Bronte collections of the Leeds University.

Leeds University

library.leeds

Yesterday I received an e-mail from Anne (living in the USA)  from the blog Stay at Home Artist. This year she visited Haworth for the second time. She told me that she went to Leeds University.
She saw 6 of Charlotte's letters to Amelia Taylor (in a beautiful book). 

I searched for this university and found a lot of interesting information. 

For instance:

The letters of Branwell Brontë

This resource provides searchable transcriptions of the letters of Branwell Bronte (1817-1848) kept in Special Collections at the University of Leeds Library.

Patrick Branwell Brontë was the younger brother of the Brontë sisters. His life has been infamously documented as one of alcoholism, debt and longing for a married woman called Lydia Robinson, with whom he supposedly had an affair. Much of the evidence for this comes from letters written by the Brontës, including these letters written by Branwell himself.

Transcriptions were made by volunteers working on a crowd sourced transcription project in 2015.

Haworth nr Bradford
May 15^th
1842.
Resurgam

Dear Sir,

I have received great pleasure from the
examination of the three Drawings which you put
in to the hands of Mr J. Brown, and it appears
to me that the Design at £40. No. 2. has
received the greatest approbation from the Committee
appointed to carry into effect the erection of a
monument to the late Mr Andrews

If you could come over to Haworth on
the Afternoon of Friday May 20^th ; during
the evening of which day the Committee will sit,
they will be able to speak more distinctly
to you than I have power to do - and I am sure
my Father would be pleased to see you if you can
make it convenient to visit us before the meeting.

Mr Brown will be thankful for any instruct
-ions you may be pleased to give him, and as he
expects an order for two more monuments - of course
through your hands - he will be thankful for some

information respecting the best method of colouring
letters Sunk in marble tablets.

Excuse the extreme illegibility of this scrawl
as I am scarcely hoping recovering from severe in-
disposition, and, with a hope to see you on Frid-
-ay,

Believe me,

Dear Sir,

yours most respectfully,

P.B. Bronte

P.S.

I should feel obliged by knowing per return
of post whether it will be in your power to come
over on the day mentioned above, or not.

[A sketch of a tombstone with the word RESURGAM on it. The initials P.B.B. are in the foreground. ]

library.leeds./letter_from_branwell_bront_to_joseph_bentley_leyland_15_may_1842_bc_ms_19c_bronte

Bibliography and relevant literature

• Alexander, Christine and Jane Sellars, The Art of the Brontës, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995)

• Alexander, Christine and Margaret Smith, The Oxford Companion to the Brontës, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006)

• Barker, Juliet, The Brontës (London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1994)

• Grundy, Francis Henry, Pictures of the Past (London: Griffith and Faran, 1879)

• Gunnis, Robert, Dictionary of British sculptors, 1660–1851 (London: The Abbey Library, 1953)

• Leyland, Mary, ‘The Leyland family’, Transactions of the Halifax Antiquarian Society 29–48 (1954),

• Neufeldt, Victor, A bibliography of the manuscripts of Patrick Branwell Brontë (1993)

• Neufeldt, Victor, The poems of Patrick Branwell Brontë (London: Routledge, 1990)

• The works of Patrick Branwell Brontë, ed. V. A. Neufeldt, 2 vols. (London: Taylor and Francis, 1997–9)

Revd. Arthur Bell Nicholls

A final substantial collection of letters from Charlotte's husband, the Revd A. B. Nicholls, rounds off the biographical material (Nicholls' hand-copied collection of his wife's poems is included too). The account to Ellen Nussey of Charlotte's final illness, associated, it now seems, with pregnancy, is remarkably reserved; Nicholls retains his formal composure throughout even when commemorating, on 14 February 1855, his just departed wife: she was 'as good as she was gifted'. library.leeds/revd_arthur_bell_nicholls

Brontë Treasures In The Ellen Nussey Archive

And here the wonderful story of Nick Holland 

The Brotherton Library Special Collections room houses many old and valuable manuscripts, but there was one set in particular I was looking for: referenced ‘BC MS 19thC Brontë/07’ it is the Ellen Nussey archives. Collated inside the pages of a leather bound book are hand written letters and extracts written by Charlotte Brontë’s best friend Ellen Nussey, and they give startling insights into the Brontë sisters as a whole. Read all: annebronte/bronte-treasures-in-the-ellen-nussey-archive/

More then 1.000.000 pageviews.

I hardly believe it. My blog about the Bronte Sisters reached more then 1.000.000 pageviews. When I started it was for myself. I wanted to collect information. After a while I realised that people were interested. Through the time I met some very nice Bronte lovers. Paula and Kirsten from Holland. Anne and Jessica from the USA. Lynn, Nick and others from the United Kingdom. George from France with his big love for Emily.

It was so nice meeting all of you

And now

On to the next million ;-)

Branwell Brontë's Bicentenary Celebrations.

Branwell Bronte

This year, 200th anniversary of his birth

We remember him as the failure of the family. Despite being a passionate poet, writer and artist, he failed to hold down conventional jobs, and repeatedly succumbed to vice. Finally, his world fell apart after the end of an affair with a married woman, Lydia Gisborne, which accelerated his dependence on opiates and alcohol. He died at the young age of 31 from the long-term effects of substance abuse.

The poet Simon Armitage is the museum’s creative partner for this bicentenary, curating an exhibition that pairs his own poetry with objects owned by Branwell; inviting us to reflect on the workings of his mind and our relationship with this problematic fellow. At the heart of the exhibition is a letter to the Romantic poet William Wordsworth. Branwell, then a earnest 19-year-old, encloses one of his own poems, and expresses his hopes and dreams of building “mansions in the sky”.

Wordsworth never replied.

Life threw repeated punches at Branwell, but within this series of unfortunate events there was happiness and worth. We must not forget that the Brontë brother grew up in the same literature-charged environment as his three siblings. For much of their young lives, they collaborated on fantasy sagas as complex as our modern-day Game of Thrones. Set in the worlds of Glass Town and Angria, the siblings wrote the tales in tiny books and acted them out together. But Branwell was at the centre of this universe, often dictating the events of the saga or writing long parliamentary speeches and war epics. As Armitage says: “He was driving the whole show. He had this flurried imagination and they seemed to be wildly encouraging of each other.” Read more: theguardian

Branwell was a talented artist

Verdopolis

This sketch of Verdopolis, an imaginary Angrian town, was the inspiration for Simon Armitage's exhibition Mansions in the Sky

Brontë Parsonage‏Branwell was a talented artist & while he never quite made it as a portrait painter, we think his "Gos-Hawk" is pretty special

Branwell Brontë was born 200 years ago

He was the first Brontë to publish his work, often as 'Northangerland', his literary alter ego

This wallet is one of the few personal possessions we have of Branwell Bronte

 Branwell was a Freemason

This apron was decorated by him for the Three Graces Lodge, in Haworth, in the 1830s

Monthly Intelligencer newspaper

As a child, Branwell created the imaginary world of Angria with Charlotte - this is his Monthly Intelligencer newspaper

Here's his Little Henry play set