Emily Brontë and Parmenides

Maddalena De Leo writes:

On 7^th February an interesting meeting in English about Parmenides was held in Ascea-Velia, Italy, just the place where this ancient Greek philosopher was born and from which Eleatic School thought spread. The event was organized by Parmenideum (www. Parmenideum.com), an association whose purpose is the increasing of knowledge of the Eleatic School of Philosophy and, not least, of all its contemporary ramifications in intellectual life, science, and culture.

There were some lectures in the morning and a discussion workshop with Parmenideum’s founder, Mr Habeeb Marouf (from London) as a chairman. A concert was also held in the evening with Belgian cello player Mr Nicolas Deletaille and multimedia music composed by Mr René Mogensen. During the meeting our BS member Maddalena De Leo read the following considerations which drew the audience’s interest and attention to our beloved Brontë theme:

A SHORT NOTE linking an aspect of Parmenides thought to Emily Brontë’s poetic.

   As a long time scholar of Emily Brontë, the famous English author who lived in the mid-nineteenth century, I found in one of her poems a useful hint to today’s discussion about Parmenides Being/Not Being principle.

   I refer to the last two stanzas in the famous poem No coward soul is mine, probably written in 1845 and seemingly one of the last in her production but surely Emily Brontë’s crowning poetic peak and the consummation of her thought.

Though Earth and moon were gone

And suns and universes ceased to be

And Thou wert left alone

Every Existence would exist in Thee.

There is no room for Death

Nor atom that his might could render void

Since Thou art Being and Breath

And what Thou art may never be destroyed.

The Brontës' biographer May Sinclair was the first and maybe the only critic to underline for us in her work The Three Brontës (1912) that these stanzas can be considered as a direct link to ‘one of the most ancient of all metaphysical poems, the poem of Parmenides on being’ so referring to Parmenides De Natura, 28 B8, vv. 19-25:

[Greek: pos d' an epeit apoloito pelon, pos d' an ke genoito;

  ei ge genoit, ouk est', oud ei pote mellei esesthai.

         *       *       *       *       *

  tos, genesis men apesbestai kai apiotos olethros.

  oude diaireton estin, epei pan estin homoion

  oude ti pae keneon....

                         ....eon gar eonti pelazei.]

   Surely Emily Brontë never heard of Parmenides in her remote Yorkshire village but her deism in this poem is conveyed towards an entity whose existence is the Being versus all the rest that is in any case a Not Being and we understand this in her last verse in particular ‘What thou art may never be destroyed’ where the author’s convinction is asserted as an absolute truth just following Parmenides path.

                                                                              

                                                                                

Reference texts:

1.     1 Brontë Emily, Poesie, opera completa, edited by Anna Luisa Zazo, Oscar Classici Mondadori, 1997

2.     2 Sinclair May, The Three Brontës, 1912

The Radical at Red House

In the pictures - Red House and 'Mary Taylor' at the piano.

David and Imelda Marsden write:

A interesting exhibition - Mary Taylor - An Independent Yorkshire Woman - is on now at the Red House Museum in Gomersal and not to be missed. It finishes on 18 April.

Mary Taylor was Charlotte Brontë's schoolfriend, and an inspiration. Charlotte visited and stayed at Red House, the family home of the Taylors and depicted the family in her novel Shirley.There are various items in the exhibition relating to Charlotte.

Mary Taylor was a woman who lived a unusually independent and adventurous life for a woman of her time, and was a pioneering feminist in the nineteenth century. She taught boys English in Germany, emigrated to New Zealand and started a business, then, after making a good living, returned to Gomersal.

She was the leader on mountaineering expeditions for women in Europe, and wrote magazine articles and a novel Miss Miles : A Tale of Yorkshire Life Sixty Years Ago. The exhibition gives the visitor a real insight into Yorkshire history, and gave us some new facts we did not know about. Well done to the Curator and staff at Red House for an informative and interesting exhibition.

And well done to the Parsonage Museum for sucessfully acquiring items at the two recent auctions. We are looking forward to viewing them.

To read about Mary Taylor in Wellington, New Zealand, click THE CUBA STREET MEMORIES PROJECT.

Reopening 1 February

The Parsonage is preparing to reopen on Monday 1 February following a redevelopment project which has been supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

The project began with a series of events aimed at encouraging local people in and around Haworth to find out more about the museum and its collections and contribute their ideas on how its presentations might be improved. This included a free local residents’ day and several open evenings for representatives of local community groups and local residents. The open evenings included guided tours of the museum and library, and an opportunity to see items from the museum’s collection relating to the history of Haworth and its nineteenth-century community.

The work that has been done in the museum following this public consultation includes new interpretation, which will help tell visitors the Brontës’ story and the story of their home. There will also be new object casing and displays around the house, which will include some remarkable new acquisitions to the museum’s collection including Emily Brontë’s mahogany artist’s box and her geometry set recently bought at auction in London. The box contains ceramic mixing dishes, remnants of paint, quill nibs, a paint tray, sealing wax with miniature envelopes and a glass bottle. The museum has also purchased a special miniature poetry manuscript by Charlotte Brontë. The two microscopic poems written by Charlotte in 1829 are signed “U. T” (“us two”) which suggests that they were jointly produced by another Bronte sibling, possibly Branwell. Neither of these items have been on public display before.

The museum also appealed to local people to get in touch if they believed they had items that may once have been owned by the Brontë family. As a result several intriguing items came to light which will also feature in the new displays. These Include a hymn sheet from Haworth church dating from the Brontë period and three bound volumes of the Family Economist once owned by Tabitha Brown, former Brontë domestic assistant and sister to Martha Brown – former Brontë servant.

We’re delighted with the improvements to the Parsonage and sure that these will enhance the experience of visiting. The new casing and displays are allowing us to show more of the treasures of the museum’s collection and more of the collection that relates to the Haworth community in which the Brontës lived. It’s wonderful to be able to exhibit new items which have come to us through the generosity of local people. We’ve also tried to create the new displays in such a way as to make the Parsonage feel even more like a domestic home and so we hope people will come along and see the new look and enjoy some of the wonderful new displays.

Andrew McCarthy
Director, Brontë Parsonage Museum

Serve on Council?

Paid-up members of the Brontë Society are invited to serve on Council. This is made up of twenty-one Ordinary Members and three Honorary Officers - Secretary, Treasurer and Publications Officer.

Ordinary Members of Council are elected for a three-year term and may serve three consecutive three-year terms before being required to stand down for one year. Honorary Officers are elected annually and are required to stand down after three consecutive one-year terms. In June 2010, all three current Honorary Officers and one Ordinary Member will complete their maximum terms and will be standing down. Four further Ordinary Members have completed their three-year terms and must stand down, but will be eligible for re-election.

Nominations are invited for the Honorary Officer posts and for up to fifteen Ordinary Members to serve on Council (which meets regularly in Haworth) for the periods 2010 - 2011 (Honorary Officers) and (Ordinary Members).

There is no financial reward: the Society is a charity. Travel expenses for attendance at meetings are paid.

If you are interested, check that you have been a fully paid-up member for at least one year, make sure that you have a proposer and a seconder (who must also be paid-up members) and compose a statement of up to one hundred words describing yourself. You will also need a recent passport-sized photo. Your nomination must reach the Council Administrator no later than Saturday 27 February. If you have not already received a nomination form, contact the Parsonage.

The election will be by ballot only.

Don't Leave Him Now

Don't Leave Him Now is a song written and performed by Val Wiseman and Brian Dee, one of the songs from the Brontë tribute album Keeping The Flame Alive. See www.brontelegacy.com


You can listen to it now in an improved high definition version on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vr6qY4ydanw


Alternatively, you can google: Don't Leave him Now Val Wiseman and it will also take you to the YouTube site.

Orphans

Helen Kirk writes:

I am currently doing an MA in Victorian Studies and am putting together my dissertation proposal which I am intending to do on the portrayal of orphans in the works of the Brontës and how this links to their own experiences of mother-loss and isolation.

I was wondering if you knew of any links that the Brontë Sisters had with regards to orphans as they grew older, i.e. any references to any of them visiting Coram's Foundling Hospital for example. Any advice or tips on where to look would be much appreciated.

(Reply to email address on the right - or click on comments below)

A literary prize

Buon Natale a tutti i nostri lettori in Italia!

Maddalena De Leo from the Italian Section of the Brontë Society sent us this article:

A LITERARY PRIZE TO Prof. MADDALENA DE LEO for her article about a comparison she drew between Wuthering Heights and a novel by the Italian writer Francesco Bruno

On 18^th December 2009 Professor Maddalena De Leo from Ascea Marina (SA) was awarded a literary prize for an article in Italian she wrote and published in an Italian newspaper and on the Internet dealing with a comparison between an aspect of Wuthering Heights, the famous novel by Emily Brontë, and Paese di eriche e ginestre, the only novel written by the Italian critic and journalist Francesco Bruno who lived in Naples during the first part of the twentieth century.

Every year a journalistic prize and a cultural evening are held to commemorate this literary man by his still living relatives. The seventh edition of the event was held this year in Naples in the elegant Red Room of Libreria Guida, a very antique and renown bookshop in the very historical centre of the city. It was a delighting evening in which three important Italian journalists gave lectures on Futurism and Francesco Bruno’s critical contribute to it at the beginning of the last century.

Our BS member Maddalena De Leo received a plaque and a cheque by Mr Francesco D’Episcopo, Professor of Italian Literature at University Federico II in Naples and the approval and the economical contribution of the direct heirs of the late journalist and critic, Mr Francesco Jr. and Enrico Bruno and their mother, Mrs. Maria Novi Bruno.

Prof. De Leo explained to the public what inspired her to draw so strange a parallel between two worlds apparently so different, the North of England and the South of Italy, eventually the word ‘heather’ used by both the authors to describe their birth landscape. By going on in the reading of Bruno’s novel, Mrs. De Leo realized instead that the real parallel in the two novels was to be found in the inmost nature and the different fate of their main characters and so she worked on this idea.

You can read here the winning article by Professor De Leo translated into English by herself:

ARCHANGELS AND DEVILS IN LITERATURE, A REVERSE PATH

by Maddalena De Leo

Recently I came across a rare book that is virtually unknown even to Italian readers. Written by Francesco Bruno, an eminent journalist, critic, and essayist this book was a unique and fascinating discovery. Entitled "A Country of Heather and Gorse" the work is nearly impossible to find in either bookshops or libraries.

Mr. Bruno's life spanned a good deal of the twentieth century lasting from 1899-1982. Snatched by death just before completing the book it was never given a conclusion. It is my intention through this article to do just that. We would. perhaps, never even have heard of this work if it wasn't for his son Elio. A journalist and critic in his own right we owe a great deal of the preservation of this classic to him. Another tireless promoter of Mr. Bruno's work is Professor Francesco D'Episcopo. We are indebted to him for keeping the literary works of Bruno alive.

The novel takes place in a rural setting, so familiar to the works of his contemporaries. It is reminiscent of Deledda and Verga where love of the land and pride in property ownership form the basis of so many of their stories. The landscape forms a backdrop against which even the birds are given human-like qualities. These fluttering birds actually seem to not only witness but in fact understand human affairs.

The title of this work could easily be "A Country of Thrushes and Alder" because of its location. Set in Ascea-Velia a lovely Mediterranean region the naturaly beauty of the land is vibrantly depicted. It is in fact the birthplace of Francesco Bruno and he has very tender feelings for it.

There are several references to the harsh sun of the south which causes devastating droughts. He also alludes to historical facts which occurred during the seventeenth century. There are allusions as well to social injustice and outright piracy all of which Mr. Bruno has accurately captured.

His descriptions of plant life is also quite captivating. Heather, like the plant broom, both grow in cold, harsh, remote and unproductive lands. The author's protagonist, Archangel, like the plant heather can survive and even thrive in the most difficult environment. His life, like that of the heather plant endures in a sterile and barren environment.

Archangel is a devout person trusting in Providence just like the characters created by Manzoni. He is an asset to his fellow countrymen lending support whenever he can. This goodness to others is not reflected in how the character views himself. Archangel is in fact dissatisfied with his sterile existence and is increasingly worried about the fact that he has no children.

The psychological imagery employed by Mr. Bruno is also utilized in one of the world's most famous novels "Wuthering Heights." The "land of heather" in this case refers to the fertile and highly imaginative mind of its author Emily Brontë. In "Wuthering Heights" birds along with harsh winds and a barren landscape form a relationship to mankind's suffering.

The character Heathcliff is an evil, selfish, and dominating man. He is the antithesis of Bruno's Archangel. Even though Archangel is a good man and Heathcliff an evil one they both share a similar fate. Both men are disappointed by the paths their lives have taken.

Both men adopt the false belief that if they work hard and protect their land they will get whatever they want from life. Both live in homes that are isolated from the rest of the world. Bruno's "Casa Romita" perfectly corresponds to Bronte's "Heights."

Bruno tells us at the end of chapter two "the story of men is changeable and cannot be contained by any rational force." Only death will draw a veil of oblivion over the inevitably stormy passions experienced in these so far off lands, one sunny and the other solitary and exposed to winds. Only by his lonely and irreligious death the diabolical Heathcliff will be able to obtain, although superficially, that peace he never enjoyed in life, and certainly for the Archangel a reverse path will be accomplished based again on a melancholy resignation and an acceptance. So in the end both Archangel and Heathcliff await death as the final and true peace.

I believe this may well be the never written yet inevitable conclusion to this enigmatic novel.

Below, Professor Francesco D’Episcopo presents a plaque and a cheque:

Commemoration in Dewsbury

Dewsbury Minster is to celebrate the arrival of Rev Patrick Brontë in December 1809 at what was then called All Saints Church with a service on Sunday 6 December at 6.30pm

The Bishop of Wakefield, the Rt Rev Stephen Platten, will lead the commemoration.

For further details telephone 01924 457057.

From Imelda and David Marsden

Help raise the funds

News release

The Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth, West Yorkshire has been stunned by news of two auctions in as many weeks, both featuring Brontë treasures of a kind that have not been seen at public auction in many years.

On 4 December, Christies in New York will host an auction of the William E Self library which includes numerous Brontë lots. The most significant of these is an extremely rare first edition of Emily’s only novel, Wuthering Heights. This is the copy owned by her sister Charlotte, who revised the novel for a new edition published after her sister’s death, and contains her pencilled-in corrections. There are also three lively letters from Charlotte Brontë to Henry Nussey, brother of her close friend Ellen Nussey. The letters include Charlotte’s reflections on family, work, the relationship between men and women, and marriage. One of the letters is Charlotte’s response to Nussey’s proposal of marriage. The sale also includes a miniature poetry manuscript produced in childhood by Charlotte.

These lots alone are expected to fetch in the region of $280,000 or £170,000 and the museum is desperately trying to raise funds to ensure that these items are returned to a public collection in the UK and not lost to a private collector.

It’s rare for such significant items to come onto the open market and there’s no doubt that these are items which are of such great significance to our cultural and artistic heritage that they should certainly be thought of as national treasures. It would be very sad indeed if these treasures were not repatriated or were lost to a private collection. We feel that these are things which belong here in Haworth and we’re appealing for people to get in touch if they can help us raise the funds to make sure this doesn’t happen.

Andrew McCarthy

Director, Brontë Parsonage Museum

This will be followed on 17 December by an auction at Sotheby’s in London, which features items from the Law Collection and includes Charlotte’s mahogany writing desk, a pencil drawing by Emily, and an extremely rare surviving personal possession of Emily’s, her artist’s box and geometry set. As an independent charity the museum is constantly trying to raise funds to support its work, a fundamental part of which is seeking to acquire such important Brontë material and making it accessible to the public.

It’s very difficult for us to compete in a market where these items can fetch such high prices and we need the support of organizations and individuals to make sure that they are returned to Haworth where they surely belong. If anyone feels they can make a financial contribution to help us, this would be very much appreciated

Andrew McCarthy

Director, Brontë Parsonage Museum

Click for Daily Telegraph report

Gyles Brandreth standing on his head

Richard Wilcocks writes:

Thanks, George and several others, for your enquiries about our President's gymnastic abilities. Yes, he can stand on his head, and he did so in York. He did it for the One Show on television not so long ago as well........see this post for the photo.

The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë

Syrie James writes:

Exciting news! The Women’s National Book Association has named my novel, The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë, one of the Great Group Reads of 2009. I am delighted because I truly believe that Charlotte’s story will open up lively discussions about a host of timely and provocative topics.

The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë, by Avon/HarperCollins Publishing in July 2009, is the result of many years of intense research and writing. As a devoted Brontë scholar, I was intrigued by how many of Charlotte's own life experiences found their way into her novels, and I found immense pleasure in bringing her true story to life on the page.

The novel begins with an impassioned proposal from Charlotte’s father's curate, Arthur Bell Nicholls, who has carried a silent torch for Charlotte for more than seven years. Charlotte greatly disliked Mr Nicholls when they first met, but her feelings have evolved and changed over the years. Does she love him? Does she wish to marry him?

Seeking answers, Charlotte takes up her pen to examine the truth about her life. In these pages, she exposes her deepest feelings and desires, her triumphs and shattering personal disappointments, her scandalous, secret passion for the man she can never have—the man who was the basis for all the heroes in her books, including Mr Rochester in Jane Eyre —and the intimate details of her compelling relationship with Mr Nicholls, the man she eventually comes to love with all her heart.

At the same time, we learn of Charlotte’s relationship with her family, the inspiration behind their work, and their evolution as novelists. Although Charlotte and her sisters Emily and Anne did not have a single connection to the literary world, and lived in an era when women rarely saw their work in print — and despite their difficult circumstances at home, including an alcoholic brother and a father who was going blind — all three women became published authors at the same time. I cannot think of any other family in history who have achieved such an extraordinary feat, and I wanted to celebrate that and reveal how it happened.

As part of my research I made an extended visit to the Brontë Parsonage Museum. I owe a debt of gratitude to Ann Dinsdale, the Collections Manager, for her gracious welcome to both the house and library, and to Sarah Laycock, the museum’s Library and Information Officer, for sharing many wonderful details about Charlotte’s clothing and other garments in the collection. I also was privileged to receive an unforgettable, attic-to-cellar tour of the former Roe Head School in Mirfield which Charlotte attended, which still sports the legend of a mysterious attic-dwelling ghost.

I hope you will enjoy reading The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë as much as I enjoyed writing it. My first novel, The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen, became a bestseller and was named a Best First Novel of 2008 by Library Journal. I welcome visitors and messages at my website, www.syriejames.com

ISBN 978-0061648373

A remarkable cache

News release from the Parsonage:

A remarkable cache of new Brontë treasures have recently been donated the Brontë Parsonage Museum by a private owner living in Manitoba, Canada. The items were given to the museum by Mr Tony Hart, whose great grandfather was the nephew of Mary Anna Bell, the second wife of Arthur Bell Nicholls. Nicholls’ first marriage was to Charlotte Brontë and took place at Haworth Church in 1854, although Charlotte died the following year, possibly in the early stages of pregnancy. Mr Hart’s great grandfather emigrated from Ireland to Canada in the 1870s.

The items donated all belonged to Charlotte Brontë and include a gold brooch set with garnets, a beautifully carved ivory visiting card case and card, a fragmentary manuscript by Charlotte, dated 1829 and entitled ‘Anecdotes of the Duke of Wellington’, an ink drawing of a ‘Wellington monument’ accompanying the manuscript, and a signed engraved portrait of Charlotte. The items would have been taken to Ireland by Arthur Bell Nicholls in 1861 after Charlotte’s death and may have been given to Mr Hart’s great grandfather as keepsakes.

It’s very rare indeed for such a wonderful group of items to emerge under any circumstances, but we feel extremely fortunate and grateful to Mr Hart for donating what is certainly a very valuable collection indeed to the museum. Some of these items are quite unique within the context of the museum’s collection and so to have them return to Haworth after so many years, and all the way from Canada, is very special.

Ann Dinsdale

Collections Manager

The new items are now on display at the Brontë Parsonage Museum and can be seen along with many other treasures from the museum’s collection as part of an exhibition focusing on Charlotte Brontë.

Henry Hastings in Italian

Maddalena De Leo reports from Milan:

On Saturday 24th October 2009 at 5 p.m. Professor Maddalena De Leo gave a talk at the British Council in Milan concerning her last publication, a first edition and translation in Italian of Charlotte Brontë’ novelette Henry Hastings. The event was organized by the Italian section of the Brontë Society and by Albusedizioni, the publisher of the nice little book.

The public assembled in the historical seat of the British Council at Via Manzoni 38 had the pleasure to listen to Mrs. Franca Gollini, who introduced the editor and her work and to Mr Giuseppe Gambini, an Italian narrative writer, who spoke about the publishing House Albus and dramatized some famous moments in the book as the Prologue and Henry Hastings’s arrest. Professor De Leo then explained why she long ago had chosen to translate this particular tale by Charlotte by saying that it is extremely fascinating. Its main characters, just three, and the analysis of the already troublesome relationship between brother and sister are really puzzling for any Brontë lover. Moreover in the character of Elizabeth Hastings can already be found the germs for Charlotte’s mature heroines Jane Eyre and Lucy Snowe. The talk ended with a video reproducing some moments of the York Conference 2009 and the flowered moor at Haworth and, last but not least, a little party for all the people present.

Are you anybody, Miss Snowe?

Readings from Villette. From left to right: Valerie Sculfor, Sally Batten, Maureen Peeck, Jennifer Rankin, Sherry Vosburgh, Zigurds Kronberg

Helen MacEwan reports on a talk organised by the Brussels Brontë Group:

The theme of our talk on Saturday 17 October in our usual venue (Facultés Universitaires Saint-Louis) was Charlotte Brontë's novel Villette. People who read or re-read the novel after moving to Brussels agree that reading it here is illuminating both about Villette and Brussels. There are always some readers who find it difficult and unappealing, yet for many it is uniquely atmospheric and fascinating.

Maureen Peeck O'Toole's talk, Are you anybody, Miss Snowe? by focusing on the narrator Lucy Snowe and her relationship with us, the reader, addressed some of the questions that arise about this novel. Many of these relate to the character of Lucy. Can we like her, or at least understand her and feel sympathetic towards her? What is her attitude to us, the reader? Why does she sometimes seem to deliberately mislead us or at least withhold things from us? The talk was intended to be useful for first-time readers of the novel while suggesting new ways of approaching it to those already acquainted with it. The discussion that followed and comments by people who attended suggest that the audience did indeed find it thought-provoking.

Maureen Peeck has lived in the Netherlands for much of her life and taught for many years at Utrecht University, but she was born Maureen O'Toole and brought up in Bradford close to the Brontë village, Haworth, which she visited as a child. Maureen is a founder member of the Brussels Bronte group and has always been one of its most active members.

Her talk was followed by readings of passages from Villette selected by her to illustrate it. We had five very competent readers, many with acting experience. Four were members of our group while the fifth had volunteered to join them in response to our appeal for a male reader to read M. Paul's part. The formula of talk plus readings worked well and several people said afterwards that the readings highlighted the points touched on by Maureen as well as being enjoyable in their own right.

We prepared for the talk by reading Villette in our reading group. There was so much interest that in addition to our meeting of regular members of the reading group, we organised an extra discussion just before Maureen's talk for all the other people eager to talk about the novel.

Heathcliff the scrubbed-up oik

Richard Wilcocks reports on yesterday evening's event:

“I first read Wuthering Heights when I was sixteen,” director Coky Giedroyc tells the audience in Haworth. “I think it spoke to my innermost gothic self.”

Screenwriter Peter Bowker says that he stumbled through the novel in his teenage years: “My first strong memory is of the black and white Hollywood film, but I read it at university and I adored it……..

I had to return to my brutal younger self when I was choosing what to cut and what not to cut. The book is the work, of course, and I am doing a take on it, what a musician calls a cover version………ultimately, it is a redemptive version……..

I was told things like ‘Unless you are doing Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you won’t get away with it’, but I was determined to keep in the gothic and supernatural elements.”

We watch a clip, one of several. Heathcliff looks at the fresh gravestone for Catherine Linton and starts wielding his spade, watched by a distant figure behind an upstairs window. He reaches the wood of the coffin lid quickly and tears it open with ease. Cathy’s beautiful face is in his mind, and he sees it down there, but there’s also a glimpse of a skull.

Coky Giedroyc speaks: “It seems sacred…..a lot of people think they own the characters…….

This was the first time I have understood Heathcliff…….huge and rock-like….a fulcrum……..Peter got inside his soul….”

“Writing it felt like a conversation with Emily Brontë…..there are certain key speeches which can’t be lost…..it’s more of an extended prose poem than a novel……….I often put the dialogue reported by Nelly Dean back into the characters’ mouths” says Peter Bowker.

“My dialogue filled in gaps….I was responsible for the card game….I had to show that debauched moment.”

Poet James Nash asks questions. He is there to engage the pair in conversation and to bring out significant insights, which he does with wit and charm. Dryness is not in order this evening. It’s a kind of family affair, part of a pleasant weekend visit to the Parsonage and the village. Both of the speakers have their mothers with them (in the audience) and everybody is smiling. The pair talk briefly about their collaboration on Blackpool, then about the casting. Coky Giedroyc begins:

“Casting was a long journey………we needed a brave and dangerous performer for Heathcliff……there’s few that can do it, but there’s so many who want to do it. I was getting live links from LA.

I was confident that Tom Hardy would be brave……and grubby and……a little bit random. He played that graveyard scene absolutely from his solar plexus…..you have to embrace the gothic but also the emotional truth.

As for Cathy, we kept on coming back to Charlotte Riley…..she brought a minxy, compulsive quality to the character……but she still is able to elicit sympathy…

To cast Andrew Lincoln as Edgar makes Cathy’s decision to marry much more understandable. He’s not the weedy opposite to the Byronic Heathcliff that we often see.”

“Andrew’s Edgar contrasts well with Heathcliff, the scrubbed-up oik,” adds Peter Bowker. “Tom was just the actor for that……he’s a playful actor……

When I first started on this, I was thinking I would have three Cathys and three Heathcliffs to cope with times and ages, but then you would have to have three of all the others…”

We watch a clip set in Thrushcross Grange. Nelly comes in gasping as Heathcliff threatens Edgar with a poker. Emily Brontë does not write all that much about Thrushcross, but there’s plenty of detail here. It speaks of a squire’s wealth, but it is pale and quiet, calm and comfortable in contrast to Wuthering Heights.

Question time arrives. A woman thanks the pair at the front for providing her eight year-old daughter (who is with her) with an excellent experience. She has watched the DVD several times. There is a question about the novel’s ambiguity. In the novel it is not clear what Cathy and Heathcliff actually do with each other. Does Cathy really understand what she is doing anyway? Why is their relationship so steamy in this television version?

“We had to strip away the ambiguity to make the story work on screen,” comes the reply from Peter Bowker.

I ask, “Why did you go down the gypsy route so firmly with Heathcliff? Did you consider the Irish interpretation, with the young boy speaking Gaelic? Or a mixed-race Heathcliff found in Liverpool, the slave port?”

And, of course, Peter Bowker had considered all of those: “We had to fit it to the chosen actor. I did think about the Irish connection though.”

Last chance to see Ghosts

Not only is the half-term holiday a great opportunity to see some fantastic exhibitions at the Parsonage, it’s also a chance to enjoy special discount entry. Throughout the half-term week, two for one vouchers will be available at various locations around the village, allowing two visitors to enter for the price of one.

Visitors will have a last chance to view Ghosts, an exhibition of atmospheric landscape photographs by major British artist, SamTaylor-Wood. The exhibition is a response to Wuthering Heights and will close on 2 November.

Jenna Holmes writes:

The Ghosts exhibition has proved very popular with visitors this summer. It is unusual to find the work of such an important contemporary artist in an historic environment such as the Parsonage, and many visitors have commented that the works are like windows on to the moors, and the dramatic landscape that the Brontës knew and wrote about in their novels.

We hope that people will take this last opportunity to see the works hung within the museum, before the series of photographs is returned to London.

Behind the Scenes of ITV’s Wuthering Heights

Arts Officer Jenna Holmes writes:

Bafta-winning screenwriter Peter Bowker and director Coky Giedroyc will be visiting Haworth to talk about their recent work adapting Wuthering Heights for ITV1. The special event will take place on this coming Saturday (24 October) at 7pm at the West Lane Baptist Centre in Haworth, and will look at the process of adapting the novel for television, as well as behind the scenes information about making and filming the drama production.

The drama, which was filmed on location in Yorkshire including sites such as Oakwell Hall and East Riddlesden Hall, was broadcast over the August bank holiday and has proved popular with visitors to the museum:

We’ve had a lot of interest in the ITV production from visitors, especially with the costumes being on show at the Parsonage. It will be fascinating to hear how a drama like this is put together, and the ways in which Peter Bowker and Coky Giedroyc have adapted the story of Wuthering Heights for a twenty-first century audience.

Peter Bowker wrote Blackpool for the BBC and won a BAFTA for his 2001 ITV movie Buried Treasure. His television film Flesh and Blood won the Prix Europa and two Royal Television Society awards in 2002. Peter Bowker’s three part drama Occupation about three British soldiers serving in Iraq was shown on BBC1 earlier this year and he also wrote the recent Desperate Romantics for the BBC.

Coky Giedroyc has directed numerous dramas for television, including the BAFTA-nominated The Virgin Queen (2006) and Oliver Twist (2007) for BBC television. She also directed Peter Bowker’s Blackpool in 2004.

Tickets are £10 and can be booked from the Brontë Parsonage Museum by contacting the Arts Officer: jenna.holmes@bronte.org.uk / 01535 640188.




For further information contact jenna.holmes@bronte.org.uk / 01535 640188.

Haworth Through Time

Susan Goodacres writes:

Few English villages can have been as well documented and photographed as Haworth, a place with more significant connotations than most of the others. A recent publication is the latest in a series which uses the old pictures next to the new ones to show how things have changed, and not always for the better. The title is Haworth Through Time, and it is by Steven Wood and photographer Ian Palmer.

Its brief introduction puts the causes of the many changes into a nutshell. It is explained, for example, that the first development of Main Street was brought about by the making of the Blue Bell turnpike through Haworth in 1755, and that the reason for the large number of non-conformist chapels in the Haworth area is because one of the charismatic leaders of the evangelical revival, William Grimshaw, was the local minister. The major nineteenth century expansions were caused by the opening of the branch railway from Keighley in 1867, which also made it necessary to alter the road system in the lower part of the village.

A point sometimes missed by students of the Brontës and by some scholars as well, is that Haworth was until well into the twentieth century a hectic, industrialised part of Yorkshire, and a generally unhealthy place for those people packed into small rooms where they lived, worked hard and died, apart from the folk up at the Parsonage. It was not at the far end of beyond. Many industries and the quarries have of course collapsed now, and at one time the railway itself was closed – until it was reopened by a preservation society.

Today, so many people have cars, and Haworth is a healthy and desirable place for commuters and families to put down roots. Main Street is full of little shops and cafés geared to the tourist trade, and a good place to stroll along, even though it is not yet a pedestrian precinct, and cars can often be observed going unnecessarily fast along it.

The cars were a problem for Ian Palmer too – he had to put up with their obscuring of many views of course, and apparently had to dodge one or two while pointing his camera, and no doubt holding in one hand the old photograph so that the new one could be taken from the same vantage point. One surprising thing to note in the new colour images is the number of trees. They appear to have multiplied. For example, in a view entitled Haworth from Brow, the increase in the numbers of houses for mill workers dating from the late nineteenth century can be clearly seen, and they are now accompanied by large numbers of verdant trunks and branches. In the old photo, Ivy Bank Mill with a smoking chimney is visible on the left. The chimney has gone, of course, along with thousands of others across Yorkshire, mainly demolished in the 1960s, and the background landscape looks windswept and bare. Ivy Bank mill is now a burnt out ruin.

A view of Church Street and Changegate from the Church Tower taken at the time of the Great War shows huddled buildings (usually described as ‘slums’) and a lack of modern roads. These can be seen in the up-to-date view. An old photo dating from 1960 of Acton Street shows a row of houses now demolished where once lived Old Jack Kay, who was known as the village wise man. Did every village have one of these? Old Jack could foretell and even control the weather, so it was said, and defeat the evil created by witches. Not many people come into the old or the new photos, but an exception is Smithy in the Fold, c1900, in which four well-built men can be seen posing casually – blacksmiths Abraham Scarborough and his son Herbert, along with two other smiths. Their smithy is now a garage.

And the most photographed building in Haworth has to be there as well, naturally – a well-known sepia image of the Parsonage from about 186o is set above a present-day view with tall trees in the foreground.

There are more than 180 photographs in this book, which is published by Amberley Publishing at £12.99.

ISBN 978-1-8468-509-3