Beautiful pictures of the Haworth moors in autumn.

 

Autumn on the Haworth Moor heart-emoticon
Thanks to Vesna Armstrong © 2015

 Over on the blog: vesnaarmstrong.blogspot.co.uk

 

 facebook.com/photo

Both Charlotte and Emily returned to school after the midsummer holidays in this fatal year. Is this true?



 

I can tell you I am the proud owner of a copy of Claire Harman's ""Charlotte Bronte"".  Thanks to Anne, who sent it to me. I really am happy with it. And off course I am reading in it since I received it.

 

 

I own the Bronte biographies of Juliet Barker, Rebecca Fraser and Elizabeth Gaskell. I love the biography of Elizabeth Gaskell because I find it interesting that a lady, a woman of the world like Elizabeth Gaskell became so close to Charlotte Bronte. Charlotte who was so shy and insecure, but the same time so brave, so trusted her. I think Elizabeth Gaskell did the best she could with the knowledge she had at that time. And she showed courage to mention all the difficulties like Cowan Bridge and the love affair between Branwell and Mrs. Robinson. Afterwards she came in trouble because of her writing. She called it ""a hornet's nest"".

Later Juliet Barker wrote a fabulous biography in wich she proved when and why Elizabeth was wrong, for instance about Patrick Bronte. There is so much information in her book and she is giving so many details, so many notes to back it up.

In the biography of Rebecca Fraser I like the part she, like a detective, is searching for the truth behind the poststamps on the loveletters Charlotte Bronte sent to Mr. Heger.

The new biography

 

I started to be surprised from the beginning when I was reading the new biography of Claire Harman.  I get the feeling the days of Elisabeth Gaskell returned. Patrick Bronte as a selfish, excentrike man, only focused on himselve. And Haworth, a remote village, far away of civilisation. As if Juliet Barker never proved the opposite.

But I started to be shocked reading Patrick Bronte sent Charlotte and Emily back to Cowan Bridge, after their sisters Maria and Elizabeth died. Reason,  as Claire Harman is writing, because he had paid for it already. Did Patrick Bronte really did such a thing????? I didn't remember reading this before. So I started to search. I could not find this story in Juliet Barker, nor in Rebecca Fraser but then, yes, I found it in  Elizabeth Gaskell's book. So it is true. I am shocked. Elizabeth wrote: Both Charlotte and Emily returned to school after the midsummer holidays in this fatal year. But why didn't the other biographers mention it, I ask myself? Some hours later I thought, maybe there are notes in the book of Elizabeth Gaskell? And yes, I found it. The note: As Miss Gérin has shown (op.cit.p.16) this statement is inaccurate: the surviving Bronte sisters left the school for good on 1 June 1825.

I was trying to find out what Winifred Gérin was writing

Read here:

 

So, really I am confused. How is it possible that in the newest biography something is told

what is refuted in other biographies?

 

And.... Patrick Bronte got his money refunded? This really is a different story.

November and december in Haworth

The following list includes events (many of which are held on a regular annual basis) which take place in or near to Haworth village (appearing in approximate forthcoming order):

• November Christmas Market
• The Haworth Steampunk Weekend
• Scroggling the Holly
• The Christmas Torchlight Procession
• The Christmas Nativity Pilgrimage
• Christmas and New Year in Haworth
• The Haworth Beer Festival
• The Bronte Vintage Gathering
The Haworth 1940s Weekend The Haworth Festival The Oxenhope Straw Race Yorkshire Day in Haworth

• The Worth Valley Beer and Music Festival
• Halloween in Haworth

The big tree is up in #Haworth! Just in time for the @BradfordMarkets Christmas market in Central Park this w/e.

Events which are held on a more regular basis include the following:

• Arts Markets (held regularly in Haworth and Ilkley)
• Haworth Family Treasure Hunts in Haworth Park from CluesGo Treasure Hunts

 

“Mary thou dids’t not know that I was nigh / Thou dids’t not know my gaze was fixed on thee. Brontë Society discovers manuscripts in ‘much-treasured’ book owned by the writer’s mother

 

Maria Brontë died when her six children – the authors Emily, Charlotte and Anne among them – were very young. Among the few possessions she left behind was a copy of Robert Southey’s The Remains of Henry Kirke White, which was “much-treasured” by the family, according to the Brontë Society. Stuffed with annotations, sketches, and markings by various members of the household, the volume just acquired by the society also contains unpublished manuscripts by the teenage Charlotte, stuck in among the pages. “We knew the book existed but we didn’t know it had these papers in it,” said spokesperson Rebecca Yorke. “They’ve never been published or come to light before.”

The family sold the book after the death of Charlotte’s father Patrick in 1861. It travelled from the family home in Haworth to the US, where it eventually ended up in the hands of an American book collector. The circle will be completed in the new year, with the volume due to go on display at the Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth. The society received £170,000 for the purchase from the National Heritage Memorial Fund, in addition to contributions from the V&A Purchase Grant Fund and the Friends of the National Libraries.

Collections manager at the museum Ann Dinsdale called the book “one of the most significant Brontë items to come to light in many years”. She described the finds as “hugely important”. The book “was clearly well-used and of great sentimental value to the Brontë children, who lost their mother while they were very young. In addition, the unpublished writings by Charlotte offer new opportunities for research, which is really exciting.”

Both pieces of work relate to the fantasy world of Angria imagined by Charlotte and her brother Branwell in a series of tiny books. “It played a huge part in their lives,” said Dinsdale. “Everything they read and everyone they met in Haworth fed into their imaginary world.”

The short story features a public flogging, embezzling from the Wesleyan chapel, and a “vicious” caricature of the Reverend John Winterbottom – a religious opponent of the children’s father. Winterbottom is “in the middle of the night dragged from his bed” and then “by the heels from one end of the village to the other”, writes Charlotte in the story.

The poem features Mary Percy, the lovesick wife of the king of Angria Zamorna, and “one of the leading Angria characters”, said Dinsdale. “It’s quite an ambitious poem for a young girl, full of thees and thous,” she added.

Mary thou dids’t not know that I was nigh / Thou dids’t not know my gaze was fixed on thee,” the poem opens. “I stood apart and watched thee passing by / In all thy calm unconscious majesty.”
The pieces have been dated to 1833, when Charlotte would have been around 17. The story runs to 74 lines, and the poem is 77 lines. Dinsdale predicted that it would be of interest to general readers as well as scholars. “It’s of interest to anyone interested in Charlotte’s life, and because of the tragic story of the Brontës, their lives are particularly appealing to a wide range of people,” she said

Historian Juliet Barker, author of the biography The Brontës, said that “the book alone is a valuable acquisition because of its rare associations with Mrs Brontë before her marriage to Patrick, but its importance is immeasurably increased by the unpublished manuscripts tipped into it”.
According to the Brontë Society, the Southey title is one of Maria’s “rare surviving possessions”, after a box containing all her property was shipwrecked off the Devon coast shortly before she married Patrick Brontë in 1812. It also features Patrick’s Latin inscription, reading that it was “the book of my dearest wife and it was saved from the waves. So then it will always be preserved.”
theguardian
 

Unpublished manuscripts by Charlotte Brontë.

The Brontë Society is delighted to announce the acquisition of Mrs Brontë’s copy of Robert Southey’s ‘The Remains of Henry Kirke White’ which contains unpublished manuscripts by Charlotte Brontë. The volume, which was much-treasured by the Brontë family, has been acquired thanks to £170,000 from the National Heritage Memorial Fund (NHMF), in addition to funding from the V&A Purchase Grant Fund and the Friends of the National Libraries. The book is one of the rare surviving possessions of Mrs Maria Brontë, whose box, containing all her property, was shipwrecked off the Devonshire coast shortly before her marriage to Patrick Brontë in 1812. It contains Latin inscriptions in Patrick’s hand stating that this was ‘….the book of my dearest wife and it was saved from the waves. So then it will always be preserved.’ The pages of the book contain annotations, markings and sketches by various members of the Brontë family. Also included are a poem and a fragment of prose by Charlotte Brontë and a letter by Arthur Bell Nicholls, Charlotte’s husband, written shortly after her death in 1855. bronte.org.uk
  

Biographer of the Brontës gets her own biography

A leading biographer of the Brontës herself comes under the spotlight in a new book. Helen McEwan has written a biography of Winifred Gérin, whose own four volumes were for many years the standard biographies of the family members. Winifred first visited Haworth in her 50s and was so impressed that she went on to write separate biographies of Charlotte, Emily, Anne and Branwell. After a life spent trying poetry and playwriting, she achieved renown for her biographies, written between 1959 and 1971. She died in 1981. The life of Winifred has been explored by Helen MacEwan, a long-time Brontë scholar and founder of the Belgian branch of the Brontë Society.
A Brussels resident for the past 11 years, she decided to write about Winifred after discovering their shared links with the Belgian city. Helen said Winifred was “bowled over” by Haworth during her 1954 visit and felt people could not understand the Brontë family without becoming immersed in a their environment. Helen said: “Very romantically, on that first visit Winifred met her second husband, John Lock, also a Brontë enthusiast. “They both decided to move from London to Haworth and devote themselves to writing biographies of the Brontës.
Read more on: keighleynews

Rarities to go on show to commemorate Elizabeth Gaskell

First editions of Elizabeth Gaskell’s novels and a selection of the author’s letters are to go on show this week at her former home to mark 150 years since her death.

The celebrated novelist died on November 12 1865 at the age of 55, and lived at 84 Plymouth Grove in Manchester which reopened to the public in 2014 as the attraction Elizabeth Gaskell's House.
One of the Victorian era's most iconic authors, Gaskell is known for her works of social realism featuring strong female characters including 'North and South', 'Cranford' and 'Mary Barton' as well as her biography of her friend Charlotte Brontë.
First editions of her novels which feature her annotations, a music book with a note from her husband William to Elizabeth, and her own notes on how to cure a range of ailments in cats - featuring copious amounts of porridge, from Central Library's Gaskell Collection are among the works which will be shown at her former home.

Visitors can also explore the home of the author and learn more about her private and public life. The event is free with the admission fee and advance booking is not required.

Archives Uncovered: The Elizabeth Gaskell Collection at Elizabeth Gaskell’s House, Thursday November 12, 11am-3pm, 84 Plymouth Grove. Entry fee adults £4.95, concessions £3.95, under 16s free with tickets valid for one year.
See seven of the women who made Manchester great from Time Out. timeout/manchester

The Brontë Cabinet - A review

The Brontë Cabinet: Three Lives in Nine Objects
by Deborah Lutz (Author)
W. W. Norton & Company, May 2015
ISBN-13: 978-0393240085

Deborah Lutz has managed to combine a 'chatty', conversational way of writing with solidly scholarly background and research. The Brontë Cabinet is a wholly entertaining read, yet thoroughly researched and incredibly enlightening. New Brontëites will find some of the facts about the Brontës interesting and old Brontëites will refresh their memories and - we are pretty sure - learn new things if not about the Brontës themselves, then surely about the period they lived in.

So Deborah Lutz takes each object and writes a chapter around it, telling us both the Brontë story and the Victorian story, putting the Brontës firmly in the period they lived in but with which they aren't always really associated both because they lived in the earlier part of it and because their tastes and style tend to be reminiscent of an earlier period. And yet, looking at their belongings and their way of life, it's clear that they can't have been anything else. The Brontës were Victorians through and through.
Read more on: Bronteblog
 

Winifred Gérin, biographer of the Brontës

To celebrate the Brontë bicentenaries, Helen MacEwan has written a new book exploring the life of one of their most important biographers. On 21 November at Waterstones Piccadilly, she will be launching Winifred Gérin, biographer of the Brontës (publication date 15 November). Having written about the Brontës in Brussels, Helen first became interested in Gérin’s life story because of her Belgian links and her special interest in Charlotte Brontë’s Brussels period.

Winifred Gérin (1901-81) is known as the biographer who moved to Haworth to write the lives of all four Brontë siblings, literally treading in their footsteps as she researched them. But her ten years in Haworth were just part of a romantic, eventful and sometimes tragic life.

Marriage to a Belgian cellist, Eugène Gérin, took her to Paris and then, in 1939, to Brussels where the couple worked for the British Embassy. Following the German invasion of 1940 they had various hair-raising adventures in France, finally escaping to Britain where they worked for Political Intelligence. After Eugène Gérin’s death in 1945, Winifred sought consolation in writing poetry and plays until discovering both her literary vocation and second love on a fateful first visit to Haworth. 

Gérin went on to write biographies of Elizabeth Gaskell, Anne Thackeray Ritchie and Horatia Nelson. She also wrote plays about Jane Austen, Fanny Burney and Charlotte Brontë. This book is based on her letters and her unpublished memoir. bronteparsonage

Warm & sunny 1st of November.

 

twitter/MrsHaworthFox 

 

Beautiful photographes

 

Editing Elizabeth Gaskell: manuscripts and letters in the Brotherton Collection:

 

 

November 2015 marks the 150th anniversary of the death of author, biographer, humanitarian and campaigner, Elizabeth Gaskell.

 

Join Dr Shirley Foster, President of the Gaskell Society, to explore the Brotherton Collection's Gaskell manuscripts for insight into her life and work.

 

Dr Foster will talk about the how these literary manuscripts informed her work editing the Penguin edition of Sylvia's Lovers.

eventbrite.co.uk/lunchtime-talks-editing-elizabeth-gaskell

"May have " and so much "simply".

I didn't read the new biography ""Charlotte Bronte"" from Claire Harman. Off course not, because it is only two days ago it is published. But I am a little surprised by the reactions I am reading. For instance this one:

From: Charlotte Brontë: A Life by Claire Harmann review – a well-balanced, unshowy biography
theguardian

In the pragmatic 1990s, Juliet Barker worked hard to clear away the consequences of Gaskell’s well-meaning gothicisation by rebuilding the Brontës’ story on solid historical grounds. In particular Barker challenged her portrayal of Patrick Brontë as a storybook ogre. Charlotte too was transformed from a sequestered tragic heroine into a chippy spinster who carefully stage-managed her rise to literary fame by persistently pushing herself and her work, even the duff stuff, before the public.

As a highly experienced biographer, Harman has too much integrity to suggest that this idea of her subject as a proto-modernist is entirely fresh. Nor does she even hint that she has uncovered any new documentary sources about her. Instead, she wisely concentrates on rounding out and deepening aspects of the author’s life that have been previously scanted or skewed. Particularly fine is Harman’s reading of how the tortuous, sexless love affair between Héger and Brontë could ever have been allowed to reach such heights – or depths. Previous biographers have tended either to castigate Héger as a married flirt who led Brontë on, or they have painted her as a disordered spinster, randy with celibacy, quite capable of spitefully destroying a man who refused to make love to her. (...)

Harman, by contrast, suggests that what we may be looking at is primarily a cultural misunderstanding. Héger routinely lavished his pupils with a repertoire of kisses, pats and affectionate glances. Brontë, raised with brisk Yorkshire non-showiness, may simply have misread pseudo-parental tenderness as a special favour. What’s more Mme Héger, far from being as sly and vengeful as her fictional avatar Mme Beck, was simply a sensible businesswoman who realised the damage to her school’s reputation if gossip emerged about a tendresse between her husband and the plain, nervy English governess. Deciding not to respond to the stream of yearning, abasing letters that Brontë wrote once she had returned to Haworth wasn’t a vicious move on the Hegers’ part, but simply self-preservation. Read all:  theguardian

I am an admirer of the biography of Juliet Barker and I really don't recognize that I ever thought:

Charlotte is transformed from a sequestered tragic heroine into a chippy spinster who carefully stage-managed her rise to literary fame by persistently pushing herself and her work, even the duff stuff, before the public.

"May have " and so much "simply" in:

Harman, by contrast, suggests that what we may be looking at is primarily a cultural misunderstanding. Héger routinely lavished his pupils with a repertoire of kisses, pats and affectionate glances. Brontë, raised with brisk Yorkshire non-showiness, may simply have misread pseudo-parental tenderness as a special favour.

What’s more Mme Héger, far from being as sly and vengeful as her fictional avatar Mme Beck, was simply a sensible businesswoman who realised the damage to her school’s reputation if gossip emerged about a tendresse between her husband and the plain, nervy English governess. Deciding not to respond to the stream of yearning, abasing letters that Brontë wrote once she had returned to Haworth wasn’t a vicious move on the Hegers’ part, but simply self-preservation. theguardian

Is everything really that "simply"?

Mr. Heger's most personal and thoughtful gift yet...........

On the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë's birth, Penguin is publishing the definitive biography of this extraordinary novelist, by acclaimed literary biographer Claire Harman.

 

This beautifully-produced, landmark biography is essential reading for every fan of the Brontë family's writing, from Jane Eyre to Wuthering Heights. It is a uniquely intimate and complex insight into one of Britain's best loved writers. penguin.co.uk

  

I am a little bit surprised. A definite biography?

 

It is a nice idea to publish a new biography on the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë's birth, but "" definitive biography ""? After the excellent biographies of Juliet Barker and Rebecca Fraser?  Is it possible to write better biographies then these? I wonder, is there something new in this biography we didn't hear of?

 

New to me is what I am reading in an article of Claire Harman in the telegraph.co.uk:

 

One Friday afternoon, 11 days before the end of term, Heger came into the classroom where Charlotte was teaching and handed her a small object wrapped carefully in a piece of thin writing paper. She opened it as soon as he left. Inside the zigzag wrapping was a small piece of pale wood, too thin to be anything other than crating. It was a piece of Napoleon’s coffin, or, rather, since Napoleon was famously coffined in tin within mahogany within lead, possibly a piece of the outer casings in which the great man’s remains had been brought back to France three years earlier, under the command of his son, the Prince de Joinville, whose former secretary, Joachim-Joseph Lebel, was Heger’s friend and principal of the Athénée. Out of the fog of disregard, Heger had reached out to her with his most personal and thoughtful gift yet, a relic at once to be revered for its connections and regarded with a touch of pleasant mutual cynicism, a continuation of their conversation about the emperor and his British nemesis, and a reminder of her triumphant essay on the subject; a small gift which could be slipped into her hand without fuss, which Madame Heger would never notice, and which, above all, was a token of her abiding place in his thoughts. While the girls were still busy, Charlotte wrote on the spread-out wrapper the exact coordinates of place and time of this precious new possession: “August 4th 1843 – Brussels – Belgium/ 1 o’clock pm/ Monsieur Heger has just been into the 1st Class/ and given me this relic – he bought it from/ his intimate friend M. Lebel.”

 

On the website of the Bronte Parsonage Museum I find this information

Object number	BS20a
Title	fragment from one of Naoleon's coffins
Description	small strip of wood that formed part of one of Napoleon's coffins; inscribed in ink in French; fair; complete; 106mm l x 21mm w x0.5 mm d;
Material	wood, ink
Dimensions	coffin fragment 106  mm coffin fragment 21  mm coffin fragment 0.5  mm bronte.adlibsoft

 

And on facebook/CharlotteBronteFans/

From the Treasure Trove: Napoleon's coffin.
The Brontes had been fascinated by both Wellington and Napoleon. On 4th August 1843, Charlotte's tutor M. Heger presented her with this fragment from Napoleon's coffin. Here, it is pictured with a note written by Charlotte, authenticating the item.

August 4th 1843 - Brussels - Belgium
1 o'clock pm...
Monsieur Heger has just been into the 1st class and given me this relic - he bought it from his intimate friend Mr Lebel.
C Bronte
Mr Lebel was the Secretary of the prince Achille Murat - The Prince de Joinville son of Louis Philippe brought over the remains of Bonaparte from St Helena.

 

I am going to search on the internet. Can I find more descriptions about this present Mr Heger has given to Charlotte Bronte? Because it seems very romantic the way it is written here. But as I always understood the romance came from one site, the site of Charlotte.

•  So I am curious why Mr. Heger gave Charlotte this present
• Did Mr. Heger had reached out to her with his most personal and thoughtful gift yet, a relic at once to be revered for its connections and regarded with a touch of pleasant mutual cynicism, a continuation of their conversation about the emperor and his British nemesis, and a reminder of her triumphant essay on the subject; a small gift which could be slipped into her hand without fuss, which Madame Heger would never notice, and which, above all, was a token of her abiding place in his thoughts.

 

Pierpont Morgan Library, New York. New found portrait Charlotte Bronte.

 

I wonder when and why Claire Helman started to think this is a self-portrait of Charlotte Bronte? I was searching on the internet but I didn't find an answer till now. I wonder, because I am reading this:

The drawing was known to be by Brontë, not least because it was sketched on her school atlas. But it has remained unpublished until now, recorded without an image in the 1995 scholarly volume The Art of the Brontës as “possibly a sketch of a fellow pupil in Brussels”. It is owned by the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York. theguardian

So, from ""possibly a sketch of a fellow pupil in Brussels"" to ""a self portrait?"" It makes me curious, what happened?

Questions about this item?:	Please include all the starred fields in this record in your enquiry or request
*Location:	Printed Books Collection (RB1)
*Call Number:	129886
Status:	Charged
*Bookmark for This Record:	http://corsair.themorgan.org/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=267605
*Record ID:	267605
*Accession Number:	PML 129886
*Author/Artist:	Russell, J. C.
*Title:	Russell’s general atlas of modern geography / by J.C. Russell, geographer.
*Published/Created:	London : Baldwin & Cradock, [ca. 1836]
Description:	44 p. : 25 foldout maps ; 22 cm.
Credit:	Formerly with MA 2696; transferred from the Department of Literary and Historical Manuscripts, 2007.
Notes:	This volume is undated but contains the plates and index of Russell’s atlas of modern geography, London, 1836.
	Contains sketches by Charlotte Brontë, and two notes by her, one on the fixed back endpaper dated Brussels, Oct, 14, 1843, and one on the free back endpaper. See Mildred Christian, "Census of Brontë Manuscripts in the United States," part I, The Trollopian, vol. 2, no. 3, Dec. 1947, p. 197, for transcriptions.
Binding:	Half red calf.
Provenance:	Charlotte Brontë; Bonnell Brontë Collection, 1969 .
Associated Names:	Brontë, Charlotte, 1816-1855, former owner.
	Bonnell, Henry H. (Henry Houston), 1859-1926, former owner.
	Baldwin & Cradock, publisher.
Formatted Place:	England London.
Accompanying Material:	With one folded leaf containing the last three pages and table of contents for a Continental edition of Mme. de Staël’s novel Corinne, ou l’Italie.
Subjects:	1836.
Dept./Collection:	Pierpont Morgan Library Dept. of Printed Books corsair.themorgan.org atlas+charlotte+bronte Henry Houston Bonnell was a life member of the Brontë Society and collected Brontë material from the 1890s. During his lifetime this collection was considered one of the most valuable and representative in existence. He expressed a wish to see much of his collection return to Haworth and when he died in 1926 his wife carried this out. She made a further donation of the remains of his collection to the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, in the 1960s. nationalarchives.gov.uk

Charlotte Brontë sketch identified as self-portrait

Pencil sketch by Charlotte Brontë, which new research reveals is a self-portrait alongside George Richmond’s portrait. Composite: Pierpont Morgan Library/Getty Images

Experts say author made drawing, sketched on her school atlas, years before writing Jane Eyre in which protagonist draws herself in similar fashion.

A sketch of a woman’s head by Charlotte Brontë, previously thought to be of another pupil drawn while the author was at boarding school in Brussels, has been identified as a self-portrait.

The literary biographer Claire Harman said the drawing, which she suggests shows Brontë looking into a mirror, preceded the novel Jane Eyre, in which the protagonist also draws herself in a similar fashion.

The sketch dates from 1843, four years before Brontë published Jane Eyre, one of English literature’s great masterpieces, and when the young writer was suffering the agonies and insecurities of unrequited love.

The drawing was known to be by Brontë, not least because it was sketched on her school atlas.

Harman’s discovery is “massively significant” as there are only two other known lifetime portraits of Brontë.

Despite the sketch’s small size – barely 1.5 inches high – its facial details resemble those in an 1850 image by George Richmond, now in the National Portrait Gallery, although the artist was known to flatter his sitters. Read more: theguardian/charlotte-bronte-sketch-identified-self-portrait

Ann Dinsdale, collections manager of the Brontë Parsonage Museum, Haworth, says that it is hard to prove the identity conclusively, but the sketch 'does certainly resemble the sitter in the Richmond portrait' dailymail./New-self-portrait-Charlotte-Bronte-discovered-drew-looking-mirror-just-like-great-heroine-Jane-Eyre