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Friday, August 11, 2017

The Economist reviews John Pfordresher's The Secret History of Jane Eyre:
With “The Secret History of Jane Eyre”, John Pfordresher, a professor at Georgetown University, seeks to provide some answers. His aim is to unearth the real-life people and events that inspired Brontë’s much-loved classic novel.
Unfortunately, Mr Pfordresher cannot illuminate the writing process itself, save for noting the date that Brontë first put pen to paper. She left “no outlines, notes about characters, drafts scribbled over with revisions and additions” or any other such tantalising clues. So Mr Pfordresher chooses to follow the chronology of the novel and weave in the biographical detail.
Brontë poetry in a Hamilton chronicle in Los Angeles Times:
Jumping on bandwagons is my least favorite activity. Don’t force me to tell you all the must-see movies I’ve skipped (“Forrest Gump” is all you’ll get out of me), the No. 1 bestsellers I’ve bypassed (I discovered the world of “Harry Potter” only after it became a play) or the platinum records I’ve turned a deaf ear to (Bieber who?).
Some might interpret this as snobbery, but I see it as a form of self-protection. You are what you culturally consume, and I treasure the freedom of serendipitous discovery. Emily Brontë, in the poem “Stanzas,” speaks for many of us who instinctively steer clear from the madding crowd: “I’ll walk where my own nature would be leading:/ It vexes me to choose another guide.” (Charles McNulty)
Interlochen Public Radio talks about Sarah Shoemaker's Mr. Rochester:
Mr. Rochester is known as the passionate, difficult and mysterious man who falls in love with her in the story. But little is learned about his background in Brontë’s novel. Now, 170 years after "Jane Eyre" was published, writer Sarah Shoemaker tells his story in a new book called "Mr. Rochester."
"In a lot of ways it is kind of hard to recreate a character, especially a character that people have very varying attitudes towards," says Shoemaker. "Some people really dislike Mr. Rochester. Most people are fond of him or love him." (...)
Shoemaker lives in Northport and is a former University of Michigan librarian. She will be in Traverse City for a National Writers Series event at Kirkbride Hall Thursday at 7 p.m. (Morgan Springer)
The Locarno Film Festival describes like this Jacques Tourneur's I Walked With a Zombie 1943, recently screened in a Tourneur retrospective:
What is the best way to end the day? According to Manuel Puig: enjoying a nice movie. Maybe a supernatural story. After about 150 pages of his 1976 novel Kiss of the Spider Woman, one of Puig's characters starts to recall a strange movie he saw many years before, which told the story of a female zombie. It's I walked with a Zombie that Jacques Tourneur made for RKO in 1943 with the supervision of producer Val Lewton. Puig's novel confirms the strange aura that surrounds the movie. Thomas Pynchon quotes it in Inherent Vice. The great rocker Roky Erickson named one of his tracks I Walked with a Zombie. Pedro Costa had it in mind for Casa de Lava. The movie inspired many artists. Tourneur had always considered I Walk with a Zombie one of his best movies, even if it was produced with a very low budget (but the idea of “greatness” had never something to do with money for Tourneur). The movie? Exotic setting, voodoo rituals, a love story that makes us recall Jane Eyre. The cinematography is outstanding, a perfect black and white that completely gives back the underlying tense of the story. A sort of magnificent spell. On the wall of Jessica's room, the sick wife of the rich owner of St. Sebastian’s island, there's a copy of Arnold Böcklin's Isle of the dead. The movie was quite unappreciated, it was considered an unidentified object, but later it became a cult movie. (Rinaldo Censi)
The riddle of the self in The Institute of Art and Ideas News:
Questers abound, and I have sufficient space only for an insufficient survey: Inanna in the Underworld, Isis and Osiris, Odysseus, Hercules and his trials, Theseus in the Labyrinth, Jesus in the wilderness, Buddha on his quest for enlightenment, sundry Grail Knights trotting nervously through enchanted forests, Hamlet tasked with avenging his father. Later, we encounter the heroes and heroines of bildungsromans (novels about the ‘building of a self’), including: Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce, Martha Quest by Doris Lessing, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Valis by Philip K Dick, Never Any End to Paris by Enrique Vila-Matas and so on. (Joanna Kavenna)
Metro presents some of the not-to-be-missed productions at the Edinburgh Fringe:
This year comes his highly anticipated new show, Queen of Wolves – a terrifying gothic comedy, in one ridiculous hour: Turn of the Screw meets Jane Eyre meets Rebecca meets Selena Gomez. (Amy Duncan)
Inlander recommends the novel Uprooted by Naomi Novik:
With threads that are comfortably familiar to fans of the fantasy genre (the book has even been compared to the literary classic Jane Eyre), Uprooted manages to stay true to its genre roots (no pun intended) while simultaneously presenting a fresh and mesmerizing new realm of magical storytelling. (Chey Scott)
Manchester Evening News on a really remote house now for sale:
A spokesperson for Auction House Manchester said: “If you think Wuthering Heights is a bit too accessible and want real seclusion then Keeper’s Cottage in Diggle ticks most of the boxes. (Dominic Smithers)
Diario El Zonda lists the most-read books in the digital platform Leamos. Although we don't know really what the are really reading. Not the Jane Eyre we know:
9. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë.
Esta desgarradora historia de amor fue publicada hace 170 años, pero eso no impide que lectores de todo el mundo se sigan cautivando con la relación de Jane y el señor Reed (!!), el primer gran amor de una de las hermanas Brontë (!!!). (Translation)
Ferloo talks about the writer Maryse Condé:
Maryse Condé a pratiqué le récit autobiographique, le roman policier, le fantastique, le roman d’amour et le roman historique, ainsi que la réécriture de classique de la littérature comme les Hauts de Hurlevent, un amour fusionnel avec sa mère, le théâtre et la littérature de jeunesse. (Saggo) (Translation)
Medium publishes an article about Bertha Mason:  The Woman With The Candle. Another perspective on Charlotte Bronte’s famous mad woman in the attic.

Finally on ConcertRoyal's YouTube channel:
Flautist Peter Harrison explores the collection of tunes for flute compiled by Branwell Brontë between 1831 and 1832 in his home The Parsonage in Haworth, Yorkshire, which he shared with his father and famous sisters.

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