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Monday, August 23, 2021

More news outlets talk about Wycoller, 'the village frozen in time':
The 'lost' Lancashire village of Wycoller has a rich history, with ancient bridges and ruined hall, as well as some of the most beautiful scenery Britain has to offer.
Brontë lovers flock to the ruined hall, which is said to have been the inspiration for Ferndean Manor, the property which Mr Rochester moved to after fire destroyed his home in Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane Eyre. (...)
The Brontë sisters are said to have regularly trekked to visit, from their neighbouring village of Haworth, with the rugged Yorkshire landscape later inspiring their novels. (Rosaleen Fenton & Dianne Bourne in The Mirror)
The village is now a country park, and only disabled badge holders or residents may park inside.
The ban has allowed officials to renovate previously abandoned properties and keep Wycoller's natural aesthetic.
Their efforts mean it is now almost unchanged since the Brontë sisters once allegedly visited from their perch in nearby Haworth.
Rumours have long insisted Charlotte Brontë used the ruined Wycoller Hall as inspiration for Jane Eyre's Ferdean Manor. (Liam Doyle in The Daily Express)
Head North for your staycation according to The Telegraph:
The Calder Valley is a gorgeous melding of milltown architecture, slopes and uplands as dramatic and alluring as any of those that enraptured Emily Brontë, with lovely towns and country inns on and off the main roads. Follow the Calderdale Way up to Stoodley Pike, erected in 1815 to celebrate the defeat of Napoleon. (Chris Moss)
Wanderlust is all for the Peak District:
The Peak District’s dramatic landscapes and sometimes ‘moody’ weather has inspired many. Charlotte Brontë, who stayed at the vicarage in Hathersage while writing Jane Eyre, used the village as the novel’s setting while Jane Austen declared that there was ‘no finer county in England than Derbyshire’ in Pride & Prejudice; that book’s 2005 adaptation made fine use of local locations. (Graeme Green)
Fine Books & Collections reviews The Madwoman Upstairs by Catherine Lowell:
It can be no easy task to re-hash Brontë lore--whether in fiction or non-fiction--and yet, occasionally a reader finds reason to rejoice. Catherine Lowell's debut novel, The Madwoman Upstairs (Touchstone, $25.99), is utterly absorbing, a lighthearted read that appeals to those of us who unwind with TV adaptations of Victorian novels (almost any will do) and who might be still be sobbing this morning over the demise of Downton Abbey. (Rebecca Rego Barry)
The UK Today News talks about the (many) problems of the Post Office, and mentions Haworth's fight to save his local branch:
Another round of cost-cutting and restructuring seems inevitable but risks further undermining relations with the public. Sammy Ahmed, a postmaster was recently told that his branch that dates back 190 years in Haworth in West Yorkshire — close to where the Brontë sisters wrote most of their novels — would be closed and replaced by a concession in a food store 10 minutes down a steep hill. Within days the local community had organised a 1,000 signature petition opposing the closure.
“The Post Office has been planning behind the scenes. I don’t see the reason they want to move it down there,” says Ahmed. “Apart from they want to cost-cut and save pennies.”
La Opinión de Murcia (Spain) publishes the obituary of the painter Francisco Serna (1935-2021) who in 1974 painted Hermanas Brontë (Picture source): 
Sus primeras obras reflejaban el mundo que le rodeaba, eran estampas cotidianas en las que apenas aparecían per
sonajes. Con el paso de los años, sus obras se van llenando de figuras humanas y de color. Reflejan este cambio dos de sus obras más emblemáticas: Homenaje a las palomas de Picasso y Hermanas Brontë. (Translation)
The Guardian reviews Un Dimanche à Ville d'Avray by Dominique Barbéris:
It is also woven through with the cultural experiences throughout Jane and Claire Marie’s lives: Jane Eyre, Gérard de Nerval and a repeated refrain from the poem Autumn Song by Théophile Gautier: “Rain bubbles on the garden pond/ The swallows gathered on the roof/ Confabulate and correspond.” (John Self)
Also in The Guardian, the best books about islands:
Islands are perfect settings for origin stories: places where characters can be formed before moving into the larger and often hostile world. Nowhere is this clearer than in Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys’s classic prequel to Jane Eyre. Opening in Jamaica in the immediate aftermath of the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833, it considers the deep scars inflicted by colonial rule on a landscape and its inhabitants. (Kiran Millwood Hargrave)

A quote from the story Within These Arms Forever Swim by John Andrew Fredrick as published in Vol.1 Brooklyn:

Many’s the time Kristine’d told me of happy hours spent plopped on some sweet stretch of beach or other, keenly reading one of her precious black or tan or orange Penguin paperbacks, the Eminent Victorians–Hardy and George Eliot, The Brontës and the later, darker Dickens, mostly, she’d told me she favored: the deep ones, the heavies, the big boys and girls.
Regeneración (México) publishes a (highly novelized) article on Emily Brontë, "withdrawn, cool, and a dog lover":
Emily Brontë (1818−1848) tuvo una personalidad introvertida. A pocas personas les abrió su corazón y, desde pequeña, cultivó un retraimiento que la hacía replegarse sobre sí misma. Esta mujer, de labios carnosos y bien dibujados, hablaba poco de sus anhelos y sus convicciones, como si ambas cosas le parecieran una pérdida de tiempo. Prefería refugiarse en la introspección. (...) (Ricardo Sevilla) (Translation)
The new season of books in La Presse (Canada):
Cécile Coulon avait remporté beaucoup de succès avec son roman précédent, Une bête au paradis. Dans Seule en sa demeure, elle raconte l’histoire d’un mariage arrangé entre la jeune Aimée, 18 ans, et Candre Marchère, riche propriétaire terrien dont la première épouse est morte peu de temps après les noces. Son fantôme hante la demeure du Jura où vit le couple, et où la jeune Aimée tente de trouver sa place. L’atmosphère est mystérieuse à souhait dans cette histoire que n’auraient pas reniée les sœurs Brontë. (Nathalie Collard) (Translation)

A reader of The Standard-Times is reading Wuthering Heights, a book that is recommended by Aventuras Na História (Brazil). AnneBrontë.org weekly post is:'Did the Brontës eat meat?'. Spoiler alert: they did.

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