Mr Rochester is Branwell drunk. St John Rivers is Branwell sober.

The Spectator reviews Blackeyed Theatre's production of Jane Eyre (available for streaming) with a strange theory about Rochester.

Blackeyed Theatre is another victim of the virus. Its production of Jane Eyre was midway through a UK tour, and due to visit China for a month, when the pandemic shot its plans to bits. Last month the show was revived on stage and committed to film. Kelsey Short (Jane) leads a team of just five actors who tell the story as Charlotte Brontë wrote it.

The costumes, hairstyles and habits of speech seem authentically Victorian. The director, Adrian McDougall, has rejected the fashionable habit of presenting Jane as a rad-fem freedom fighter surrounded by grotesque male oppressors. His version reminds us how sympathetic the novel is towards men. Mr Rochester (Ben Warwick) is a romantic enigma, a dashing, grizzled buccaneer who is also decent, honourable and kind-hearted. Socially he’s a rebel. He exposes the hypocrisy of the marriage market by favouring Jane, a penniless governess, over the wealthy beauties competing for his hand.

When her nuptials are cancelled at the last minute, Jane is rescued from destitution by St John Rivers, a scholarly and idealistic clergyman who wants to travel east and convert Indians to Christianity. One theory holds that these two male figures are based on Branwell Brontë, Charlotte’s older brother, an imaginative but unpredictable alcoholic painter. Mr Rochester is Branwell drunk. St John Rivers is Branwell sober.

This is an absorbing, beautifully designed version that will please the casual viewer as well as the lazy student who wants to revisit the text without the hassle of moving his eyes across the page. (Lloyd Evans)

Pocketsize Theatre reviews it too.

Kelsey Short is wonderful as Jane Eyre leading us through the story with the first-person exposition in character reflecting the style of the original novel. From her first meeting with Edward Rochester (played by Ben Warwick) as he is thrown from his horse (portrayed with just a hanging reign!) until the moving final scene, the chemistry between them is excellent as they try to define and express their feelings for each other. He is aloof and distant at first but when he says “the only superiority I claim over you is age” we already sense the battle of two equals ahead. Jane too rather too quickly answers his question “Do you find me handsome?" with a “No”. The critical scenes when she is called by Rochester to tend to the injured Mr Mason, when she returns to Thornfield from visiting Aunt Reed to be met in the copse by Rochester and when she meets Bertha Mason are all beautifully played and we can see her affection for him and torment over his feelings towards her.

There is good support from Eleanor Toms, first as the consumptive Helen, then the bouncing excitable Adele and the snooty gold digger Blanche. Each is very different in character and demeanour and she simply and effectively creates each persona. Camilla Simson plays the other female characters including the unpleasant Aunt Reed, the housekeeper Mrs Fairfax, and the deranged Bertha Mason to good effect. Oliver Hamilton not only accompanies on the piano but plays the characters of the bully, John Reed, the visitor Mr Mason, and the clergyman St John Rivers.

Director Adrian McDougall keeps an even pace with simple groupings and cleverly raises the tension in the conflicts that Jane encounters as she tells her story and grows from an unhappy young girl into a heroic savour of troubled people. Of course, the original story has in its conclusion the most ludicrous coincidence of Jane’s uncle being a friend of the Mason’s and uncle to St John Rivers but it tidies up the loose ends and provides for a happy ending! This does not detract from the quality of the storytelling and the uplifting sense of well being and contentment that the heroine Jane’s strong moral character and determination helps bring about. (Nick Wayne)

Indiana Daily Student recommends 'Classic books that you’ll actually like' including

“Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Brontë

Young orphan Jane Eyre lives with her abusive aunt and cousins after the death of her parents and uncle. Deemed too much of a burden, she is sent away to a strict school for orphan girls.

After working her way through school and securing a teaching position, Eyre wishes to leave and begin a new career. She is hired as a governess for the ward of the wealthy owner of Thornfield. When the typically absent owner, Mr. Rochester, comes back to pay a visit, mysterious events begin to transpire. An enigma himself, Rochester involves Eyre in the strange happenings. 

“Jane Eyre” is full of twists and turns, making this novel a page-turner. The mystery surrounding the characters and events creates confusion as to what is really going on at Thornfield. (Alexandra Sulewski)

The Guardian has selected the top 10 books influenced by Shakespeare.

5. A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf

This landmark in feminist thought was inspired by Woolf’s recollection of an old academic declaring that “women cannot write the plays of William Shakespeare”. Her portrait of “Judith Shakespeare” becomes a polemical fiction about a woman who, like Woolf herself, had to stay home, watch her brother go to school, and become imprisoned in domesticity. Eventually, Judith is shamed into a marriage of convenience. Her brother flourishes, while Judith’s genius remains unfulfilled. The poet’s sister eventually kills herself, but enables Woolf to review the creative beginnings of some great literary examplars, including Jane Austen, George Eliot, and the Brontë sisters. (Robert McCrum)

The Ouachita Citizen looks into the origins of the idiom 'make do'.

Interestingly, a recipe from a newspaper in 1849 is believed to be among the first times that “make do” appears in print. Within the recipe for Beet Root Vinegar (I can sense your disappointment that the entire recipe is not available), the following appears: “Many families purchase their vinegar at a very considerable annual expense; some ‘make do’ with a very indifferent article . . .”

Although this is the first verifiable mention in print, some scholars believe that the idiom was in use as early as the 1700’s. A variation (“make it do”) appeared in 1847 in Charlotte Brontë’s novel, Jane Eyre. (Georgiann Potts)

Eastern Eye has compiled the 'ultimate watchlist' of Bollywood star Dilip Kumar.

14. Dil Diya Dard Liya (1966): The really interesting Bollywood adaptation of classic Emily Brontë novel Wuthering Heights saw the actor take on the role inspired by classic literary character Heathcliff. The multi-layered performance adds another dimension to a story that has been adapted into live action around the world. (Asjad Nazir)