Happy St Patrick's Day 🍀 and happy birthday to Patrick Brontë on the 246th anniversary of his birth in Ireland.
A former museum building with Brontë links can be turned into a luxury holiday home and a wedding venue.
Kirklees Council, which owns the former Red House museum building in Gomersal, has been given approval to go ahead with its plans for the site.
Submitted over a year ago, they include a £600,000 investment to completely refurbish Red House and to bring it back into use, celebrating its Brontë connections. [...]
Prior to its closure in 2016, Red House operated as a community museum, but visitor numbers and increasing costs made the site unviable. It has been predominantly vacant since.
The plans themselves include changing the use of the main house and a detached single-storey former cart shed into short-term holiday stays, and the Council wants to license the main reception hall for small weddings.
The main building would offer five bedrooms and would be let to one party at a time, and the cart shed would be split into four one-bedroom flats for holiday let.
In a report by planning officers, who approved the change of use and listed building consent under delegated powers, it states that the Council’s own conservation and design department believe the plans will provide a sustainable use for the heritage asset.
“The building has been vacant for several years and the proposal is for the change of use from its former use as a museum to short term holiday accommodation.
“As such, the proposed change of use would provide a sustainable use for this important heritage asset, helping to secure funding for its future upkeep and preservation. The same goes for the associated cart shed which is to be developed.
Earlier this year, Councillor Paul Davies, cabinet member for corporate, told the Telegraph & Argus that the Council’s cabinet had approved a £600,000 investment to carry out a comprehensive refurbishment of Red House, to bring it back into use as a luxury holiday home, “unique in its Brontë connections”.
“At a time when there is increasing pressure on council finances, the income generated by holiday stays is a financially astute way of retaining the property in public ownership, and means that we can continue to offer managed community access to a site which we know is much-loved by local people.” (Jo Winrow)
The Nerd Daily reviews the upcoming novel
Jane & Edward by Melodie Edwards.
Jane & Edward: A Modern Reimagining of Jane Eyre is exactly what it says on the tin—but that doesn’t convey the utter brilliance and remarkable competence with which debut author Melodie Edwards pulls off this retelling. Charlotte Brontë’s most popular novel has been adapted numerous times for various audiences, some hewing more closely to the source material than others which merely use it as loose inspiration, but Jane & Edward is truly a masterpiece that will set the bar impossibly high for other future retellings.
The titular characters are transplanted into our modern day society, and their surnames, occupations and backgrounds are updated by necessity, but it’s done in a most elegant fashion that still believably moulds them into recognisable representations of their counterparts from the classic story. At a tender young age, Jane is left an orphan at the mercy of the foster care system after the premature passing of her father, a gifted professor renowned in academic circles, but absentminded and careless when it came to providing for his daughter. The author outlines Jane’s growth from her teenage years to her early 20s with a focus on how alone and neglected Jane is, bereft of all company and comfort, but without giving in to any need for tawdry embellishment or heavy-handed melodrama. It is enough to witness how frugal Jane must be to stretch her limited funds as a waitress, the compromises and indignities she must shrug off just to barely remain above the poverty line. But finally Jane is done with her grey, dreary existence of just making do and pushes herself outside her comfort zone to pursue a new career as a legal assistant which is how she winds up at the illustrious law firm Rosen, Haythe & Thornfield. [...]
A deft and clever retelling that effortlessly retains the traits of the classic characters loved for generations while positioning them in a realistic modern context. Jane & Edward continues to explore the timeless themes of social inequality, the struggle for financial security and the innately human desire for love and a place to belong that Charlotte Brontë originally raised in Jane Eyre. With a quietly capable, charming and resilient heroine following the difficult path of learning to value herself and stand firm on what she believes in plus a prickly, blustering yet hopelessly endearing love interest, this is a beautifully heart-warming and enchanting story destined to be a comfort read for countless bookworms. (Annie Deo)
Lire magazine (France) has an article on the bad reviews that
Wuthering Heights got initially.
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