International Women's Day 2023

It's International Women's Day and The Yorkshire Post looks at famous Yorkshire women.

From Olympic sports champions like Sheffield-born Jessica Ennis-Hill, Doctor Who star Jodie Whittaker from Leeds and former Labour MP Betty Boothroyd, who sadly died in February this year, to legendary pilot Amy Johnson, Jane Eyre author Charlotte Brontë and R&B singer Corinne Bailey Rae, Yorkshire is the birthplace of many famous faces.[...]

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will, which I now exert to leave you.” - Charlotte Brontë; the author of Jane Eyre and a third of the famous Brontë sisters was from Thornton, West Yorkshire. (Liana Jacob)

Times of India shares the same quote.

Wide Sargasso Sea is one of '5 Novels That Are Must-Reads During Women's History Month' according to The List.

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

Next on the list is "Wide Sargasso Sea," a 1966 publication from British author Jean Rhys. Drawing from her upbringing in the Caribbean, the author crafts a prequel to Charlotte Brontë's "Jane Eyre" that fleshes out the backstory of Antoinette Cosway, who is known as Bertha in the original novel.

With feminist and anti-colonial themes, this novel explores mental health, sexual politics, race, marriage, and assimilation. While "Wide Sargasso Sea" is better understood if you've read "Jane Eyre," it still stands on its own and is a well-liked feminist classic that's worth checking out. (Madison Emily Whisenand)

And also one of the 'Books to Read This International Women's Day' according to Left Lion.

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys 

Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea is the unofficial prequel to Charlotte Brontë’s renowned Bildungsroman novel Jane Eyre. Wide Sargasso Sea challenges the representation and racial prejudices of Bertha in Jane Eyre and illuminates the prominent patriarchal oppression in Bertha’s story as well as including historical colonial context to Rochester’s story. The Byronic hero in Jane Eyre becomes the abominable villain in Wide Sargasso Sea. Not only is Rhys’ novel a poignant and valuable postcolonial text in the Canon, Wide Sargasso Sea tells the other side of the story, providing an important voice to the voiceless female character Bertha. Despite Wide Sargasso Sea being written a century after Jane Eyre, Rhys' writing haunts Brontë's. Rhys’ exceptional narrative highlights important themes of power, freedom, and the undertone of feminism throughout the novel has meant that I will never be able to view or reread Jane Eyre the same way again. (Elle Jacobson)

The British High Commissioner Vicki Treadell gave a speech on 'Modern Britain':

So, let me be clear:

Yes, I represent the Britain of Brontë and Beckham.

But I also represent the Britain of Mary Seacole and James Cleverley, of Riz Ahmed and Rishi Sunak, of Courtney Pine and Kemi Badenoch, and for the literary among you, of Zadie Smith and Hanif Kureishi.

The Mary Sue has a video interview of Frances O'Connor and Broadway World shares a clip of Lookingglass Theatre Company's take on Villette.