A Time out of Time

It seems odd in these dark ages we are living through, but spring is here. Parade salutes the new season with quotes, one of them by Charlotte Brontë in Jane Eyre:

“Spring drew on…and a greenness grew over those brown beds, which, freshening daily, suggested the thought that Hope traversed them at night, and left each morning brighter traces of her steps.” — Charlotte Brontë (Kelsey Pelzer)

Greece Reporter puts things into perspective reminding us that our quarantine sufferings among our tons of frozen food and toilet paper, streaming TV and meme-sharing are a bit of a joke when you look at people like 14-year old Ibrahim:

We are living in times of uncertainty. Greece, it seems, is especially so. Ibrahim is one of too many children in Greece who are not yet cared for as they need to be.
“I want to be able to read my books,” he tells me. He pulls out two books from his bag. An
educational text on the benefits of using the waste from brick making for fuel, and a novel.
“I like to read novels,” he says, smiling gently, while his eyes light up as he glances with fondness at his book. I ask him more. He delves into a half hour, chapter-by-chapter, in-depth description of Jane Eyre. He is momentarily a child again, bright-eyed and excited.
“Books transport me, they take me away from this difficult life, they make me feel like I am somewhere else,” he shares. “So, will you spend your next weeks reading?” I ask him, temporarily encouraged and oddly relieved to see this passion inside of him. “No. It is too difficult to read now. I need a quiet place; I need to feel safe,” he explains. My chest clenches and I stay composed for his sake.
How haunting, that this child who has suffered so unimaginably, who loves nothing more than to read novels, is having even that rendered inaccessible. He starts to tell me again of why he loves Jane Eyre and I find myself feeling only love for him. Wanting only the very best for this brilliant, young, shiny human being who continues to endure in such incredibly strong ways. (Michaela Korodimou)

Some very interesting lessons to learn in Bleak House and Jane Eyre, as the New Yorker reminds us:

 In contrast, Charlotte Brontë’s “Jane Eyre,” published six years before Dickens’s novel, holds lessons not only for slowing the covid-19 crisis but for what could come next. When Jane is ten or eleven, typhus runs rampant at Lowood, the charity school to which she has been consigned by her aunt, who despises her. Lowood is a bleak house; as Jane describes it, “semi-starvation and neglected colds had predisposed most of the pupils to receive infection; forty-five of the eighty girls lay ill at one time.” (The description of life at Lowood echoes the experience that Brontë and her sisters had at the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge.) Some girls “have friends and relations able and willing to remove them from the seat of contagion”; some go home only to die; some die at school, and are buried quickly, “the nature of the malady forbidding delay.” Those that are vulnerable become, during an epidemic, more vulnerable.
And for those, such as Jane, who remain well, “Classes were broken up, rules relaxed. The few who continued well were allowed almost unlimited licence.” Some of the most evocative passages of the book describe a child’s magical sense of suddenly being left to her own devices, observing the world. Those running the school are too busy to mete out strictly limited meals: sometimes Jane is just handed “a large piece of cold pie.” It does her good. Parents who are concerned, in this time of closed schools, with maintaining educational normalcy might find something to reflect on in those pages. Epidemics are a time out of time, and perhaps less a moment to worry about screen time. Many families, of course, have more existential concerns. (Amy Davidson Sorkin)

The coronavirus pandemic is also triggering initiatives for sharing educational content and entertainment. iMore informs that Thandie Newton's Jane Eyre is available for streaming free in Audible:

In the wake of the novel coronavirus pandemic, Audible is offering hundreds of titles children ages 0-18 completely free of charge. Divided into four different age groups (Teen, Tween, Elementary, and Littlest Listeners,) these titles have been hand selected by Audible's team of editors specifically to entertain, engage, and even educate young people who are stuck at home because of school closures and quarantine efforts. The selection includes many classics, such as Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables, A. A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh, Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.  (Casian Holly)

Playbill shares that L.A. Theatre Works is also offering free recordings of some of their productions. Like the Christine Calvit adaptation of Jane Eyre:

In a bid to aid educators around the globe—many of whom are now working remotely due to social distancing—L.A. Theatre Works has made available 25 audio recordings of stage plays. Each performed by leading actors of stage and screen, among the titles on offer are Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac, Shakespeare's Hamlet, Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, and Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. (Olivia Clement)

More recommendations for quarantines: Story (Serbia) suggests reading Wuthering Heights, Gonzaga Bulletin, The Times (book and TV series), Glamour (France), Bisnis (Indonesia) and Times of India go with Jane Eyre:

Jane Eyre
Charlotte Brontë
Poor but plucky heroine comes out on top. (David Mills)

Jane Eyre 2006
The Ruth Wilson/Toby Stephens version is the most satisfying for romance lovers: Stephens touching, Wilson the perfect foil. Steady, sensible, yet full of life.
Britbox; Amazon, from £5.99 (Helen Hawkins)

"Jane Eyre", de Charlotte Brontë : le plus romantique
Un livre pour les filles que ce Jane Eyre considéré comme un classique ? Tout ça parce qu’il y a de grands sentiments, du drame, du mystère, de la moralité, le tout en costume victorien ? Eh bien oui, et alors ? Orpheline élevée dans internat minable, Jane Eyre est engagée comme gouvernante par le ténébreux Mr Rochester qui s’amourache d’elle et lui propose de l’épouser alors qu’il est déjà marié à une folle échevelée qui fout le feu au manoir. Dans le genre rebondissements digne d’un soap, ce roman se pose là. Mais cette sœur Brontë ( il y en a deux autres) n’est pas la moitié d’une manchote. Si bien que fille ou garçon, on est totalement envoûté(e) par cette histoire et prêt(e) à passer nos nuits dans un manoir gothique ( avec l'équivalent de Rochester en moins vieux). (Erick Grisel) (Translation)

Kita semua punya daftar buku untuk dibaca kan? Ini adalah waktu yang tepat untuk memilih beberapa buku romantis dari daftar yang Anda baca. Ketika hari-hari sepi dan malam panjang, buku klasik tentang kisah cinta yang tak terlupakan seperti Rhett Butler dan Scarlett O 'Hara atau Jane Eyre dan Mr. Rochester dapat menjadi teman terbaik Anda di malam hari. Dan jika Anda ingin membuatnya lebih menarik, Anda dapat bertukar daftar bacaan dengan pasangan Anda. (Krizia Putri Kinanti) (Translation)

We all have our 'books to read' wishlist, right? This is the perfect time to select some romantic books from your to-read list. When the days are lonely and nights are long, a classic on an unforgettable love story like that of Rhett Butler and Scarlett O' Hara or Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester can be your best companion for the evenings.

La Vanguardia (Spain) recommends Wide Sargasso Sea:

Puede que ésta sea una de las novelas que con mayor finura capta el alma confundida y la psicología de los caribeños. Como señala el título del libro, el mar de los sargazos –que son una especie de algas que flotan en la superficie- es de una gran amplitud, puesto que su forma ovalada se extiende a lo largo del Atlántico Norte, al suroeste de las Antillas, donde nació la autora de esta novela, Jean Rhys. Para ser exactos, nació en la isla Dominica, una de las islas de Barlovento en el Caribe. La historia es una precuela y recupera a un personaje de una famosísima novela: Jane Eyre de Charlotte Brontë. Nos explica el pasado de Antoinette Cosway, conocida como Bertha Mason. (Luis Martí) (Translation)

Helena de Bres in Point Magazine reminisces about other times of isolation:

Unsurprisingly for a future professor, what got me through the half-year of my childhood shelter-in-place order was reading. Jane Eye, Wuthering Heights, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, Far from the Madding Crowd, Great Expectations, Nicholas Nickleby, The Woman in White: I raced through them and their many cousins like they were crack.

Local Greece celebrities share what they are doing while quarantined in their homes on iPop:
Anita Brand:

Ποιο αγαπημένο βιβλίο διαβάζεις αυτές τις μέρες;
“Όταν έκλαψε ο Νίτσε” και Wuthering Heights. (Translation)

It seems a long time ago, but there was a time when people reviewed theatre plays. Scan publishes a review of the recent Manchester performances of Wuthering Heights.

 This was an unconventional love story inspiringly prevailing through the characters’ lives and surviving the many years the couple spent apart. Alex Austin brilliantly captured the wild and untameable- except under his own terms- nature of Heathcliff, leading to a fantastic moment of tension and feeling of unnaturalness when we see him ‘scrub up’ first to try to impress, then to take revenge on Cathy by seducing her sister in law Isabella. (...) The violence and jarring mocking of Heathcliff by his adoptive sibling Hindley was perfectly depicted through revelations of Hindley’s psychotic nature such as his graphic murdering of a pregnant fox. All in all, a spine-chilling and thought-provoking production paying tribute to the original novel. (Beth McMillan)

The Daily Mail talks with the biographer Hugo Vickers:

As a child in the Fifties, there were superb serials of great stories on black-and-white television on Sunday evenings.
I wanted to know more. Thus I read Dickens — Oliver Twist, Great Expectations and The Old Curiosity Shop. I was terrified by an adaptation of Jane Eyre, loved Wuthering Heights, and then I found Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca — and read all of them at prep school before I was 12.

Biddeford-Saco-Old Orchard Beach Courier interviews the director of the Libby Memorial Library in Old Orchard Beach, Lee Koenigs:

Nancy Florig: What is your favorite book?
(...) Another of my most treasured is “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontë.

Movies film in Harrogate in The Harrogate Informer:

Jane Eyre (1996)
Charlotte Brontë’s “Jane Eyre” is undoubtedly a classic and has been a favourite with audiences for over a century with there have been over 16 English language versions of the gothic romance. Not one but two versions of this epic tale have been filmed right here in Harrogate in1996 and a TV movie in 1970. The unique collection of rock formations at Brimham Rocks serves as a backdrop for the notable scene of Jane and Rochester’s first meeting when his horse slips on a patch of ice and Rochester falls. Brimham Rocks have also been used as a filming location for “Wuthering Heights” (1970), “The Hound of the Baskervilles” (1988) as well as the series “A Woman of Substance” (1984) and “Ivanhoe” (1997).

Ansa (Italy) celebrates the 70th anniversary of Jane Eyre 1996's Rochester, William Hurt:

Nel 1996 William Hurt viene scelto da Franco Zeffirelli per uno dei suoi più ambiziosi progetti internazionali: è il disperato Signor Rochester di "Jane Eyre" dal romanzo di Charlotte Bronte: anche grazie alla sua prova maiuscola quel testo, spesso visto come tanti melodrammi vittoriani nell'ottica di vuoti ed eleganti ritratti in costume, trova la forza originale della scrittrice e il crudo realismo di un'epoca tra luci e ombre. (Giorgio Gosetti) (Translation)

Liberal (Greece) has an article about the Brontë Parsonage (with some dubious pictures). Cinco Noticias (Spain) mentions the Brontës as a family of writers.