AMY! just stopping by to say hello.

Hiya Rita! Glad to see you made it! Hope to see you posting here frequently, as well as on the new Medieval Board!

Hi, Amy, I, too, am just stopping by to say hello and to wish you well with this site.

I agree with Charlotte being the driving force. From her intros to her sisters�s books and from her letters to Gaskell and from Jane Eyre, who is based on herself, I think she must have been a very strong, determined person, with a huge love for her sisters.

Absolutely. All the criticism directed at the "Bells" really hurt her, especially after Anne & Emily died, and she tried to show the world a true picture of them with her intro to WH/AGNES GREY. I don't think any of the Brontes would have published without Charlotte at the fore -- it was she who discovered Emily's amazing poetry and persuaded her -- which wasn't easy -- to let it be compiled into a book.

I think one thing that most people often forget is that Branwell did write something himself. I mean, he wasn`t totally devoid of all feeling or talent, even if he didn�t have his sisters` genius. The thing was he was wild and somewhat demented-it�s a sad case of wasted talent. But I read that there was a time when he really cared about his sisters and tried to behave. And they loved him dearly too. Having a somewhat oppressive father and a fanatical aunt probably didn�t help matters at all-he wanted out nd drinking was the only way he knew how.

There is kind of a revisionist movement afoot to revive poor Branwell's reputation. He mentioned in s letter to a friend that he was working on a novel, & had finished one volume, but I don't think this has ever come to light. By 1848, when Charlotte, Emily, & Anne were publishing, they didn't tell Branwell, because he was so far gone on opium & drink they thought that their success would be like a slap in the face to him. Sad.

Yeah. Huntingdon from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is slightly based on Branwell, although Branwell didn�t have the character`s sadistic nature. Seems that Anne was a governess at the house where Branwell was working (on what, I have no idea; do you, Amy? she worked there, partly to keep an eye on him) and she observed her brother`s friends in their "activities", thus gathering information for her novel, which in my opinion is startingly modern in its content. Addiction is, unfortunately, a very modern the e. And even Charlotte felt compelled to explain why her sister�s choice of subject had been unfortunate, which I understand she had to do, although thank God Anne was brave enough to go forward with the TWH!

Yes, Anne and Branwell both worked in the Robinson home. What happened there is disastrous: it's probable that Branwell had an affair with the married Mrs. Robinson (some biographers think this was only the product of his over-heated imagination, but his paramout seemed to supply him with cash t.o. his life). Anyway, he was dismissed by Mr. Robinson, necessitating Anne's departure as well. The ironic thing about Anne is though she was considered the baby of the family, she was the only sibling who managed to go out into the world and successfully hold down a post for any period of time. Emily couldn't -- every time she left the moors, she practically died from homesickness. And Charlotte was either too nervous or too caught up in her passion for M. Heger in Brussels to be able to be a successful governess/teacher. And I don't think any of them were especially well-suited to care for chil ren!

It has always been too easy to slot the Brontes into the categorys you mention. Their father and Aunt Branwell have also suffered from this. Charlotte, of course, is largely responsible for creating the surviving images of her two sisters. She probably did this as a dismayed response to a public that so misundertood the siblings she loved dearly. In doing so, however, she molded them into versions she thought appropriate. For example, her editing of Emily's poetry is outrageous - Emily would never have tolerated it while alive. Emily resisted her older sister's ideas while alive, living her life entirely her own way, and so Charlotte turned her into an "untutored genius" when she was dead - to excuse Heathcliffe to an uncomprehending public, she made Emily into an artist who was the slave of her powers and who didn't understand what she had created. A little unfair to Emily as an author.

Hi Elena & welcome to this Board! Your erudite comments are much appreciated. Yes, I'm reading Juliet Barker's massive 830 page bio of the Brontes now, and she explodes quite a few of these myths. Turns out that Mr. Bronte was NOT a stiff unbending tyrant -- in fact, he was extremely liberal, supported Catholic Emancipation, the Poor Laws, & revision of the criminal code so that only MURDER would be a hanging offense!!! I have also read of Jane Austen that she was an "unconscious genius" who knew not what she wrote. Ha! She was probably the most calculated author in literature. Of course Emily knew exactly what she was doing, as much as Charlotte did. Charlotte also tended to undervalue Anne as well. I have to say though that I don't think C. was acting from any evil impulses -- she was just trying to protect the memories of her beloved sistes. And she herself has been the victim of inaccurate myths through the yea s (as with Mrs. Gaskell, painting her as a 'victim among the tombstones,' which she decidedly was NOT).

Just one quick response to something posted above. An intro to Tenant of Wildfell Hall that I saw said that Branwell wasn't the model for Huntington, but for his sad friend Lawrence (addicted, constantly swearing to give up drink or drugs, pining for a love to "save" him). Although I'm sure Branwell's behavior while indulging his habits was a role model for most of the men in that novel. Anyway, something to think about.

Yeah, Branwell wasn't that far from Lawrence -- he blamed all of HIS troubles on his "lost love" Mrs. Robinson, the lady of the house with whom he had an affair when he was a tutor at Thorp Green. And Branwell kept up the fantasy that Mrs. R. was going to marry him, which of course she didn't when her husband died. She went for a rich guy.

Just read a rather strange bio on Emily -- Katherine Frank's. HER theory is that Emily was anorexic! Every time she left home, she refused to eat, sickened, & ultimately had to return. I'm not going to deny that Emily suffered from homesickness, but anorexia? This one seems pretty far-fetched to me. Anyone else have any views on this?

Like I indicated elsewhere, I'm not into this theory. It just doesn't ring true. Charlotte, after having lost both her sisters, believed that while Anne was prepared for an early death (very arguable point), Emily she thought was the strongest. I mean, here's a girl who participated in heavy domestic chores, and then spent her free time roaming around the moors. I know what it is to be intensely homesick - when I was a child, my father had several diplomatic postings overseas and I missed my home bitterly (as in, counsellors wanted to send me home to live with relatives whilst the family was posted for three years in Singapore). The attachment to one location so evident with Emily was similer to what I experienced when younger. With me, it was our home on a cliff overlooking the ocean. And it got worse rather than better over the time I was away. I experienced severe depression, and some psychosomatic illnesses. Given what had happened to her older sisters, it's no wonder Charlotte sent Emily home. But Emily proved she could buckle down when she put her mind to it, although God only knows what personal hell she went through in Brussels. If she had Anorexia, the symptoms were not evident at that time - which is when one would expect them to be visible not only to Charlotte, but to the others that knew her then.

I agree -- I think the theory is very modern & has little to do with Emily herself. If she truly -were- anorexic, I think that Charlotte was honest enough to have mentioned it in her letters or even the Biographical Notice. I am now reading Winnifred Gerin's bio of Emily, which strikes me as better & more scholarly.

My biggest problem with Gerin's biography it the take she has on Emily's death. She is one of the biggest proponents of the idea that WH was the ultimate expression of Emily's creative powers, and having written the book there was little else to say. She believes Emily's inspiration had given out, and Emily was happy to die. "It might be argued that by 1848 Emily had nothing further to say, that her explorations into the life of the spirit had ended with WH and the preserved poems. Perhaps the truth must be faced that there were no further voyages to make; M Heger's navigator had crossed her last sea." I don't buy that at all. As Stevie Davis says, she has a distinct feeling claim like that would not have been made had the unfinished second novel survived. Gerin's main supportive evidence for this claim is lack of surviving material from September 1846 to May 1848, where two versions of `Why Ask to know the Date, the Clime' are all that remain. I hardly think this is enough validate the Emily was happy to die theory. Simply because there is little material doesn't mean nothing was produced. She might have been quite engrossed in the new novel, over which she had been advised to take her time. We wouldn't even know the novel was being written, save for a chance surviving letter. I won't go over the "who destroyed Emily's work?" ground again, but someone did. More recent biographers (Chitham and Davies) think it possible that in her very last works Emily was breaking even more innovative, possibly even revolutionary ground. They see her as moving towards a sort of Shellyian stance. There isn't a huge amount of material to support this, but there's just as much as there is for Gerin's views! Oh, and Branwell happened to be killing himself at the time, so that might have been a minor drain on Emily's inventive powers. Charlotte, who produces just about all the information about how Emily died, had a very definite view of the matter. She was quite emphatic, right up to when she herself died, that Emily was torn out of a happy existance. Gerin rejects this because it doesn't fit her theory, deciding Charlotte must have been in denial: "Stranger still, Charlotte spoke of Emily as `rooted up in the prime of her days, in the promise of her powers - like a tree in full bearing - struck at the root'. Yet Charlotte could produce no evidence to prove her point". What strange language! Here's poor Charlotte, recording her impressions of the death of a sister she dearly loved, not realising that she had to treat it like a federal case and "produce evidence to prove her point".

I agree with you entirely, Elena. The other thing to remember is that Emily was a person separate from her work -- even if, to follow the Gerin theory, WH was her ultimate expression & she never wrote again, this doesn't mean that Emily THE PERSON wanted to die! Maybe she didn't feel like writing again; maybe she was taking a break; maybe, as you say, she was busily working on her 2nd novel. I think these biographers take the "Emily willed her own death" tactic because they can't face the fact that this great author was only able to produce one novel before being struck down by an insidious disease. Emily killing herself gives her more "control" over her own destiny, but again, if she -had- been given control, there's no doubt in my mind that she would have chosen life. The Gerin theory puts a neat storybook ending on someone dying painfully of T.B. -- it's like saying that Chopin willed hi own death...pretty absurd...

Absolutely. Emily had no more choice in her death than Maria, Elizabeth or Anne...I won't go out on a limb and add Branwell to that particular list. Biograpthers never seem to declare Anne's early death, from the same cause as Emily's, indicates anything other than what a terrible disease TB is - after all, it is still one of the world's top five causes of death. The point you raise about identifiying an author too closely with their work is an important one, particularly in Emily's case. Her poetry is susceptible to being read like this. Even when a poem is quite catogorically Gondal, biographers desperate for material choose to often read the work as autobiography, referring to specific emotions or incidents that are transposed to a Gondal context. No doubt this is sometimes the case, but how are we to determine that? Some of Emily's poems could be read as autobiographical, until we learn that Anne was writing on the same subject at the same time (eg the captive bird poems). Maybe they both felt the same way. Or just maybe they were writing fiction! This doesn't mean an author's works should be discounted in our perceptions of their life and character by any means. One of the best biographers, Edward Chitham, uses Emily's poetry a bit more often than I'm comfortable with, or at least with some of his conclusions. But when Gerin says that Emily's "wish to die had been supremely expressed three years before; Emily had envisaged death as an act of daring that could be freely accomplished, given a boldness of mind commensureate to the deed. ...Glad comforter, will I not brave unawed the darkness of the grave? Nay, smile to hear Death's billows rave, My Guide, sustained by thee? The more unjust seems present fate The more my Spirit spings elate Strong in thy strength, to anticipate Rewarding Destiny!" she is going just a tad too far.

I see absolutely no correlation between Emily's poetry and her death as a result of tuberculosis. It seems that drawing an inference between the two is pretty ridiculous, isn't it? Now Robert E. Howard, my pulp hero & creator of CONAN, wrote very gloomy poetry for years celebrating death, and ultimately, he ended up blowing his brains out. So, in THAT case, you can see the connection. But not in Emily's.

Hi, my name is Ri�tte, and I'm new here. I'm a great Bront� fan, and just love all the speculation going on about their lives - hopefully it will never cease! All of them fascinate me, but I probably admire Emily just a little bit more than the others. I've often found that biographers are a bit keen on presenting her to the reader as the 'dark' sister, allways a bit morbid and perhaps even a bit perverse. I don't agree with this at all. And, like amy2, I also feel that there is no correlation between her poetry (or 'wuthering heights') and her death from TB. From the various biographies we gather quite clearly that she was at least physically the strongest of the sisters (remeber the incident with the fighting dogs, her rambles on the moors come rain or shine, or her carrying Branwell up to his room after drinking orgies at the Black Bull). But what about emotionally? What I find interesting, is that she seems to have been the only sister who remained close to both her other sister, the father and Branwell all through their lives. Ellen Nussey said she and Anne 'were like twins'; only her love for Charlotte could have moved her to go to Brussels, even though she hated being away from home; she remained close to her father throughout (she was the only one of his children whom he taught how to shoot, which seems pretty irrelevant at first, but if we think that Patrick had a great love of fire-arms, it WAS probably an affectionate act - specially as he was not of a particularly demonstrative nature himself); most importantly, I think, is the fact that she i the only sister who remained close to Branwell. It is quite understandable that Charlotte and Anne gave up on him - after all he did make life hell for everyone under the parsonage roof - but it also says alot about Emily's emotional state. To me it suggests great stability. Some authors just don't seem to want to accept the fact that the women was simply a brilliant dramatist. Imagine what she could have produce today as a playwright! As far as her last days are concerned: I don't think she WILLED her death at all. She must have realized as soon as her symptoms developed, that her illness was terminal, and, being a very intelligent human being, she knew that neither fear, nor denial or any of the other things that must go through the minds of dying people, would save her - she WOULD die. To think about the things she still wanted to do, the people she would leave behind, and all the books she'd never have the chance to write was pe haps so unbearable to her, that she just wanted 'to get it over and done with'. Perhaps she just wanted to die as she had lived: allways in control. Merry Christmas, everyone. Given her circumstances I don't think one could expect Death to play anyting BUT a big role in her writings. She experienced it first hand over and over again - of course it would be imprinted on her mind!

Sorry, people, I'm a rotten typist! The mind is eager, but the fingers falter . . .

Riette -- that's a good point you bring up about Emily's emotional strength. She is definitely portrayed as a dark genius in most of the bios I've read -- the emphasis is always on her anti-social nature. I think she was strong, and when she failed, she bitterly disappointed herself (as in having to leave Roe Head & Miss Patchett's). My favorite writing Bronte is Charlotte -- I can relate to her more because I think she made an effort to live in this world & suffer the pangs of love & life which most o the rest of us feel. I also admire her strength of will, flair for poetic prose, and essentially feminist stance. My fiance's favorite is Anne, for her quiet fortitude. We are lucky to have three immortal authors to choose from in the same family, aren't we?

I agree with Riette and Amy on Emily being very strong. Just because she was more introverted and reclusive doesn't mean she was a dark brooding woman with a suicide wish. I think her death was simply that she had been independent during her whole life (in charge of household chores and all) and didn't like to depend on other people. It seems to me that Emily was very practical and steady and she also was a brilliant writer with a strong imagination. I think a lot of biographers overlook the fact that she can be both of those things at once. As for their overall images, I think Charlotte gets a lot of her "driving force" fame because she was the one who mostly tried to fit in with the world around them and make a life outside. Probably, she's the reason any of their work got published, for which I am extremely grateful.

What are some examples of how she tried to fit in?