sections:
The Bronte story has been written many times but rarely as compellingly as by the Brontes themselves. Juliet Barker has used her unrivalled knowledge of the family to select extracts from their letters and manuscripts, many of which are appearing in print for the first time, to present the authentic voices of the three novelist sisters as well as their brother and father.
The letters detail the siblings' self-absorbed childhood, high-lighted by wild, imaginative games; the years of struggling to earn a living in uncongenial occupations before Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall took the literary world by storm;the terrible marring of that success as, one by one, Branwell, Emily, and Anne died tragically young and Charlotte's marriage to her father's curate. The letters are supplemented by extracts from other contemporary sources, and a brief narrative text guides the reader through the letters and sets them in context.
book reviews
- Jane Dunn, The Observer
‘Thrilling and engrossing . . . This book is alive with voices, affectionate, witty, sorrowful, fantastical, spiritual, mischievous and full of grief’
- Kathryn Hughes, The Daily Telegraph
‘By her careful excerpting and excellent narrative insertions, Juliet Barker reprises the extraordinary achievement of her The Brontes . . . It is not easy to hold all the voices together . . . but Barker combines them magnificently, getting closer than anyone to the sound of everyday life at Haworth’
- The Guardian
‘Letters like these allow the reader a fleeting intimacy with another’s life . . . Juliet Barker has laid her brilliant selection before the reader in chronological order, explaining any significant gaps in her story and introducing new friends and acquaintances . . . a deft and revealing book’
- The New York Times Book Review
‘A gripping documentary chronicle of this extraordinary brilliant and insular family’
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