Constructive Chucking

The novelist Gill Hornby selects for The Daily Mail books on being dumped:

There is such a thing as constructive chucking, which Jane Eyre pulls off with aplomb. Mr Rochester has proposed to her, it’s the realisation of her dream and yet somehow feels like a fairy tale — she can’t quite trust it.
She loves him, and yet as soon as they’re engaged, he starts to treat her like a doll, a ‘performing ape’.
He smiles upon her as a sultan would smile at a ‘slave his gold and gems have enriched’. She’s not comfortable with it at all. When she finds out the real impediment to their marriage, it’s up to her to end it and plunge herself into ‘an awful blank; something like the world when the deluge was gone by’. But — and, yes it does take a while — eventually that act of strength on her part leads to the ultimate happiness of both.

Is there an appropriate age to first read the classics? TES think so:

This is a cynical view, but it reflects my own school experience and, I suspect, the experience of many others. I was "taught" Jane Eyre but all I did was watch a film (I only really remember the mad wife jumping out of the burning building) and I was never asked to read the whole book. At age 14, I was not ready for the Brontës – and I don't think I should have been.
Some adults feel disappointed with their younger selves for not having read certain classics earlier. But adulthood is the right time to read these books. I am glad that I was not force-fed any other age-inappropriate literature when I was a teenager. Recently, I've begun to read a few classics under my own steam, but I certainly haven't felt compelled to revisit Jane Eyre (although I did enjoy the more recent film). I wouldn't have been in the right place as a younger person to appreciate certain books which I now love. In fact, I might have ended up hating them, thus spoiling them for my older self. (Aidan Severs)

The Malay Mail on pseudonyms:

A trend reflecting the prevailing sexism of the time saw many accomplished female writers publish their work under masculine names: George Eliot’s real name was Mary Ann Evans, George Sand was Aurore Dupin and the Brontë sisters were first published as Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. (AFP)

Sex and love in The Huffington Post (Italy) on

Si innamorano quasi ''a prima vista'', Levin di Kitty in Anna Karenina, e Karl di Linda ne ''La mia lotta'', non fanno riferimento a ciò che dicono, come invece fanno le autrici donne analizzate nel pezzo: Elena Ferrante (ammesso che dietro lo pseudonimo si celi una donna ), Charlotte Brontë, Jane Austen che partono proprio da lì per innamorarsi. Knausgard e Tolstoj, o meglio i loro personaggi, si sentono attratti come fosse un 'esplosione, un'attrazione che ha qualcosa di inspiegabile e misterioso.  (...)
 Però, tra le varianti infinite, l'idea romantica sembra appoggiarsi a una o all'altra di due poli: il concetto di amore come una profonda, misteriosa attrazione, che è più smaccatamente maschile, almeno negli autori esaminati nell'articolo, o l'idea di una collaborazione con un'anima, una persona unicamente in grado di comprendere la propria vita interiore, che è più femminile e delle autrici donne come Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, George Eliot, conclude la scrittrice nel suo pezzo. (Mariagloria Fontana) (Translation)

The New Lens (Hong Kong) lists Emily Brontë as one of the literary 'hermits'; a local entrepreneur who loves Wuthering Heights in The Times-Reporter; AnneBronte.org reminds us of four women writers which are mainly remembered today for their relation with the Brontës.