The Bronte Sisters


Bronte, Anne (1820-1849)

Anne Bronte was the sister of both Charlotte, and Emily Bronte. As the youngest of the family, Anne was heavily home taught, though she briefly attended school at Roe Head in 1836-1837. Together, the Bronte's came up with the imaginary word Gondal, which became the setting for several poems and an important characteristic in their lives. Than either Charlotte or Emily, Anne had the most experience as a governess. She worked for the Ingham family at Blake Hall in 1839 and the Robinsons of Thorpe Green Hall in 1841-1845. She was followed there by Branwell (her brother) but he was later dismissed due to his fixation with Mrs. Robinson, so he followed him home. Anne's quasi-autobiographical story, Agnes Grey based on her experiences as governess. It was published under the alias Acton Bell as were Poems by Currer, and Ellis-her 1846 collection. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, being her second novel, was published in 1848. Despite the fact that Anne's work included lucid and powerful portrayals of description in her text, it didn't budge sociey's collective opinions that her novels didn't measure up to her sisters'. In 1849 she died on a visit to Scarborough in May 1849 and was buried there.

Bronte, Charlotte (1816-1855)

The acclaimed novelist and poet, Charlotte was the sister of Anne and Emily Bronte and born to a Yorkshire clergyman. After the death of their mother in 1821, their aunt Elizabeth Branwell took care of them. Charlotte attended school at Cowan Bridge, where her eldest sisters contracted the tuberculosis from which they died. She was governess to the Sidgwick family in 1839 and then in 1841, the White family. She and Emily went to Brussels in 1842 to study languages, but were forced to return form their excursion due to the untimely death. The following year Charlotte returned to Brussels and formed a deep friendship and passion for her tutor M. Heger. He was fictionalized in both The Professor (1857) and Villette (1853). In 1845, she discovered her sister's (Emily) poetic works and decided to include her and Branwell's childhood imagination of Angria in Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. Unfortunately the book had only sold two copies. Her first two novels The Professor and Jane Eyre were instantaneous successes. In 1848, both Branwell and Emily died from tuberculosis, followed by Anne in 1849. None the less, Charlotte continued to write Shirley and Villette. Only after a few short months after her marriage to A.B. Nicholls, she too died from tuberculosis in her early stages of pregnancy. She was accredited to being an "extraordinarily powerful and talented writer in her day," though she was accused by some critics as being a 'strong-minded' woman and of writing 'coarse' novels.

Bronte, Emily (1818-1848)

Like her sister Charlotte, Emily was a novelist and poet. Most of her life was spent living in Haworth, Yorkshire, briefly attending Cowan Bridge school. She went back to Roe Head in 1835 because she was homesick. She only left home while being a governess at Law Hill and going on that short expedition to Brussels with Charlotte. She, along with Anne Bronte, created imaginary world of Gondal, and she adopts the personae of Gondal characters in many of her poems. Wuthering Heights was the only novel that overshadowed her poetry. Her desire in writing lyrics explored "personal identity and the poet's relationship to language and to the natural landscape. 'Loud without the wind was roaring', 'Ah! why, because the dazzling sun' and 'I am the only being whose doom' are just one of her many better, and foremost accomplishments. Emily's Wuthering Heights, about setting human passions against society with exceptional violence, was initially recieved as eccentric and too rough. Since then, it has grown in critical growth in particular reference to structure.
 

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source:

Thomas, Jane. Guides to English Literature: Victorian Literature. London:Bloomsbury Publishing, 1994