Fangirling Bronte

Today was the pinnacle of my England trip. I spent the morning at the Bronte parsonage, the place where the Bronte sisters (and brother) grew up. There was so much tragedy in their lives, which I suppose gave depth to the stories they created.

My all-time favorite book is Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre. This is the place she wrote it, and where Emily wrote Wuthering Heights. Again, such tortured characters, but the graveyard was literally right outside their door.

Charlotte worked for awhile as a governess, away from the parsonage, and when she did, she was able to visit the Norton Conyers home . . . which gave her the inspiration for Jane Eyre. This place has been closed to the public for the past 15 years but it happened to be open the one weekend I was in town. See the round windows at the top? Only one of them is real (the farthest left). It’s rumored to be the crazy lady’s window and the rest are fake.

When the family was doing renovations on the home (the reason it was closed for 15 years) they rediscovered the secret door in the panel that was the inspiration for Charlotte to write about Bertha, the crazy lady who was locked in the attic.

And, as providence would have it, I’m also here at the exact same time the BBC is filming a production about the life of the Bronte sisters. They recreated the parsonage and church up on the moor near town. Here’s the set . . .

I’ll leave you with a sunset from the moor that Charlotte used to walk.