Lockdown Spring

Two households, both Locked Down in dignity....

Seasons come and seasons go
One of the luckiest privileges of My Life In Lockdown is having a panoramic meadow and woods within walking distance of the house.  When Spring 2020 started bursting, as the reality of Lockdown began, it became an endless fascination on the same walk to see how colours, shapes and textures changed as Nature resurrected its glorious self, free for the most part from a significant volume of traffic fumes. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one to notice the ecstatic increase in the sounds of birds. Was that illusory? Could the insane variety and volume of chirruping have always been there?  I’ve always delberately walked down (and driven, I admit) roads where I knew blossom trees were exploding in colour; this year my eyes seemed to bathe in blossom more intensely.

Brighter traces of her steps….
Spring reminds me of my Mum (her birthday, her in the garden, her love of flowers – see Nothing is so beautiful as Spring) and every year I think of the ancient Greek proverb A society grows great when old people plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in – a proverb brought to life in 2020 by charity fundraiser, (Captain) Tom Moore. As usual, Chaucer, Shakespeare, the Brontës and Dickens are easy to mine for quotations about Spring but, this year, it feels to me that Charlotte Brontë in Jane Eyre wrote a sentence which is worth clinging onto as Covid-19 continues to spread its fatal droplets:

“Spring drew on…and a greenness grew over those brown beds, which, freshening daily, suggested the thought that Hope traversed them at night, and left each morning brighter traces of her steps.”

Time to stand and stare
I’ll finish this Lockdown Spring riff with a poem I’ve quoted before (here). The “SuperTramp” poet, WH Davies, has had a revival during Lockdown since his words require you to slow down the pace, step away from the rat race, and breathe calmly.

Leisure by W H Davies

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

The Anne Stone

Poetry Pilgrimage
On a Spring day last year we made it to Haworth by 10:30am and, though the weather was warm and sunny, it was not too hot, which was a relief given the pilgrimage we had planned: seven miles tramping north of Haworth with views over the Worth Valley. A seven mile walk is not a stretch for many people but given the ups and downs –  more ups than downs – it certainly got the heart beating and the back sweating….

Circular walk
The walk, designed by Michael Stewart, begins (and ends) at the Brontë Parsonage and partly follows what has become known as “The Railway Children Walk.” The views were part West Yorkshire industrial landscape, part forest, part fields, part moors, part paths, part roads, a series of stiles, a packhorse bridge and an ancient stone bridge, one view after another changing and ever changing.  We drank coffee overlooking a small valley; and had our picnic lunch sitting on a stone wall. Yorkshire placenames in the area are typically evocative: Bridgehouse Beck, Holden Park, Race Moor Lane, True Well Hall, Dean Bridge, Turkey Inn, Pickles Hill, Lumb Beck, Oldfield Gate.

"Take Courage"
The final destination was Parson’s Field near the Parsonage where the wonderful Jackie Kay has penned a tribute to Anne. Charlotte’s and Emily’s stones are elsewhere in the area, but I am very pleased that Anne’s Stone is here because of course her mortal remains lie in Scarborough where she was taken in 1849 whilst suffering from tuberculosis. Contemporary accounts say that her final words to Charlotte were “Take Courage.”

Anne by Jackie Kay
These plain dark sober clothes
Are my disguise. No, I was not preparing
For an early death, yours or mine.
You got me all wrong, all the time.
But sisters, I will have the last word,
Write the last line. I am still at sea.
But if I can do some good in this world
I will right the wrong. I am still young.
And the moor’s winds lift my light-dark hair.
I am still here when the sun goes up,
Still here when the moon drops down.
I do not now stand alone.

Yorkshire Heart Vineyard in Nun Monkton

Grape to glass
The second of two minibreaks near York saw Sally and I nestled in the jigsaw-puzzle-picture village of Nun Monkton near York. We stayed in a cosy AirBnB Garden Cottage – a tucked-away paradise for two with luscious gardens to enjoy. Nun Monkton is a village with a Maypole on The Green and a sense that Agatha Christie's Miss Marple could be living in one of the houses overlooking the main road. Our “main event” was a tour and wine tasting at a successful local business – Yorkshire Heart Vineyard and Brewery. Who knew that a grape to glass vineyard was operating so close to home? The bluff host affably took us through his family’s journey to where they are now and illustrated some of the processes involved from the complexities of vine growing to the personalised bottling. We were with a friendly group and needed a lie down after the generous samplings of fizz, white, red and rosé.

Alice Hawthorn Inn and Beningbrough Hall
A delicious meal (or two) at the Alice Hawthorn Inn (walkable from our AirBnB) meant we were geared up to wander round the miles of walks at nearby Beninbrough Hall and enjoy both the house and the exhibition of portraits of “Yorkshire Achievers”, including folk as various as Simon Armitage, Alan Bennett, Charlotte Brontë, Nicola Adams, Patrick Stewart and Jodie Whitaker.

The Charlotte Stone

Brontë200
The past five years have been a bonanza for admirers of Haworth’s Brontë family with the Brontë200 five-year programme of bicentenaries: the Reverend Patrick Brontë’s invitation to become Haworth’s leading minister in 1819 and the births of Charlotte, Emily, Branwell and Anne (1816, 1817, 1818 and 1820.) As part of the celebrations, author Michael Stewart has devised a series of walks to visit monumental stones positioned in key places across Brontëland and Sally and I recently went on a pilgrimage to find The Charlotte Stone.

bog-burst of pain, fame, love, unluck.
The walk begins in Thornton near the remains of the Bell Chapel where Patrick was curate from 1815 to 1820. Over the road, the current St James’ Church contains an interesting exhibition about the Brontës. You ascend on tracks that pass Thornton Hall, probably the inspiration for Mr Rochester’s house in Jane Eyre. The wild and surprising views above Thornton carry you along high ridges that then descend to the Great Northern Railway trail where you cross the awesome 20-arch Thornton viaduct. The walk ends (inevitably) at the Brontë birthplace, now Emily’s café, and the site of The Charlotte Stone with a poem by Carol Ann Duffy. Officially “Easy,” I would describe the walk as “Strenuous” and we took all day, but that’s cos we included a lengthy picnic stop (or two) with hot bevarages and time to take in the Yorkshire views. 

Charlotte by Carol Ann Duffy
Walking the parlour, round round round the table,
miles; dead sisters stragglers till ghosts; retired wretch,
runty, pale, plain C.Brontë; mouth skewed, tooth-rot.
You see you have prayed to stone; unheard, thwarted.
But would yank your heart through your frock,
fling it as a hawk over the moors, flaysome.
So the tiny handwriting of your mind as you pace.
So not female not male like the wind’s voice.
The vice of this place clamps you; daughter; father
who will not see thee wed, traipsing your cold circles
between needlework, bed, sleep’s double-lock.
Mother and siblings, vile knot under the flagstones, biding.
But the prose seethes, will not let you be, be thus;
bog-burst of pain, fame, love, unluck. True; enough.
So your still doll-steps in the dollshouse parsonage.
So your writer’s hand the hand of a god rending the roof.

Shall Earth No More Inspire Thee

Mother's Day at the Bronte Parsonage Museum

Mother's Day 2019
We chose to be in Haworth on Mother’s Day. It may seem counterintuitive since the Brontë Parsonage was a home bereft of a mother. Mother Maria died soon after the famous family moved to the town of Haworth from Thornton in Bradford. Therefore, the Parsonage (during the years 1820 to 1861) relied for maternal influences on Aunt Branwell for 21 years, on home helps Tabby Aykroyd and Martha Brown and the sisterly love and mutual support of Charlotte, Emily and Anne.

When imagination once runs riot
Every time I walk round the Brontë Parsonage Museum (and I have done it over 20 times now, including the times I took students there) I spot something new or feel something different. This time I found myself imagining the love, rivalry and intensity of the sibling relationships; how they must have been constantly aware of where each other was in the house, the changing dynamics when each of them left for a time, the circumstances that brought each of them back. And the changing atmosphere when, one by one, they died.

Shall Earth No More Inspire Thee
The extra incentive to visit on Mother’s Day was the opportunity to enjoy a unique audio-hiking experience. The Parsonage Museum have commissioned composer Adrian McNally to set to music a selection of Emily Brontë’s poems. Adrian composed by day at Ponden Hall (historically a place that sheltered Branwell, Emily and Anne along with servant Sarah Garrs during the Crow Hill Bog Burst, a thunderstorm and mudslide in 1824.) Adrian then practised and performed the music on the piano you can see today in Mr Brontë’s study (played by Emily during her lifetime, also by Anne.) Rachel and Becky Unthank (folk group, The Unthanks) have performed and recorded the poems and the Parsonage have devised a walk up onto Penistone Hill so you can listen to the songs/poems as you follow a 45-minute climb and descent onto the nearby moor.

Song Cycle in order of audio experience in Haworth
1. Deep deep down in the silent grave
With no-one to mourn above
Here with my knee upon thy stone
I bid adieu to feelings gone
I leave with thee my tears and pain
And rush into the world again

O come again what chains withhold
The steps that used so fleet to be
Come leave thy dwelling dark and cold
Once more to visit me

Was it with the fields of green
Blowing flower and budding tree
With the summer heaven serene
That thou didst visit me?

No ‘t was not the flowery plain
No ‘t was not the fragrant air
Summer skies will come again
But thou wilt not be there

2. She dried her tears and they did smile
To see her cheeks' returning glow
How little dreaming all the while
That full heart throbbed to overflow.

With that sweet look and lively tone
And bright eye shining all the day
They could not guess at midnight lone
How she would weep the time away.

3. I’m happiest when most away
I can bear my soul from its home of clay
On a windy night when the moon is bright
And the eye can wander through worlds of light—

When I am not and none beside—
Nor earth nor sea nor cloudless sky—
But only spirit wandering wide
Through infinite immensity.

4. Shall Earth no more inspire thee,
Thou lonely dreamer now?
Since passion may not fire thee
Shall nature cease to bow?

Thy mind is ever moving
In regions dark to thee;
Recall its useless roving -
Come back and dwell with me.

I know my mountain breezes
Enchant and soothe thee still -
I know my sunshine pleases
Despite thy wayward will.

When day with evening blending
Sinks from the summer sky,
I've seen thy spirit bending
In fond idolatry.

I've watched thee every hour;
I know my mighty sway,
I know my magic power
To drive thy griefs away.

Few hearts to mortals given
On earth so wildly pine;
Yet few would ask a Heaven
More like this Earth than thine.

Then let my winds caress thee;
Thy comrade let me be -
Since nought beside can bless thee
Return and dwell with me.

5. O evening, why is thy light so sad
Why is the sun's last ray so cold?
Hush our smile is as ever glad
But thy heart is growing old.

It's over now; I've known it all;
I'll hide it in my heart no more,
But back again that night recall,
And think the fearful vision o'er.

The evening sun in cloudless shine
Has passed from summer's heaven divine,
And dark the shades of twilight grew,
And stars were in the depth of blue,
And in the heath or mountains far
From human eye and human care,
With thoughtful heart and tearful eye,
I sadly watched that solemn sky.

6. High waving heather 'neath stormy blasts bending,
Midnight and moonlight and bright shining stars;
Darkness and glory rejoicingly blending,
Earth rising to heaven and heaven descending,
Man's spirit away from its drear dungeon sending,
Bursting the fetters and breaking the bars.

All down the mountain sides wild forests lending
One mighty voice to the life-giving wind;
Rivers their banks in their jubilee rending,
Fast through the valleys a reckless course wending,
Wider and deeper their waters extending,
Leaving a desolate desert behind.

Shining and lowering and swelling and dying,
Changing forever from midnight to noon;
Roaring like thunder, like soft music sighing,
Shadows on shadows advancing and flying,
Lightning-bright flashes the deep gloom defying,
Coming as swiftly and fading as soon.

7. Lines
The soft unclouded blue of air,
The earth as golden, green, and fair,
And bright as Eden's used to be,
That air and earth have rested me,

Laid on the grass I lapsed away,
Sank back again to childhood's day;
All harsh thoughts perished, memory mild
Subdued both grief and passion wild.

But did the sunshine even now
That bathed his stern and swarthy brow,
Oh did it wake—I long to know—
One whisper, one sweet dream in him,
One lingering joy that years ago
Had faded—lost in distance dim?

That iron man was born like me,
⁠And he was once an ardent boy;
He must have felt in infancy
⁠The glory of a summer sky.

Though storms untold his mind has tossed,
He cannot utterly have lost
Remembrance of his early home—
So lost that not a gleam may come.

No vision of his mother's face
⁠When she so fondly mild set free
Her darling child from her embrace
⁠To roam till eve at liberty.

Nor of his haunts, nor of the flowers,
⁠His tiny hand would grateful bear,
Returning from the darkening bowers,
⁠To weave into her glossy hair.

I saw the light breeze kiss his cheek,
⁠His fingers 'mid the roses twined;
I watched to mark one transient streak
⁠Of pensive softness shade his mind.

The open window showed around
⁠A glowing park and glorious sky,
And thick woods swelling with the sound
⁠Of nature's mingled harmony.

Silent he sat. That stormy breast
At length I said has deigned to rest;
At length above that spirit flows
The waveless ocean of repose.

Let me draw near, 'twill soothe to view
His dark eyes dimmed with holy dew;
Remorse even now may wake within
And half unchain his soul from sin.

Perhaps this is the destined hour
When Hell shall lose its fatal power,
And Heaven itself shall bend above
To hail the soul redeemed by love.

Unmarked I gazed, my idle thought
Passed with the ray whose shine it caught;
One glance revealed how little care
He felt for all the beauty there.

Oh! crime can make the heart grow old
⁠Sooner than years of wearing woe,
Can turn the warmest bosom cold
⁠As winter wind or polar snow.

8. Remembrance
Cold in the earth - and the deep snow piled above thee.
Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!
Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,
Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?

Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover
Over the mountains on that northern shore;
Resting their wings where heath and fern-leaves cover
That noble heart for ever, ever more?

Cold in the earth - and fifteen wild Decembers,
From those brown hills, have melted into spring:
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers
After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee
While the world's tide is bearing me along;
Other desires and other hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure but cannot do thee wrong!

No later light has lightened up my heaven;
No second morn has ever shone for me:
All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,
All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.

But when the days of golden dreams had perished
And even Despair was powerless to destroy,
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,
Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy.

Then did I check the tears of useless passion -
Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine;
Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten
Down to that tomb already more than mine.

And even yet, I dare not let it languish,
Dare not indulge in Memory's rapturous pain;
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,
How could I seek the empty world again?

9. The night is darkening round me
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me
And I cannot, cannot go.

The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow.
And the storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.

Clouds beyond clouds above me,
Wastes beyond wastes below;
But nothing drear can move me;
I will not, cannot go.

I'll come when thou art saddest,
Laid alone in the darkened room,
When the mad day's mirth has vanished,
And the smile of joy is banished
From evening's chilly gloom.

I'll come when the heart's real feeling
Has entire, unbiased sway,
And my influence o'er thee stealing,
Grief deepening, joy congealing,
Shall bear thy soul away.

Listen! 'tis just the hour,
The awful time for thee.
Dost thou not feel upon thy soul
A flood of strange sensations roll,
Forerunners of a sterner power,
Heralds of me?

I would have touched the heavenly key
That spoke alike of bliss and thee;
I would have woke the entrancing song,
But its words died upon my tongue.
And then I knew that hallowed strain
Would never speak of joy again,
And then I felt . . .

The night is darkening round me
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me
And I cannot, cannot go.
And I cannot, cannot go.
And I cannot, cannot go.

Walking firmly over stones

Brontë birth anniversaries
I am living in a time of Brontëphilia. The Brontë Parsonage at Haworth begun a slew of anniversaries last year with the bicentenary of Charlotte’s birth and is continuing to celebrate milestones over the next few years.

• 2016 – 200 years since Charlotte’s birth 
• 2017 – 200 years since Branwell’s birth 
• 2018 – 200 years since Emily’s birth 
• 2019 – 200 years since the Reverend Patrick took up the role of pastor in Haworth 
• 2020 – 200 years since Anne’s birth

The number of labels on the right link to earlier blogs I’ve written about the Brontës. Like Shakespeare, their works and lives, are bottomless pits of fascination. Sally and I went to see Bolton Octagon’s production of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, adapted by Deborah McAndrew and directed by Elizabeth Newman. The set was beautifully versatile, designed by Amanda Stoodley and the lighting and sound wutheringly atmospheric. Helen Graham, the tenant of the title, prompts malicious gossip in the nearby town. Will the town ever come to understand the headstrong tenant? Is she truly a widow? Who is the father of her son? What is her relationship with her landlord? Like the novel, the adaptation used the bold narrative device of the truth pouring out of the pages of Helen’s journal that, in a theatrical flourish, appeared just before the interval. Any road up, the production was so enjoyable we booked again to see it at the Theatre Royal in York where we were even closer to the actors’ expressions – and Sancho the eager dog!

Subversive work

Published in 1848 (under the male pseudonym Acton Bell) The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was an instant and scandalous success. One contemporary reviewer proclaimed it “revolting, coarse, disgusting” and Anne’s own sister, Charlotte, prevented its re-publication after Anne’s untimely death. Is it the vivid portrayal of the lecherous and drunken husband and the debauchery of the aristocrats that offended? Or the issues surrounding the morality of bringing up a child in abusive circumstances? Or the blatant refusal of Helen to be a meek dutiful wife? Or the portrayal of a woman who refuses to compromise her principles? Or the class-upsetting thought of a “rich widow” attracting the admiration of a working class Yorkshire farmer and she going after him as an equal? Does the novel deserve its reputation as an early feminist tract? (Probably yes in answer to all these questions, in my view, and a masterpiece in consequence.)

A uniformly superb cast, beautifully choreographed, skillfully distinguished
Elizabeth Newman coaxed terrific performances out of the cast, some of whom played two roles effectively:

• Pheobe Pryce as the complicated, religious, determined, straight-talking Helen Graham/Huntingdon
• Michael Peavoy as the hard-working, steadfast, jealous, dogged, stubborn but lovable Gilbert Markham
• Nicôle Lecky as Rose Markham, loyal and industrious, sometimes susceptible to gossip; and as the dazzling and amoral Lady Lowborough
• Susan Twist as Mrs Markham, Yorkshire mother, blind to her own son’s faults and eager to be hospitable to all; and as courageous servant, Rachel
• Marc Small as the charismatic, authoritative but doomed drunken rake Arthur Huntingdon
• Colin Connor as the hypocritical pastor Reverend Millward; and as the hapless toff Lord Lowborough
• Natasha Davidson as the flighty Eliza Millward; and as the abused Millicent Hattersley
• Philip Starnier as the enigmatic landlord Lawrence; and as the weak-willed Ralph Hattersley
• + a variety of child actors as the younger Arthur, crucial in scenes showing the contrast between Arthur Huntingdom and Gilbert Markham
• + a variety of canine performers as Sancho the dog (woof!)

My favourite quotations
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall doesn’t contain some of the rock-hewn language of the works of Charlotte and Emily, but Deborah McAndrew’s adaptation included a couple of my favourite quotations from Anne's magnificent novel:

I maintain that if she were more perfect, she would be less interesting.

If you would have your son to walk honourably through the world, you must not attempt to clear the stones from his path, but teach him to walk firmly over them - not insist upon leading him by the hand, but let him learn to go alone.

I would rather have your friendship than the love of any other woman in the world.

No coward soul is mine

Invading a sister’s privacy….

According to contemporary accounts it was the discovery of her sister Emily’s poems that first prompted Charlotte Brontë to push the girls into sending some of their writing for publication. Charlotte, apparently, “accidentally lighted on a (manuscript) volume of verse, in my sister Emily’s handwriting” and thought them “nor at all like the poetry women generally write. I thought them condensed and terse, vigorous and genuine. To my ear they had also a peculiar music, wild, melancholy and elevating.” Emily was furious and, at first, refused consent but relented after a few days when Anne supplied some of her own verses and a plot was hatched for the sisters to remain anonymous.

Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell

In the biographical notice that Charlotte wrote for the 1850 edition of Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey she explained:

“Averse to personal publicity we veiled our own names under those of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell; the ambiguous choice being dictated by a sort of conscientious scruple at assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because – without at the time suspecting that our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called “feminine,” – we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice….”

Fine quaint spirit

In the first review of the Brontë’s poems, published in the July 4th Athenaeum, the reviewer thinks Ellis (Emily) is the best writer of the “three brothers” being “a fine, quaint spirit” and who possesses “an evident power of wing that may reach heights not here attempted.” The poems of Ellis “convey an impression of originality beyond what his contributions to these volumes embody.” Sadly, several magazines that received copies did not bother to review the volume and only two copies were sold. Less than 10 copies of the original 1846 print-run survive, but a reprinting in 1850 with additional poems curated by Charlotte fared better (cashing-in on the success of Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.) Emily’s poetry has certainly stood the test of time.

Emily Dickinson apparently requested that No coward soul is mine be read at her funeral

The steadfast rock of immortality

Emily’s most famous poem is probably the following, published after her death and containing an elemental and mind-expanding account of “universes” (cheeky plural!) that exist inside and outside the imagination. Apparently Emily Dickinson asked for this poem to be read at her funeral. I can understand why – it is technically perfect with its formal patterns and rhymes but it is audacious, too, with its wild use of verbs (shine, arming, anchored, animates, pervades, broods, changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, rears, render) with a glut of verbs in stanza 5. What does it mean? The voice in the poem is courageous at facing the world with a grounded self-defining confidence in the face of life’s uncertainties and trivial concerns. The voice embraces doubt, embraces nature, embraces death, and embraces immortality. God in this poem seems to be inside Emily Brontë, inside in the form of her own self-worth, her mother, her dead sisters, her brother, the Yorkshire landscape. The key phrase in this poem for me is “creates and rears” – the creation and the rearing of life, the actions of a mother; the creation and rearing of works of art that will “never be destroyed.”

Though earth and man were gone / And suns and universes ceased to be....

If Charlotte is to be believed, this is Emily’s final piece of writing

No coward soul is mine,
No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere:
I see Heaven’s glories shine,
And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

O God within my breast,
Almighty, ever-present Deity!
Life that in me has rest,
As I undying Life have power in thee!

Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men’s hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as withered weeds,
Or idle froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by thine infinity;
So surely anchored on
The steadfast rock of immortality.

With wide-embracing love
Thy spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And thou were left alone,
Every existence would exist in thee.

There is not room for Death,
Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou thou art Being and Breath,
And what thou art may never be destroyed.

Art work by Chrissie Freeth, Tapestry Weaver

"Her strong imperious will"

Apologies to the copyright holder of some photo I posted in a collage somewhere in this blog. I removed what I thought was the copyrighted infringement but have been informed again that something else needs removing (maybe I removed the wrong one first time?) so I have removed all the collages. It would have been more helpful if the person whose copyright I had infringed had just left a message on the blog, specifying which picture it was. As it is, I'll leave this as an illustration-free post. 

Invisible No More

All members of the Brontë family have their supporters and detractors. Around anniversaries or around new TV or film productions, commentators in The Media try to whip readers and viewers into declaring for Team Charlotte or Team Anne in pursuit of some fresh angle. The men at the Haworth Parsonage (father Patrick, brother Branwell and short-time husband of Charlotte, Arthur Bell Nicholls) often receive dismissive attention or downright hostility. One of the things I found impressive about Sally Wainwright’s fictional biographical film about the Brontës, To Walk Invisible, was its atmosphere of a busy town with family, servants, neighbours, acquaintances and employers swirling around the talented sisters and influencing them just as much as they influenced each other. Haworth was by no means a backwater in the mid-Victorian period. Prompting this blog is the news that Sally Wainwright is coming to the Ilkley Literature Festival to talk about To Walk Invisible and Sally-partner-wife-friend was quick off the mark to get tickets so I’m looking forward to that.

“Team Emily”

It’s no surprise that, if a Hogwarts Sorting Hat were to hover over me, I’d be in Team Emily. I’ve already declared that Charlotte’s Villette is my personal favourite of the Brontë novels and I have family reasons to have a deeply-felt admiration for Anne’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. The mythic archetypes and tropes of Charlotte’s Jane Eyre are lodged deep within the DNA of all readers (and writers, for that matter.) But the writer of Wuthering Heights, and indeed Wuthering Heights itself, exercises my imagination and passion above all other facets of Brontëana. (Shirley, The Professor and Agnes Grey are still in my to re-read pile; in fact I think I’ve never read The Professor or Agnes Grey….must put that right!)

The tallest Brontë

Some aspects of Emily Brontë’s biography are agreed upon because of the consistency of the evidence:

• she always seemed tall – and taller than the other siblings
• she was the fifth of six children, her two eldest sisters dying in childhood
• she liked walking
• she was stubborn and willful
• she loved her bulldog Keeper who, when Emily died, “followed her funeral to the vault” and, according to Charlotte was “lying in a pew couched at our feet while the burial service was being read"
• my writer friend, Kerry Madden, reminds me of the story we heard when visiting the Parsonage in May 2014, that, when returning from Anne’s funeral in Scarborough, the Parsonage dogs bounded out to greet the arrivals but Keeper howled when only Charlotte appeared and proceeded to whimper outside Emily’s door for days to come
• she had only nine months of formal education in two stints aged 6 and 17
• at Cowan Bridge School (age 6) her report card reads Emily Brontë… reads very prettily and works a little 
• her father gave her, her brother and surviving sisters a box of toy soldiers in 1826 and this fired their imaginations
• in childhood she wrote chronicles of Gondal with Anne, whilst Charlotte and Branwell wrote the imaginary history of Angria

Strong imperious will

• she spent some time (unhappily) in Brussels learning to be a teacher before returning for her Aunt Branwell’s funeral (which she missed)
• the headmaster of the school in Brussels, Monsieur Heger, wrote of Emily: “She should have been a man – a great navigator. Her powerful reason would have deduced new spheres of discovery from the old; and her strong imperious will would never have been daunted by opposition or difficulty; never have given way but with life.” 
• she learned some German
• she liked reading Sir Walter Scott, Shelley and Byron
• she enjoyed reading the lurid (and often violent) tales in Blackwood’s Magazine
• her poetry was admired by Charlotte and Anne
• she put out a fire at the Parsonage after Branwell upset a lighted candle
• she self-cauterised a wound from a dog bite
• she attended the funeral of her brother in September 1848
• she died of TB six days before Christmas Day in 1848.

Charlotte lived just long enough to understand the Brontë novels were gaining some critical acclaim and popularity, but not to appreciate just how phenomenal their popularity would still be in 2017. What would Emily have made of tourists running about the moors shouting “Heathcliff….Cathy….”?