Courageous Creativity

The Richmond Times-Dispatch reviews Rachel Cantor's Half-Life of a Stolen Sister:

A courageous, creative take on lives of Brontë sisters. (...)

Cleverly conceived and adroitly accomplished, Cantor’s novel vividly portrays the sisters, whose talents brightened 19th-century literature but whose lights failed in relative youth, with Charlotte dying at 38, Emily at 30 and Anne at 29.

Cantor relies heavily on the historical record but also includes an unusual technique: anachronisms, such as television, dollar stores and airports. Purists would consider them egregious chronological miscues, but the transcendence of time testifies to her courageous creativity. (RJ Strafford)

The Sunday Times reviews the latest novel by Emma Donoghue, Learned by Heart, inspired by the story of

Eliza Raine, a half-Indian, half-English 14-year-old attending a boarding school. (...)

The book is based on two real-life women. Lister is an important name in British history. She left 26 volumes of diaries detailing how she lived her life as a lesbian while also building a business empire. A recent BBC drama about her life, Gentleman Jack, was directed by Sally Wainwright and starred Suranne Jones as Lister. Less was known about Raine until recently, though some believe she was the inspiration for Mrs Rochester (née Bertha Mason) in Charlotte Brontë’s novel Jane Eyre. (Aoife Barry)

The Teen Magazine reviews several summer reads, including

Jane Eyre

by Charlotte Brontë

Rating: 9/10

Jane Eyre is my summer reading accomplishment! This book (at least my edition!) is 477 pages, and is one of the classics, right up there with Little Women and Fallen Angels. It's a dense read, so it's definitely a commitment to finish once you pick it up. The main character, unsurprisingly, is Jane Eyre. Jane's parents died before she could remember them, and she grew up with her extended family. However, her childhood was marred by abuse, and this experience stayed with her for the rest of her life. Later, Jane moves out, and, abandoned by her family, clings to others whom she loves. Although some of these people pass out of her life, she meets one man who she cannot let go: Mr. Rochester. Try as she might, she cannot extinguish her love her him, although social class, but mostly moral issues, do not allow her to be with him. At the end, Jane finds the lifelong love she has always pined after since her youth. (Adeline Yang)

The Pine Belt News quotes J.D. Salinger saying:

When asked the boilerplate question regarding his influences, Salinger reeled off a laundry list: "A writer, when asked to discuss his craft, ought to get up and call out in a loud voice just the names of the writers he loves. I love Kafka, Flaubert, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Dostoevsky, Proust, O'Casey, Rilke, Lorca, Keats, Rimbaud, Burns, E. Brontë, Jane Austen, Henry James, Blake, and Coleridge." (Mik Davis)

OiCanadian presents some juvenile fashion trends with a quote from Anne Brontë's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall:

“I will lead him by the hand until he has the strength to go alone; and I will remove as many stones from his path as I can … ”, wrote the Englishwoman Ann (sic) Brontë. It also follows the whole growth process step by step Alviero Martini brand 1st class Juniorwith clothes and accessories decreased by age in three lines: “children’s“,”Baby” AND “Junior”, all presented for both men and women. Compass of the entire journey: iconic Geo print.

The quote is not verbatim but close enough:

"I will lead him by the hand, Mr. Markham, till he has strength to go alone; and I will clear as many stones from his path as I can, (...)"

Stoke on Trent Live visits Wycoller Hall:

Eerie ruins, cobbled streets and ancient bridges - sounds like something from a book right?

The wild beauty of Wycoller in Lancashire, has inspired visitors for centuries, including the Brontë Sisters, who would regularly walk there from their home in Haworth

In fact, the village's "haunted" hall is also said to have inspired Ferndean Manor in Charlotte Brontë's literary masterpiece Jane Eyre. (...)

There is also the spooky figure of a woman dressed all in black said to have been spotted at the windows of the hall. The bewitching location of the hall is said to have inspired the literary genius of Charlotte Brontë when she walked here with her sisters in the 19th century.

For it is believed that Wycoller Hall was the inspiration for Ferndean Manor, the woodland manor house of Mr Rochester in her classic work Jane Eyre. There are plenty of information boards all around the ruins to give you the full, fascinating history. (Dianne Bourne & Louise Elliott)

Movie Web lists the best film adaptations of romance books:

Jane Eyre (2011)

Based on a timeless classic novel of 1847 by Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre is a romantic drama movie starring Michael Fassbender and Mia Wasikowska. The story follows a young orphaned woman named Jane Eyre, played by Mia, who is plagued by her bad childhood memories.

She ends up going to a place called Thornfield Hall where she falls in love with the master of the house Edward Rochester. Their romance, however, is not initially successful as Jane discovers a dark secret that Rochester tries very hard to keep from the world. Their romance is beautiful and heart-wrenching, while the element of thriller in the movie really completes the story. (Jordyn Spears)

Some Brontë horses genealogy in Journal de Galop (France): 

Dubai Opera est une fille d’Emily Bronte (Machiavellian), gagnante des Réservoirs (Gr3) et mère d’Earnshaw (Medaglia d’Oro), gagnant du Thomas Bryon (Gr3) et deuxième du Critérium International (Gr1), et de Lockwood (Invincible Spirit), lauréat du Prix de Ris-Orangis et des Supreme Stakes (Grs3). « Un beau poulain, équilibré », a commenté Anthony Stroud. (Translation)

Causeur (France) discusses a very French (and frankly quite stupid) controversy where a French singer, Juliette Armanet, criticises an almost classical song, Les Lacs du Connemara, of being ideologically on the right... or something like that:

 Le moment paroxystique et énigmatique de la chanson, c’est lorsque Maureen plonge nue dans un lac du Connemara. Ça interroge… Pourquoi risquer une broncho-pneumonie dans une eau à 13 degrés ? Pourquoi Sean n’a pas plongé nu, lui ? La vérité, c’est que Sean poursuivait Maureen depuis trois jours et cinq nuits. Captivée par la lecture des Hauts de Hurlevent, Maureen lui avait dit « non ». La vérité c’est que Maureen a plongé nue dans le lac pour échapper aux avances du lourdingue non déconstruit. Le salaud s’est rincé l’œil. La vérité, c’est que Maureen était secrètement amoureuse de Heathcliff et que Sinéad O’Connor était secrètement amoureuse de Maureen. (Henri Beaumont) (Translation)

Mujer Hoy (Spain) interviews Sophie Auster: 

En la tarde en que tiene lugar esta conversación, sus facciones lucen redondeadas. La letrista espera su primer hijo junto a su marido, el fotógrafo Spencer Ostrander. Entre sus planes futuros de crianza está el de emular un ritual nocturno de lectura que su madre, la también escritora Siri Husvedt, instauró en su vida y prolongó más allá de la infancia, hasta el punto de invertir y turnarse en los papeles de lectora y oyente. «Desde muy niña y hasta que cumplí 13 años, me leía entre una y dos horas cada noche en la cama. Ella alentó mi apego a la literatura del siglo XIX. De su voz conocí Cumbres borrascosas, David Copperfield y El jardín secreto». (Begoña Donat) (Translation)

 A TV screening of a Jane Eyre adaptation in Canal do Boi (Brazil).