Bradford Literary Festival 2023 (I)

This is a list of the Brontë-related events celebrated at the Bradford Literary Festival 2023 today, July 1:

Dr Claire O’Callaghan, Dr Michael Stewart

Understanding Emily

Saturday, 1 July 2023 | 11:00 – 12:00

French Ballroom, The Midland Hotel, BD1 4H

Emily Brontë has inspired everyone from Kate Bush to Sylvia Plath – but what makes arguably the most enigmatic of Haworth’s famous literary siblings such an attractive subject for filmmakers and biographers?

The middle of the three Brontë sisters, Emily was largely unknown as a writer during her lifetime. Wuthering Heights, her passionate love story set on the windswept moors of West Yorkshire, was initially released in 1847 under her pseudonym Ellis Bell just a year before her death from tuberculosis. In the decades since, it has been adapted numerous times for stage and screen and continues to leave its mark on our modern cultural landscape.

To mark the 175th anniversary of her death, Brontë expert Dr Claire O’Callaghan, author of Emily Brontë Reappraised, and award-winning author and lecturer Michael Stewart, lead a discussion of her legacy, her relationship with her sisters and whether she really was the wild child of the moors

Bella Ellis, Simon Marsden, Samantha Ellis

Dark Imaginings: Emily and Heathcliff

Saturday, 1 July 2023 | 14:00 – 15:00

French Ballroom, The Midland Hotel, BD1 4HU

As fictional romances go, they don’t come much more tempestuous than Heathcliff and Catherine’s in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. And it’s one that has gripped generations of readers.

From Heathcliff and Catherine’s tumultuous and obsessive relationship, to the themes of revenge, jealousy and control, Emily and her sisters offer a compelling critique of the dangerous elements of romantic love.

Bella Ellis, author of A Gift of Poison, the latest in the Brontë Sisters Mystery series, and Samantha Ellis, playwright, screenwriter and author of Take Courage: Anne Brontë and the Art of Life, are joined by Simon Marsden, author of Emily Brontë and the Religious Imagination. They will explore the enduring popularity of Wuthering Heights and its continued relevance in contemporary conversations about toxic masculinity, codependency, and the perils of idealised love.

Bella Ellis, Karen Powell, Tasha Suri

Inspired by Emily
Saturday, 1 July 2023 | 12:30 – 13:30
French Ballroom, The Midland Hotel, BD1 4HU

Few novels have been as influential or had such a profound impact as Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights – but what makes her story so compelling today, more than 175 years after it was written?
We’ve gathered a group of authors to discuss how this story, with its unforgettable characters and dark, Gothic imagery, not only defined a gBlake Morrison, Yusra Warsama

Behind the Brontës with Blake Morrison

Saturday, 1 July 2023 | 15:15 – 16:15

French Ballroom, The Midland Hotel, BD1 4HU

Emily Brontë has inspired everyone from Kate Bush to Sylvia Plath – but what makes arguably the most enigmatic of Haworth’s famous literary siblings such an attractive subject for filmmakers and biographers?

The middle of the three Brontë sisters, Emily was largely unknown as a writer during her lifetime. Wuthering Heights, her passionate love story set on the windswept moors of West Yorkshire, was initially released in 1847 under her pseudonym Ellis Bell just a year before her death from tuberculosis. In the decades since, it has been adapted numerous times for stage and screen and continues to leave its mark on our modern cultural landscape.

To mark the 175th anniversary of her death, Brontë expert Dr Claire O’Callaghan, author of Emily Brontë Reappraised, and award-winning author and lecturer Michael Stewart, lead a discussion of her legacy, her relationship with her sisters and whether she really was the wild child of the moors

Bella Ellis, Simon Marsden, Samantha Ellis

Dark Imaginings: Emily and Heathcliff

Saturday, 1 July 2023 | 14:00 – 15:00

French Ballroom, The Midland Hotel, BD1 4HU

As fictional romances go, they don’t come much more tempestuous than Heathcliff and Catherine’s in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. And it’s one that has gripped generations of readers.

From Heathcliff and Catherine’s tumultuous and obsessive relationship, to the themes of revenge, jealousy and control, Emily and her sisters offer a compelling critique of the dangerous elements of romantic love.

Bella Ellis, author of A Gift of Poison, the latest in the Brontë Sisters Mystery series, and Samantha Ellis, playwright, screenwriter and author of Take Courage: Anne Brontë and the Art of Life, are joined by Simon Marsden, author of Emily Brontë and the Religious Imagination. They will explore the enduring popularity of Wuthering Heights and its continued relevance in contemporary conversations about toxic masculinity, codependency, and the perils of idealised love.