and 3rd of July. Look out for further announcements.

This year also sees the premiere of the play We Are Brontë by Publick Transport in Bristol. Bristol 24/7 offers a preview of the production:

Bristol’s brilliant comic theatre company Publick Transport is offering us a distinctly different view of the sisters’ Gothic/Romantic world.
We Are Brontë is a piece of comic visual theatre inspired by the real and imaginary worlds of Yorkshire’s literary siblings, presented in Publick Transport’s irreverent style. Physical theatre collides with stand-up, clowning and improvisation as two performers deconstruct not only Gothic themes of love, madness, repression and revenge – but also themselves. Part play, part enquiry into the act of putting on a play, this promises to be no ordinary Brontë adaptation.
“The task we set ourselves was to make something where the audience are genuinely uncertain whether or not they are supposed to laugh – the polar opposite of ‘knowing comedy’, where the performers are winking at the audience,” explains Publick Transport’s founder and performer Angus Barr. “The theory is that the audience will laugh all the more because they will have been allowed to discover what’s funny for themselves, and the process of holding it in will make it erupt all the more violently: the danger is that they won’t laugh at all!
“It’s a development of Publick Transport’s exploration of modern clown, taking it closer to the edge – somewhere our director Ed Rapley was not afraid to go. The Brontës were ripe material because theirs is among the most serious of English literature, and that mirthless tone suits our purposes. In our attempt to steer clear of parody we have kept dialogue to a minimum, so it has ended up a very physical piece.” (Steve Wright)

And here's another Brontë-related production, as the Lancashire Evening Post reports that,

Lincoln-based Chapterhouse Theatre Company will launch the 2016 season and their own summer tour at Lytham Hall, Lancashire’s most popular venue, on Sunday 12 June at 6.00 pm. The company will present Richard Main’s production of Emily Brontë’s classic novel, Wuthering Heights, adapted for the stage by Laura Turner.

While the South Wales Evening Post announces plans for a local production of Wuthering Heights too.

Calling all Emily Brontë fans: auditions will be held in Swansea this month to find two actors to play Heathcliff and Cathy, the leading roles in Wuthering Heights.
Charles Vance's stage adaptation of the Gothic romance set on the wild and windy Yorkshire moors will be performed by Swansea Little Theatre at the Dylan Thomas Theatre, Swansea, from April 13 - 16, and auditions will take place on:
Thursday, January 21, 7.30pm
Sunday, January 24, 3pm
Tuesday, January 26, 7.30pm
Along with the two principal characters, a further eight parts will be up for grabs and everyone is welcome to audition.
The play will be directed by Brian Sullivan, who previously directed Under Milk Wood for the local amateur group. (Mark Rees)

Here's PopcornTV's (Italy) top 8 (although it's 10 according to them) Brontë films:

- Les soeurs Brontë (1979) di André Téchiné con Isabelle Adjani e Isabelle Huppert.
- Jane Eyre (2011) di Cary Fukunaga con Michael Fassbender e Mia Wasikowska.
- Wuthering Heights (1992) di Peter Kosminsky.
- Wuthering Heights (1939) di William Wyler.
- The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1996) di Mike Barker.
- Villette (1970) di Moira Armstrong. (!!!!)
- Wuthering Heights (2011) di Andrea Arnold, con Kaya Scodelario.
- Jane Eyre (1943) di Robert Stevenson con Orson Welles.

First Things discusses how Jane Austen's Emma 'transformed the writing of fiction', as suggestested by John Mullan in a recent article in The Guardian.

Knightley observes Frank and Jane during a game and suspects something is up. He's right, but the tiny glimpse of the Brontë romance that blinkered Emma misses is fleeting, too fleeting perhaps for a first-time reader to fully appreciate. (Peter J. Leithart)

This columnist from Big Issue North shares some of last year's (unfulfilled) new year's resolutions.

It’s way too easy to just write down stuff like drink less alcohol and get more exercise, and a whole lot easier to shrug and say, OK, maybe that’s one for this time next year. Which is what happened to me at the start of 2015 when I tapped into my laptop a slew of check-box pledges that included “climb Scafell Pike by the long Eskdale route”, “do Hull pub crawl with Dave” and “read Wuthering Heights”. Along with “muck out my filing cabinet”, none of these came remotely close to being ticked off. (Roger Ratcliffe)

BookRiot links Hello by Adele with Wuthering Heights.