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The Invention of Charlotte Brontë is an intelligent and impassioned account of the genesis and reception of Gaskell’s biography. Part 1 covers the years 1850 to 1854, when Charlotte, bowed beneath what Gaskell called “this pressure of grief which had crushed all buoyancy of expectation out of her,” befriended Harriet and Elizabeth and married Arthur. (Watson is on a first-name basis with his subjects.) Part 2 explores what Gaskell called the “hornet’s nest” of complaints, objections, and legal threats coming from “anyone whose name has been named,” as she despaired, “or whose grandmother’s great uncle once removed has been alluded to.” Watson’s focus throughout is on the four main players: stoic Charlotte, slippery Gaskell, adamantine Patrick, and insecure Nicholls. Stitching his story together from the novelists’ gossipy letters, including many from Charlotte to Nussey that Gaskell did not see or decided not to use, Watson marshals his material with maximum intensity, maintaining Gaskell’s narrative momentum, giving voice to the rage against Nicholls she was unable to express, and matching her rhetorical heights: “Broken in spirit,” he writes of Charlotte’s suffering, “she crawled, she knelt, then she tremulously stood until the hammer blows of tragedy rained upon her again.” [...]
In 1861, after Patrick died, age eighty-four, Nicholls returned to Ireland and married his cousin. Gaskell, who died suddenly four years later, age fifty-five, regretted that she had ever agreed to undertake The Life of Charlotte Brontë. “I don’t think there ever was such an apple of discord as that unlucky book,” she told George Smith. Watson’s own book is both a tribute to Gaskell’s hagiography and a necessary afterword. His Charlotte is cannier, more complex, less certain of herself—a woman who exploited the dramatic potential of her situation before trading her genius for what he calls “serfdom” to a low-wattage man. Watson defends, while being baffled by, the character of Mrs. Charlotte Nicholls, but her trajectory is not unusual. It is Gaskell, independent wife, loving mother, and successful writer, who stands alone in the annals of nineteenth-century women novelists.
The heroine of The Invention of Charlotte Brontë is not Charlotte herself, or even Gaskell, but the “invisible woman” Ellen Nussey, the novelist’s archivist and Gaskell’s co-conspirator, who “both denied she had collaborated with Elizabeth and complained that she had not been credited enough.” Nussey, who died in 1897, lived to see the parsonage become a tourist attraction. But the gray house, she wrote, was not where the Brontës had lived: “They lived in the free expansive hill moorland—its purple heather, its dells and glens and brooks, the broad sky view, the whistling winds, the snowy expanse, the starry heavens.” Her script might have been written by Elizabeth Gaskell.
It’s no secret that I am a full-time Emerald Fennell hater. I saw Saltburn (2021) and walked out of the theatre in a state of shock at how bad it was. By now, I’m sure you’ve seen the trailer for her upcoming Wuthering Heights adaptation, starring Margot Robbie as Cathy and Jacob Elordi as Heathcliff, set to the sweet sounds of Charli XCX echoing through late 18th-century Yorkshire. I even reread Wuthering Heights to see if I could gain any insight into Fennell’s vision here, and to be honest, I’m more baffled than ever as to how she is going to make this work. [...]
To return to Wuthering Heights, there are rumours that Fennell might not be directly adapting the novel, instead envisioning Robbie’s character as an upper-class woman reading the novel and imagining herself as Cathy. This would explain the bizarre sexual imagery that takes up the vast majority of the trailer. I am more open to her doing something strange with the material than I am to a direct adaptation, as I do not think she will be able to do justice to a direct adaptation. I still doubt I will like it, as I think turning a revered classic into TikTok-style dark romance is cheap and sinister.
I’m not necessarily against somewhat anachronistic adaptations. Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 Romeo + Juliet has a lot of fun with costuming and setting, but retains its reverence for the material through its dialogue. Emerald Fennell will not be able to do justice to the source material, and I doubt she cares enough to do so. Maybe the film will surprise me, but her track record with me is not exactly stellar. Emily Brontë will be rolling in her grave. (Jessie Betts)
Many fans have noticed a parallel between "Invisible String" and Charlotte Brontë's Victorian-era novel "Jane Eyre," when Mr. Rochester finally professes his love for the titular heroine.
"I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you — especially when you are near me, as now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame," Rochester says.
However, the chorus of "Invisible String" also resembles the closing dialogue in "The Sun Also Rises," Ernest Hemingway's wartime novel that draws a tragic line between wanting and having. [...]
"Mad Woman" thematically resembles "Wide Sargasso Sea" by Jean Rhys, a prequel to "Jane Eyre."
The premise of "Mad Woman" can be easily connected to the oft-cited proverb from "The Mourning Bride" by William Congreve: "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."
However, Swift's use of the word "mad," an adjective that can mean both angry and crazy, feels very intentional. Once again, it calls to mind "Jane Eyre."
When Jane finally agrees to marry Mr. Rochester in Brontë's novel, it's revealed that he already has a wife named Bertha Antoinette Mason, who's been locked away in his attic.
"Bertha Mason is mad; and she came of a mad family — idiot and maniacs through three generations! Her mother, the Creole, was both a mad woman and a drunkard!" Rochester tells Jane. "Bertha, like a dutiful child, copied her parent in both points."
Rochester claims he imprisoned Bertha because she lost her mind, painting it as a genetic illness — passed down from her mother, specifically.
Jean Rhys gives Bertha a more sympathetic backstory in her 1966 novel "Wide Sargasso Sea." The prequel reimagines how Antoinette Cosway, a Creole heiress, became "Bertha" in her unhappy marriage to Rochester. In short, she was driven to madness by his patriarchal cruelty.
At one point in the novel, Antoinette scolds her new husband for believing lies about her family.
"I know what he told you. That my mother was mad and an infamous woman and that my little brother who died was born a cretin, an idiot, and that I am a mad girl too," she says.
She adds: "There is always another side, always."
Antoinette's old nurse Christophine also denounces these rumors, accusing Rochester of greed and betrayal: "You want her money but you don't want her. It is in your mind to pretend she is mad."
The themes of "Wide Sargasso Sea" are reflected in "Mad Woman," which fans believe was inspired by the sale of Swift's music recordings without her consent.
"Every time you call me crazy, I get more crazy, what about that? And when you say I seem angry, I get more angry," she sings. "And there's nothing like a mad woman / What a shame she went mad / No one likes a mad woman / You made her like that." [...]
"Evermore" contains possible references to Dickinson and Brontë. [...]
"Evermore" also contains another "Jane Eyre" parallel in the first verse: "Writing letters addressed to the fire."
After Rochester's marriage to Bertha is revealed, Jane flees. She sends letters back to his estate, only to return months later and discover it has burned down.
In "Evermore," this image seems to represent misunderstanding and regret, all the words Swift left unsaid — but for Jane, the fire is a cleansing force. In killing Bertha, the fire allows Jane to marry Rochester and gives her a second chance at love.
The title of "Dear Reader" evokes the most iconic line from "Jane Eyre."
The title "Dear Reader" is another likely reference to "Jane Eyre," which features one of the most beloved lines in English literature: "Reader, I married him."
Like Brontë's protagonist, Swift breaks the fourth wall and addresses her audience directly throughout the song.
However, Swift flips the script with "Dear Reader," the final track on "Midnights (3am Edition)."
Even though many readers consider Jane Eyre a feminist figure, especially by 19th-century standards, she still follows the typical path of women in literature. Much like her contemporaries Elizabeth Bennett and Jo March, all known as independent and headstrong characters, Jane's story still culminates in marriage.
Even today, female leads are expected to land a man by the end of the story.
However, at the end of "Midnights," Swift stands alone. Instead of treating a man as the prize, she keeps the spotlight trained on her own accomplishments, regrets, and lessons learned along the way.
While it's not exactly a triumphant conclusion ("No one sees when you lose when you're playing solitaire"), Swift creates a fascinating tension by evoking Brontë's famous line, only to undermine its implications. (Callie Ahlgrim)
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