During the Sixties and Seventies, my speeches about Women and the Novel often included long lists of female predecessors who had had no children, and who did indeed seem to “sublimate” their creative activity into writing (partly because no other professions were open to them): Jane Austen, George Eliot, the Brontes, Dorothy Richardson, Willa Cather, Katherine Mansfield, Virginia Woolf (whose 1931 talk on “Professions for Women” gave Le Guin her eponymous fisherwoman’s daughter). My interest here was largely sociological. I was interested in pointing out the changing demographic of women writers, as authors such as Fay Weldon, Nell Dunn, Margaret Forster and I began to emerge in the Sixties.

Next, Amelia was cast for the role of Anne Brontë in Frances O’Connor’s biographical film Emily, her first movie. “That was an interesting experience,” she smiles. “I was still getting used to the dynamics of film-making and I made sure I took it all in.” (Becky Donaldson)

It sounds like there are a lot of little personal pieces of yourself in Rosie. When you pull from personal aspects of your life, are you aware while you’re doing it? Are you intentionally looking to explore those things in a story, or is it only upon reflection that you realize they’re there?

HALLIWELL-HORNER: A bit of both. That’s very interesting. Certain things, I’ve found challenging throughout life, like standing up for yourself. I think anyone can relate to that, so I thought that was an important theme to put in. Also, with grief, my dad died when I was quite young and I felt quite embarrassed of my feelings. I didn’t know how to process it. So, I thought, can we lightly touch on it with the character? But then, after I wrote it, I was like, “Oh, my God, you’ve written the exact scene that’s happened to you. I gave the story to my publisher, and they give you loads and loads of notes that make you go, “Oh, my goodness.” She said, “I want you to do two things. I want you to write a new chapter one with backstory to show the reader where she came from and what happened before she got to Bloodstone.” And so, I did. I wrote that classroom scene where the teacher comes in, and that’s exactly what happened to me. The only difference was that I was looking at a different book. I was looking at Hamlet, and she’s looking at Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. That’s the only difference. It wasn’t until after that I realized what I’d done. It was glaring me in the face. I was like, “Oh, my goodness, talk about writing what you know.” Obviously, you manipulate it a little to fit the character and the story, but the feelings and the direction are there. (Christina Radish)

WHAT SOULS ARE MADE OF BY TASHA SURI

Sometimes, lost things find their way home…

Yorkshire, North of England, 1786. As the abandoned son of a lascar―a sailor from India―Heathcliff has spent most of his young life maligned as an “outsider.” Now he’s been flung into an alien life in the Yorkshire moors, where he clings to his birth father’s language even though it makes the children of the house call him an animal, and the maids claim he speaks gibberish.

Catherine is the younger child of the estate’s owner, a daughter with light skin and brown curls and a mother that nobody talks about. Her father is grooming her for a place in proper society, and that’s all that matters. Catherine knows she must mold herself into someone pretty and good and marriageable, even though it might destroy her spirit.

As they occasionally flee into the moors to escape judgment and share the half-remembered language of their unknown kin, Catherine and Heathcliff come to find solace in each other. Deep down in their souls, they can feel they are the same.

But when Catherine’s father dies and the household’s treatment of Heathcliff only grows more cruel, their relationship becomes strained and threatens to unravel. For how can they ever be together, when loving each other―and indeed, loving themselves―is as good as throwing themselves into poverty and death? (Kelly Jensen)

Books bred out of books are typically correctives and rebukes. In Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys’s reply to Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, what is corrected is an absence, the life story of the first Mrs Rochester, and what is rebuked is the English exceptionalism and racism of the author and her characters. (Carlo Gébler)

Biographie fictionnelle, mais bien documentée, centrée sur la plus méconnue des sœurs Brontë, Brontëana mélange habilement la vie de ces trois femmes et les mondes imaginaires que celles-ci façonnent pour s’émanciper de leur condition. Ce mélange s’avère particulièrement heureux, tant l’œuvre des Brontë se nourrit de leurs expériences, ce dont l’album témoigne très bien. Paulina Spucches utilise le pinceau pour donner de la chair à ces mondes, et n’hésite pas à recourir à l’imagination : c’est ainsi qu’un esprit rend visite à la petite Anne Brontë, et que la mort est figurée de manière métaphorique. La jeune autrice excelle dans les dégradés de couleurs, tantôt chaudes, tantôt froides, et dans la conception de « paysages état d’âmes ». Il se dégage ainsi une véritable poésie de ces planches, où la douceur des trois sœurs contraste avec la violence du monde.

Brontëana s’attache à montrer qu’en dépit de sa fragilité supposée, Anne Brontë s’émancipe du cocon que ses sœurs – et en particulier Charlotte – ont conçu pour elles, jusqu’à devenir une autrice subversive, capable de choquer la bonne société anglaise avec ce qui est considéré comme l’un des premiers romans féministes. Fondé sur la déchéance de son frère Branwell, La Recluse de Wildfell Hall raconte l’histoire d’une femme qui quitte son mari abusif et débauché, qui doit subvenir aux besoins de son jeune fils. Le fait qu’une femme quitte ainsi son mari est jugé choquant par la société britannique du milieu du XIXe siècle. L’exploration des liens entre les trois sœurs Brontë – qui n’est pas sans nuages, et l’autrice interroge notamment le choix de Charlotte de ne pas republier La Recluse de Wildfell Hall après la mort de sa cadette, la condamnant de fait à une forme d’oubli – met en évidence la force de la sororité pour franchir les murs qu’imposent leur condition de femme dans la société corsetée de l’Angleterre de l’époque victorienne.

Les belles planches de Paulina Spucches, une autrice assurément à suivre, offrent un hommage poétique à une écrivaine longtemps restée dans l’ombre de ses deux aînées. (Florian Moine) (Translation)

“Cime tempestose” di Emily Brontë (1847)

Oggi è un classico della letteratura, ma quando uscì firmato Ellis Bell, non venne accolto favorevolmente dalla critica. Al centro del romanzo la passione violenta e assoluta di Heathcliff per Catherine che a causa dei sentimenti di gelosia e di vendetta del protagonista si rivelerà distruttiva. Un thriller gotico e noir dal clima cupo che scende nelle profondità dell’anima. Non a caso, solo nel Novecento, quando la società si aprì alla psicoanalisi, l’opera di Emily Brontë venne considerata un capolavoro. (Letizia Rittatore Vonwiller) (Translation)

“Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Brontë

Set against the moody backdrop of 19th-century England, this gothic romance chronicles the life of an orphaned girl as she grapples with love, morality, and self-respect. From her turbulent childhood marked by cruelty and neglect to her employment as a governess at the mysterious Thornfield Hall, our protagonist’s journey is one of resilience and discovery.

As she forms a bond with the brooding Mr. Rochester, dark secrets from his past threaten to overshadow their growing affection. Tackling themes of class, sexuality, religion, and feminism, Charlotte Brontë’s masterpiece not only offers a captivating love story but also serves as a poignant critique of the societal constraints of her time. Rich in depth and character development, the novel remains a testament to the indomitable spirit of its heroine. (Soham Singh)