Bronte

I loved this book! The descriptions of the Yorkshire moors, the town of Haworth, and the parish house and horrible boarding school are amazingly poetic and evocative. I was looking through the book to find a certain passage that just blew my mind, and then found it reprinted on the back of the dustjacket: "With her extraordinary cramped look, with her tiny, tight shoes, her tight little gloves, and with her habit of lurking in corners of the great drawing-room rather than entering into conversations, Charlotte was that type of retiring Sunday school teacher in whom seethe all kinds of perverse, romantic passions. Only, in Charlotte Bronte's case, she being a genius, this was taken to extremes..." How strangely sexy the claustrophobic, restricted lives of this family can seem! This is what I enjoy so much about novelizations as opposed to straight biography. The novelist feels free to use foreshadowing and symbolism and mood in a way that the biographer is afraid of. While the most literal-minded reader finds fault, those of us who are compelled to try on the lives of these fascinating people will find this book irresistable.

This is a moving and sensitive portrait of the Bronte family. Apart from being rivetting, it's certainly worth reading for its emotional power and fascinating depiction of 19thC Yorkshire, social mores and above all, the Bronte family dynamics. The story is by turns comic and tragic, and through it all, Mr Hughes treats his subjects with compassion and understanding. I visited Haworth several years ago, and this book evoked for me the stark beauty of the moors and the damp, chilling Yorkshire winter. Brill stuff!

I am writing this review to contradict one I believe was unfair. I was shocked to see how unkindly this book has been portrayed by other readers. As a member of the Bronte Society and someone who has read very extensively about all things Bronte, I feel qualified to give an educated opinion also. Glyn Hughes clearly did his homework. In his Acknowledgements he claims to have spent years at the Parsonage and at the Keighly Library delving into everything that was available to him. I believe that he did. His book drips with obvious elbow grease and reasearch. He offers some new and yes, perhaps questionable, theories, but those I enjoyed. The fact is none of us know the real inspiration to Wuthering Heights. His is one of many opinions on the subject. And whether one agrees with him or not, it should not effect the enjoyment of the book as a whole. I, unlike other readers, also found the account of Branwell's downward spiral fascinating. It is inarguably a very important part of the Bronte story. The most unbelievable thing about the other reviews were the critique of Mr. Hughes' prose. I (along with the authors of all the editorial reviews shown here) have nothing but praise and respect for the beauty of his words. I was overwhelmingly impressed by how he captured the mood of the Yorkshire wilderness in which the Brontes grew up, as well as the dynamic between the siblings, and the atmosphere of the house itself. I especially delighted in the character he created from Patrick. I hope my review will encourage others to read this book. I at least hope it makes the rating of this book more fair. It is a great success.