1 00:00:02,500 --> 00:00:05,060 When I was living in this road as a child, 2 00:00:05,060 --> 00:00:07,540 I spent a lot of time immersed in 3 00:00:07,540 --> 00:00:10,700 the fantasy world of the books that I got from the library. 4 00:00:10,700 --> 00:00:13,860 But my top favourite, especially in the film version, 5 00:00:13,860 --> 00:00:16,420 was Wuthering Heights. 6 00:00:18,460 --> 00:00:21,380 Heathcliff. Make the world stop right here. 7 00:00:22,460 --> 00:00:25,340 Make everything stop and stand still and never move again. 8 00:00:25,340 --> 00:00:29,220 Make the moors never change and... you and I never change. 9 00:00:29,220 --> 00:00:32,100 And this...was my moors. 10 00:00:32,100 --> 00:00:35,540 I would run around being the wild child Cathy, 11 00:00:35,540 --> 00:00:37,620 calling for Heathcliff. 12 00:00:37,620 --> 00:00:40,940 Oh, I was so in love with him. He was my ideal man. 13 00:00:46,420 --> 00:00:48,500 Older and wiser, 14 00:00:48,500 --> 00:00:51,660 I realised that Hollywood had misled me. 15 00:00:51,660 --> 00:00:54,060 They'd left a lot out. 16 00:00:55,180 --> 00:00:58,980 Wuthering Heights never was a sentimental love story. 17 00:00:58,980 --> 00:01:02,700 And Heathcliff is far from the rather soppy romantic lead 18 00:01:02,700 --> 00:01:05,460 Laurence Olivier portrays in the film. 19 00:01:05,460 --> 00:01:08,020 Emily Bronte's masterpiece 20 00:01:08,020 --> 00:01:10,780 is a dark study of the wild extremes 21 00:01:10,780 --> 00:01:12,860 of human obsession. 22 00:01:12,860 --> 00:01:16,620 And my childhood heartthrob is a vicious psychopath. 23 00:01:18,900 --> 00:01:21,300 Emily's older sister Charlotte wrote another book 24 00:01:21,300 --> 00:01:23,900 that transfixed me. 25 00:01:23,900 --> 00:01:27,620 The shocking Gothic romance Jane Eyre. 26 00:01:27,620 --> 00:01:30,420 One of the best-selling novels of all time. 27 00:01:31,860 --> 00:01:36,260 While Anne Bronte's brilliant The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall 28 00:01:36,260 --> 00:01:40,740 scandalised Victorian society and is now widely regarded 29 00:01:40,740 --> 00:01:43,420 as an early feminist classic. 30 00:01:45,500 --> 00:01:47,940 I rate each of the Bronte sisters amongst 31 00:01:47,940 --> 00:01:50,340 the greatest novelists I have ever read. 32 00:01:51,380 --> 00:01:53,340 But I am left with a question. 33 00:01:54,380 --> 00:01:57,140 How did three spinsters 34 00:01:57,140 --> 00:02:01,620 who spent most of their life in a remote parsonage... 35 00:02:01,620 --> 00:02:03,660 on the edge of the moors 36 00:02:03,660 --> 00:02:06,020 come to write books 37 00:02:06,020 --> 00:02:08,060 that I find shocking... 38 00:02:08,060 --> 00:02:10,100 erotic... 39 00:02:10,100 --> 00:02:12,180 profoundly moving... 40 00:02:13,220 --> 00:02:15,380 ..and quite wonderful? 41 00:02:28,580 --> 00:02:32,420 My journey starts in the Yorkshire village of Haworth... 42 00:02:32,420 --> 00:02:35,940 as I search through the life and work of the Bronte sisters 43 00:02:35,940 --> 00:02:41,060 for some kind of explanation for this family's unique genius. 44 00:02:43,500 --> 00:02:49,540 Patrick Bronte was appointed perpetual curate at Howarth in 1820. 45 00:02:49,540 --> 00:02:53,340 And he and his wife Maria and six young children 46 00:02:53,340 --> 00:02:55,580 moved here to the parsonage. 47 00:02:58,420 --> 00:03:02,900 He was a self-made man. He was born in a tiny shack in Ireland. 48 00:03:02,900 --> 00:03:06,500 Yet he got to Cambridge, where he got a first class degree. 49 00:03:09,180 --> 00:03:12,500 Just six months after arriving in Haworth, Maria died of cancer. 50 00:03:14,020 --> 00:03:17,700 Leaving Patrick with six children under the age of eight. 51 00:03:19,500 --> 00:03:22,100 His two eldest daughters succumbed to TB 52 00:03:22,100 --> 00:03:24,060 less than four years later. 53 00:03:25,660 --> 00:03:27,740 The four surviving children, 54 00:03:27,740 --> 00:03:31,300 Charlotte, Emily, Anne, and their brother Branwell, 55 00:03:31,300 --> 00:03:33,460 were raised by their father at the parsonage 56 00:03:33,460 --> 00:03:37,500 with the help of his late wife's sister Aunt Branwell. 57 00:03:38,660 --> 00:03:42,980 Patrick encouraged the remarkable creativity of his precocious offspring. 58 00:03:44,380 --> 00:03:47,820 This is a little pencil drawing by Branwell. 59 00:03:49,180 --> 00:03:52,820 When he was 11 years old. It's rather sweet. 60 00:03:52,820 --> 00:03:57,140 Each of the young Brontes showed some promise as artists. 61 00:03:58,180 --> 00:04:00,500 This is really good, I think. 62 00:04:00,500 --> 00:04:03,300 It's...it's a painting by Emily... 63 00:04:04,580 --> 00:04:08,660 ..of her dog - she had several dogs, but this is Keeper, I think. 64 00:04:09,740 --> 00:04:13,820 But storytelling seems to have been their great passion. 65 00:04:13,820 --> 00:04:19,020 Each week, the Reverend Bronte would prepare his sermon in the study 66 00:04:19,020 --> 00:04:23,300 while upstairs the wild imaginations of his four children 67 00:04:23,300 --> 00:04:25,900 would run riot in the small bedroom, 68 00:04:25,900 --> 00:04:30,100 where they gathered to create exotic fantasy worlds. 69 00:04:31,180 --> 00:04:36,460 Inspired in part by a childhood gift of 12 toy soldiers. 70 00:04:37,540 --> 00:04:39,780 We have a lovely account by Charlotte 71 00:04:39,780 --> 00:04:43,980 of Father buying the soldiers and returning back to Haworth with them. 72 00:04:43,980 --> 00:04:47,340 Which er...which I can show you. Oh, right. 73 00:04:48,780 --> 00:04:51,700 'Papa bought Branwell some soldiers at Leeds.' 74 00:04:52,740 --> 00:04:54,820 'I snatched at one and exclaimed, 75 00:04:54,820 --> 00:04:57,380 "This is the Duke of Wellington. It shall be mine!"' 76 00:04:58,500 --> 00:05:02,100 'Mine was the bonniest, and perfect in every part.' 77 00:05:02,100 --> 00:05:04,660 'Emily's was a grave-looking fellow 78 00:05:04,660 --> 00:05:06,700 and we called him Gravy.' 79 00:05:06,700 --> 00:05:09,180 'Anne's was a queer little thing, 80 00:05:09,180 --> 00:05:11,260 very much like herself.' 81 00:05:11,260 --> 00:05:14,780 'Branwell chose Bonaparte.' Oh, that's wonderful. 82 00:05:14,780 --> 00:05:18,260 They would act out little plays with the soldiers. 83 00:05:18,260 --> 00:05:20,900 And they went from acting them out 84 00:05:20,900 --> 00:05:22,860 to writing them down. 85 00:05:24,700 --> 00:05:29,020 And this is by Charlotte Bronte. She'd have been 14 when she wrote this. 86 00:05:29,020 --> 00:05:33,460 And it's designed to be small enough for the toy soldiers to read. 87 00:05:33,460 --> 00:05:37,580 But it had the advantage of being like a secret code 88 00:05:37,580 --> 00:05:39,820 amongst the children. 89 00:05:39,820 --> 00:05:43,780 And their father, or their aunt, just wouldn't have been able to read it. 90 00:05:43,780 --> 00:05:46,580 Why was it so secret? Were they naughty stories, or...? 91 00:05:46,580 --> 00:05:51,900 Well, as they got older, they were probably not what you would expect the vicar's children to be writing. 92 00:05:51,900 --> 00:05:54,060 Their reading was uncensored, 93 00:05:54,060 --> 00:05:57,300 so they were reading Byron and all kinds of Gothic books. 94 00:05:57,300 --> 00:05:59,820 And everything fed into these stories. 95 00:06:01,180 --> 00:06:05,300 'An Extraordinary Dream, by Lord Charles Wellesley.' 96 00:06:05,300 --> 00:06:10,700 'In this slumber, I thought I was walking on the banks of a river... 97 00:06:10,700 --> 00:06:14,020 which murmured over small pebbles at the bottom, 98 00:06:14,020 --> 00:06:17,740 gleaming like crystals through the silver stream.' 99 00:06:17,740 --> 00:06:22,300 'And the green buds of the wild rose trees around were unopened.' 100 00:06:22,300 --> 00:06:25,820 'And a mild warmth was shed from the sun... 101 00:06:25,820 --> 00:06:28,580 then at its height in the blue sky.' 102 00:06:30,780 --> 00:06:32,940 That's obviously from their walks, isn't it? 103 00:06:35,020 --> 00:06:38,900 Branwell and Charlotte created dozens of these little books. 104 00:06:38,900 --> 00:06:43,580 Writing about life in a glamorous, exotic realm called Angria. 105 00:06:43,580 --> 00:06:47,460 It was peopled by aristocratic characters 106 00:06:47,460 --> 00:06:50,700 in these grand halls with balls and... 107 00:06:50,700 --> 00:06:54,940 All the things that the Brontes had lacked in their everyday life. 108 00:06:56,180 --> 00:06:58,660 Their younger sisters, Emily and Anne, 109 00:06:58,660 --> 00:07:01,340 felt excluded from the Angria adventures. 110 00:07:01,340 --> 00:07:03,260 So they invented a country of their own. 111 00:07:04,620 --> 00:07:09,820 Emily even added their imaginary land, Gondal, to a geography textbook, 112 00:07:09,820 --> 00:07:11,780 with a location in the North Pacific. 113 00:07:13,340 --> 00:07:17,860 I just love the idea of these children in this tiny room 114 00:07:17,860 --> 00:07:20,860 creating these extraordinary worlds. 115 00:07:24,260 --> 00:07:26,900 And I'm sure this early writing work 116 00:07:26,900 --> 00:07:29,740 would have developed the skills of all the Brontes. 117 00:07:29,740 --> 00:07:34,220 But, while Charlotte and Anne drew on their adult experiences 118 00:07:34,220 --> 00:07:37,060 to produce their later masterpieces, 119 00:07:37,060 --> 00:07:41,140 their sister never abandoned the stories she wrote as a child. 120 00:07:41,140 --> 00:07:43,220 For Emily, 121 00:07:43,220 --> 00:07:46,180 the fantasy world that she created in Gondal 122 00:07:46,180 --> 00:07:51,140 was used later as the basis for the only novel that she ever published, 123 00:07:51,140 --> 00:07:53,220 Wuthering Heights. 124 00:07:53,220 --> 00:07:57,820 But, whereas the imaginary world was set in tropical climates, 125 00:07:57,820 --> 00:08:01,300 she set this in a landscape that she knew very well. 126 00:08:01,300 --> 00:08:06,380 The wild moors that lay at the back of the home that she had lived in since she was a toddler. 127 00:08:13,900 --> 00:08:19,500 I'm retracing the route that Emily would've followed across her beloved moors 128 00:08:19,500 --> 00:08:23,580 to the location said to have inspired Wuthering Heights. 129 00:08:23,580 --> 00:08:26,340 The bleak, remote farmhouse, 130 00:08:26,340 --> 00:08:28,340 where Heathcliff makes his home. 131 00:08:29,420 --> 00:08:33,820 This is Emily's opening description of that brutal, windswept landscape. 132 00:08:34,900 --> 00:08:39,740 'Pure, bracing ventilation they must have up there at all times.' 133 00:08:39,740 --> 00:08:44,380 'Indeed, one may guess the power of the north wind blowing over the edge 134 00:08:44,380 --> 00:08:48,460 by the excessive slant of the few stunted firs 135 00:08:48,460 --> 00:08:50,500 at the end of the house 136 00:08:50,500 --> 00:08:52,860 and by the range of gaunt thorns, 137 00:08:52,860 --> 00:08:56,020 all stretching their limbs one way, 138 00:08:56,020 --> 00:08:59,380 as if craving alms of the sun.' 139 00:09:02,580 --> 00:09:06,740 Cathy's undying obsession with the cruel Heathcliff 140 00:09:06,740 --> 00:09:09,780 is mirrored by her love of this untamed wilderness. 141 00:09:10,860 --> 00:09:13,980 And I'm sure the author's own passion for the landscape 142 00:09:13,980 --> 00:09:17,940 can be heard in Cathy's almost blasphemous hymn to the moors. 143 00:09:19,500 --> 00:09:23,620 'If I were in heaven, I should be extremely miserable.' 144 00:09:23,620 --> 00:09:26,060 'I dreamt I was there once.' 145 00:09:26,060 --> 00:09:29,060 'Heaven did not seem to be my home.' 146 00:09:29,060 --> 00:09:32,820 'And I broke my heart with weeping to come back to Earth.' 147 00:09:32,820 --> 00:09:37,180 'And the angels were so angry that they flung me out in the middle of the heath 148 00:09:37,180 --> 00:09:39,420 on the top of Wuthering Heights, 149 00:09:39,420 --> 00:09:42,020 where I awoke, sobbing for joy.' 150 00:09:49,580 --> 00:09:52,580 Emily Bronte's tortured love story continues 151 00:09:52,580 --> 00:09:56,340 to inspire new films, musicals, operas, 152 00:09:56,340 --> 00:09:58,300 songs and ballets. 153 00:10:00,620 --> 00:10:06,220 David Nixon choreographed a recent interpretation of Wuthering Heights for Northern Ballet. 154 00:10:10,100 --> 00:10:13,980 I sat in with David for a rehearsal of the section where Heathcliff 155 00:10:13,980 --> 00:10:19,740 takes revenge on Cathy for marrying his wealthy rival, Edgar Linton. 156 00:10:20,980 --> 00:10:25,380 He taunts Cathy by toying with Linton's sister Isabella 157 00:10:25,380 --> 00:10:27,500 under her jealous gaze. 158 00:10:27,500 --> 00:10:31,620 That was really good. It's her reaction you're watching as you're touching her. 159 00:10:31,620 --> 00:10:34,260 'I know what you've always wanted.' 160 00:10:36,340 --> 00:10:39,340 'But...Missy here's gonna get it instead.' 161 00:10:53,420 --> 00:10:56,260 Terrific. Well done. Well done. 162 00:10:57,380 --> 00:10:59,940 Wonderful, wonderful. Really wonderful. 163 00:10:59,940 --> 00:11:02,180 What theme most attracted you in the book? 164 00:11:03,580 --> 00:11:05,980 I think there were kind of... probably two themes. 165 00:11:05,980 --> 00:11:08,340 At one point in their youth, 166 00:11:08,340 --> 00:11:12,820 there was this absolute harmony between two young people. 167 00:11:12,820 --> 00:11:17,660 And it had to do with the moors and how at one they all were in that space. 168 00:11:17,660 --> 00:11:20,140 And then, the...the contrast to that, 169 00:11:20,140 --> 00:11:25,220 that as we grow up and as we make choices, how that actually destroys it. 170 00:11:25,220 --> 00:11:28,620 Yes. Absolutely. It's an obsessional love affair. 171 00:11:28,620 --> 00:11:31,260 It's something that they have to have. Have to. 172 00:11:31,260 --> 00:11:33,660 And that's a lot of what we spoke about in rehearsal. 173 00:11:33,660 --> 00:11:37,060 We didn't actually say a lot of 'in love' things. It was obsession. 174 00:11:39,780 --> 00:11:42,460 What I just find unbelievable 175 00:11:42,460 --> 00:11:44,460 is that it's so true. Yeah. 176 00:11:44,460 --> 00:11:48,300 She understands the nature, not just of woman, but of man. 177 00:11:48,300 --> 00:11:51,060 And this is a woman that had no life experience. I know. 178 00:11:51,060 --> 00:11:55,340 This woman's had nothing. And yet she brings this truth of life to this book. 179 00:11:55,340 --> 00:11:59,180 I mean, lust, sex - everything. And she hasn't had any of it, really. 180 00:12:01,420 --> 00:12:05,060 Emily was only 27 when she completed Wuthering Heights. 181 00:12:05,060 --> 00:12:07,860 Yet her novel tells us so much 182 00:12:07,860 --> 00:12:11,100 about the darkest moments of the human condition. 183 00:12:12,220 --> 00:12:15,580 When Cathy is dying, the scene between her and Heathcliff 184 00:12:15,580 --> 00:12:18,660 is...absolutely amazing. 185 00:12:20,460 --> 00:12:23,060 Anybody that's watched somebody they love die 186 00:12:23,060 --> 00:12:25,020 will understand that... 187 00:12:26,060 --> 00:12:28,540 ..that appalling desperation 188 00:12:28,540 --> 00:12:32,100 of wanting to... keep the person with you. 189 00:12:36,620 --> 00:12:42,660 'Her present countenance had a wild vindictiveness...in its white cheek.' 190 00:12:43,740 --> 00:12:47,020 'And a bloodless lip and scintillating eye.' 191 00:12:47,020 --> 00:12:49,860 'And she retained in her closed fingers 192 00:12:49,860 --> 00:12:53,060 a portion of locks she had been grasping.' 193 00:12:53,060 --> 00:12:55,100 'As to her companion, 194 00:12:55,100 --> 00:12:58,140 so inadequate was his stock of gentleness 195 00:12:58,140 --> 00:13:00,420 to the requirements of her condition 196 00:13:00,420 --> 00:13:04,980 that on his letting go I saw four distinct impressions 197 00:13:04,980 --> 00:13:07,700 left blue in the colourless skin.' 198 00:13:14,100 --> 00:13:17,900 I think I find Wuthering Heights particularly moving because... 199 00:13:17,900 --> 00:13:21,500 I have felt all the feelings that are in that book. 200 00:13:21,500 --> 00:13:24,220 Particularly the sense of loss... 201 00:13:24,220 --> 00:13:26,260 and desperation. 202 00:13:26,260 --> 00:13:28,220 And, luckily for me, great love. 203 00:13:32,260 --> 00:13:36,460 Emily expresses many of these powerful emotions 204 00:13:36,460 --> 00:13:40,300 using imagery from this majestic landscape. 205 00:13:41,500 --> 00:13:46,820 And the moors do seem to have given inspiration to all three of the Bronte sisters. 206 00:13:47,860 --> 00:13:52,860 But in other ways, these young women were each very different. 207 00:13:53,900 --> 00:13:57,060 Emily's talent seemed to come from her Yorkshire roots. 208 00:13:57,060 --> 00:14:00,140 And a wild imagination. But she wrote only for herself. 209 00:14:01,500 --> 00:14:03,580 Now, her older sister, Charlotte, 210 00:14:03,580 --> 00:14:05,620 was quite different. 211 00:14:05,620 --> 00:14:08,660 She was ambitious and adventurous. 212 00:14:08,660 --> 00:14:11,300 And hungry for fame. 213 00:14:20,000 --> 00:14:23,240 The three Bronte girls were raised in humble surroundings 214 00:14:23,240 --> 00:14:25,320 by their curate father Patrick 215 00:14:25,320 --> 00:14:28,360 and their late mother's sister, Aunt Branwell. 216 00:14:29,440 --> 00:14:34,440 Emily, Charlotte and Anne would go on to write classic Victorian novels. 217 00:14:34,440 --> 00:14:37,880 But before their books were published, 218 00:14:37,880 --> 00:14:42,640 the sisters spent many years trying to find other ways to earn money. 219 00:14:43,880 --> 00:14:48,280 In the 19th century, most middle class women with no independent means 220 00:14:48,280 --> 00:14:50,320 had to either get married 221 00:14:50,320 --> 00:14:53,080 or work as governesses and teachers. 222 00:14:53,080 --> 00:14:57,040 Something that the Bronte sisters did and wrote about in their books. 223 00:14:57,040 --> 00:15:00,040 When they were young, they came as students 224 00:15:00,040 --> 00:15:03,080 to this...school here. Roe Head School. 225 00:15:03,080 --> 00:15:05,800 Later, Charlotte came here as a teacher. 226 00:15:06,880 --> 00:15:09,400 It wasn't altogether a happy situation. 227 00:15:11,240 --> 00:15:17,080 She wanted to be a writer, but circumstances dictated that she had to be a teacher. 228 00:15:17,080 --> 00:15:20,440 There's a wonderful bit that Charlotte writes in The Roe Head Journal. 229 00:15:20,440 --> 00:15:24,040 'Am I to spend all the best part of my life in this wretched bondage, 230 00:15:24,040 --> 00:15:27,640 forcibly suppressing my rage at the idleness, the apathy 231 00:15:27,640 --> 00:15:31,560 and most asinine stupidity of these fat-headed oafs?' 232 00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:35,960 That's wonderful. That must sum up a lot of teachers' attitudes. 233 00:15:35,960 --> 00:15:40,400 What she's wanting to do is write about her imaginary world, Angria. 234 00:15:40,400 --> 00:15:44,120 And she can't. She has to sit there and teach these wretched children. 235 00:15:45,680 --> 00:15:47,760 While she was teaching at Roe Head, 236 00:15:47,760 --> 00:15:52,200 Charlotte wrote to the poet laureate, Robert Southey, asking 237 00:15:52,200 --> 00:15:55,000 for his opinion of a selection of her poems. 238 00:15:55,000 --> 00:15:59,520 He wrote back to her, 'Literature cannot be the business of a woman's life.' 239 00:15:59,520 --> 00:16:01,600 'And it ought not to be.' 240 00:16:01,600 --> 00:16:04,000 'The more she is engaged in her proper duties 241 00:16:04,000 --> 00:16:06,040 the less leisure she will have for it.' 242 00:16:06,040 --> 00:16:09,000 'Even as an accomplishment or a recreation.' 243 00:16:10,080 --> 00:16:13,360 Now, you and I, I'm sure, will be up in arms about that. 244 00:16:13,360 --> 00:16:17,760 But the point about the whole letter is that he's actually saying to her, 245 00:16:17,760 --> 00:16:21,880 'It's OK to write poetry, but don't try to be famous with your writing.' 246 00:16:21,880 --> 00:16:25,840 'Write poetry for its own sake, not with a view to celebrity.' 247 00:16:25,840 --> 00:16:28,080 But if you are a woman, living in a vicarage... 248 00:16:29,200 --> 00:16:32,800 ..you are going to have to aim for... success. 249 00:16:32,800 --> 00:16:35,840 And we wouldn't have heard of any of those girls 250 00:16:35,840 --> 00:16:38,120 if Charlotte hadn't wanted... 'celebrity.' 251 00:16:39,720 --> 00:16:43,560 But even for a woman as ambitious and driven as Charlotte Bronte, 252 00:16:43,560 --> 00:16:46,840 Southey's letter was a major setback. 253 00:16:46,840 --> 00:16:50,680 Charlotte kept the envelope and she wrote upon it... 254 00:16:50,680 --> 00:16:53,040 'Southey's Advice. To be kept for ever.' 255 00:16:53,040 --> 00:16:56,560 'Roe Head, April 21st 1837.' 256 00:16:56,560 --> 00:17:00,160 My 21st birthday. Oh, really? And then at the top, 257 00:17:00,160 --> 00:17:02,920 she's written, 'Melpomene.' 258 00:17:02,920 --> 00:17:05,920 And that's the muse of tragedy. Oh, really? 259 00:17:07,080 --> 00:17:11,240 When she went back to school, all she would concentrate on was doing her duty as a teacher. 260 00:17:11,240 --> 00:17:14,720 And you think that was partly as a result of his letter. I'm sure it is. 261 00:17:14,720 --> 00:17:16,720 Because it closed that door for her. 262 00:17:19,560 --> 00:17:24,800 The route to a literary career seemed to be shut off for the Brontes. 263 00:17:25,920 --> 00:17:29,720 Their early efforts in education had proved a dead end. 264 00:17:29,720 --> 00:17:34,160 So it was time to start out on a new path. 265 00:17:34,160 --> 00:17:36,880 The three sisters, now all in their 20s, 266 00:17:36,880 --> 00:17:39,200 hatched a plan. 267 00:17:39,200 --> 00:17:41,480 They would establish a school of their own. 268 00:17:42,520 --> 00:17:44,840 Their ever-loving Aunt Branwell 269 00:17:44,840 --> 00:17:47,720 gave them the money to set up the school. 270 00:17:47,720 --> 00:17:51,320 And Charlotte and Emily used part of it to go to Brussels 271 00:17:51,320 --> 00:17:54,440 to improve their French, and other subjects, 272 00:17:54,440 --> 00:17:56,520 so that they had better credentials. 273 00:17:56,520 --> 00:18:01,200 Charlotte's time in Belgium was to have a profound effect on her. 274 00:18:06,040 --> 00:18:08,880 I joined a tour of the Belgian capital, 275 00:18:08,880 --> 00:18:12,080 run by the Brussels Bronte Society, 276 00:18:12,080 --> 00:18:15,680 to find out more about the sisters' stay in the city. 277 00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:18,480 Brussels was a cosmopolitan city. 278 00:18:18,480 --> 00:18:20,920 It was also cheaper than Paris. 279 00:18:20,920 --> 00:18:24,800 So a lot of English people sent their daughters to be educated here. 280 00:18:25,920 --> 00:18:29,160 The Bronte sisters attended services at the protestant chapel here. 281 00:18:29,160 --> 00:18:32,480 And Charlotte in particular enjoyed watching the ladies 282 00:18:32,480 --> 00:18:34,480 coming out and the way they were dressed - 283 00:18:34,480 --> 00:18:36,880 far better dressed than uh... 284 00:18:36,880 --> 00:18:39,400 the English ladies. 285 00:18:39,400 --> 00:18:42,160 Charlotte's interest in Belgian fashion is certainly 286 00:18:42,160 --> 00:18:45,720 at odds with her reputation as a simple country girl. 287 00:18:46,960 --> 00:18:51,120 But more importantly, the tuition she received in Brussels, 288 00:18:51,120 --> 00:18:55,080 at the Pensionnat Heger, would transform her as a writer. 289 00:18:56,760 --> 00:18:59,400 The pensionnat, where the sisters stayed and studied, 290 00:18:59,400 --> 00:19:02,280 was straight in the middle of this uh...street. 291 00:19:04,320 --> 00:19:07,440 Charlotte described Mr Heger, their teacher, 292 00:19:07,440 --> 00:19:10,240 as a brilliant man. 293 00:19:10,240 --> 00:19:15,640 And she felt that she was respected for her passion for writing and willingness to learn. 294 00:19:16,760 --> 00:19:20,800 Is it true also that he made her economise in language? 295 00:19:20,800 --> 00:19:23,440 He...he taught them discipline. 296 00:19:23,440 --> 00:19:26,640 The improvement in Charlotte's writing was enormous. 297 00:19:30,040 --> 00:19:35,000 Mr Heger certainly helped his pupil to develop her writing style. 298 00:19:35,000 --> 00:19:39,080 He may also have aroused unfamiliar passions 299 00:19:39,080 --> 00:19:42,080 in this 27-year-old Yorkshirewoman, 300 00:19:42,080 --> 00:19:45,760 driving the dutiful daughter of an Anglican minister 301 00:19:45,760 --> 00:19:50,880 to an extraordinary visit to the Catholic cathedral in Brussels. 302 00:19:52,080 --> 00:19:55,160 A remarkable episode in Charlotte's life happened here. 303 00:19:55,160 --> 00:20:00,120 She felt so bad, she decided to enter the cathedral and confess. 304 00:20:00,120 --> 00:20:04,320 There was a letter to Emily where she said, 'For heaven's sake, don't tell Father.' 305 00:20:04,320 --> 00:20:08,120 Because he was so...absolutely against Catholicism. 306 00:20:08,120 --> 00:20:11,040 Yes, of course. But it gives a fascinating idea 307 00:20:11,040 --> 00:20:14,840 of how desperate she must've been feeling, that she felt the need for that. 308 00:20:14,840 --> 00:20:21,080 In the end, she felt she had to find comfort somewhere, even with a Catholic priest. 309 00:20:24,240 --> 00:20:28,320 We will never know exactly what Charlotte said in the secret of the confessional. 310 00:20:29,400 --> 00:20:32,640 But there are strong clues that she may have been experiencing 311 00:20:32,640 --> 00:20:35,280 the sort of terrible emotional turmoil 312 00:20:35,280 --> 00:20:38,440 she would later write about in her classic novels. 313 00:20:40,760 --> 00:20:43,640 Evidence of Charlotte's state of mind 314 00:20:43,640 --> 00:20:47,320 can be found back in London, at The British Library, 315 00:20:47,320 --> 00:20:50,480 in a series of letters she wrote to Mr Heger 316 00:20:50,480 --> 00:20:52,440 after leaving Brussels. 317 00:20:53,520 --> 00:20:56,920 They probably are the most important relics of Charlotte Bronte. 318 00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:01,920 They tell us about her feelings for a man who was her mentor 319 00:21:01,920 --> 00:21:04,600 at a crucial point in her life. 320 00:21:04,600 --> 00:21:06,960 She says some very daring things to Monsieur. 321 00:21:06,960 --> 00:21:11,080 She said, 'You showed me a little interest in Brussels.' 322 00:21:11,080 --> 00:21:13,840 'I demand that you show me the same interest now.' 323 00:21:16,440 --> 00:21:19,560 Unsurprisingly, this father of five, 324 00:21:19,560 --> 00:21:23,360 under the watchful eye of his wife Madame Heger, 325 00:21:23,360 --> 00:21:27,560 does not seem to have been very pleased to receive these passionate letters 326 00:21:27,560 --> 00:21:29,640 from his former pupil. 327 00:21:29,640 --> 00:21:32,680 He tore them up, put them in his wastepaper basket, 328 00:21:32,680 --> 00:21:35,960 and what I imagine is that Madame plucked them out. 329 00:21:35,960 --> 00:21:38,960 She has...threaded a needle... 330 00:21:40,080 --> 00:21:44,360 ..and patiently sewn the pieces of the letter together. 331 00:21:44,360 --> 00:21:47,720 Because she had to understand the dynamic 332 00:21:47,720 --> 00:21:50,920 between her husband and his star pupils. 333 00:21:52,000 --> 00:21:54,280 And she understood from reading these letters 334 00:21:54,280 --> 00:21:57,520 that she should have nothing more to do with the Brontes. 335 00:21:57,520 --> 00:21:59,960 And she refused to have English pupils for some years. 336 00:22:01,040 --> 00:22:03,840 Can you give me an example of why you think... 337 00:22:03,840 --> 00:22:06,240 that she was really in love with this man? 338 00:22:06,240 --> 00:22:08,800 Well...what we have here 339 00:22:08,800 --> 00:22:12,000 is...the last letter she wrote to Monsieur. 340 00:22:12,000 --> 00:22:15,280 And this is the one letter we have that wasn't torn up. 341 00:22:16,400 --> 00:22:20,880 She says...'I must say one word to you in English.' 342 00:22:20,880 --> 00:22:24,320 And...she goes on to tell him that she delighted 343 00:22:24,320 --> 00:22:26,360 in speaking in French, 344 00:22:26,360 --> 00:22:28,960 because it reminded her of him. 345 00:22:28,960 --> 00:22:31,040 And she says... 346 00:22:31,040 --> 00:22:34,720 'Every word was most precious to me... 347 00:22:34,720 --> 00:22:37,520 because it reminded me of you.' Oh! 348 00:22:37,520 --> 00:22:40,680 'I love French...for your sake... 349 00:22:40,680 --> 00:22:44,280 with all my heart and soul.' Oh, dear. 350 00:22:44,280 --> 00:22:47,400 So I think that Monsieur never replied to this letter. 351 00:22:47,400 --> 00:22:50,760 And, by enlarging this letter for the camera, 352 00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:54,360 we have discovered that that full stop... 353 00:22:54,360 --> 00:22:57,720 is actually in the shape of a heart. So it is! 354 00:22:57,720 --> 00:22:59,960 It is a heart. This is amazing! 355 00:23:01,040 --> 00:23:03,680 So she sent this message to Monsieur. 356 00:23:03,680 --> 00:23:07,160 But I don't think we can think of love in our present day sense. 357 00:23:07,160 --> 00:23:10,440 It isn't...adulterous, it isn't an affair. 358 00:23:10,440 --> 00:23:13,560 But it's more than friendship. Because... 359 00:23:13,560 --> 00:23:18,760 for a very...proper young woman in the middle of the 19th century... 360 00:23:19,840 --> 00:23:22,960 ..she had to imagine love rather than enact it. 361 00:23:22,960 --> 00:23:25,920 And that imagining was crucial for her writing. 362 00:23:28,720 --> 00:23:31,840 One of the great myths about the Brontes 363 00:23:31,840 --> 00:23:35,520 is that they never experienced the emotions that they expressed 364 00:23:35,520 --> 00:23:37,760 so powerfully in their books. 365 00:23:37,760 --> 00:23:40,680 I certainly don't think that is true of Charlotte, 366 00:23:40,680 --> 00:23:42,800 and her great classic Jane Eyre, 367 00:23:42,800 --> 00:23:47,200 in which the young heroine has a doomed passion for the married Mr Rochester. 368 00:23:49,160 --> 00:23:53,600 This is Jane, when Mr Rochester is proposing to her. 369 00:23:53,600 --> 00:23:56,360 She thinks he's just talking about her having to leave. 370 00:23:57,440 --> 00:24:00,920 But I feel it's something to do with what Charlotte Bronte felt 371 00:24:00,920 --> 00:24:03,920 when she had to leave the man she loved in Brussels. 372 00:24:03,920 --> 00:24:06,920 'I grieve to leave Thornfield.' 373 00:24:06,920 --> 00:24:09,560 'Because I have lived in it a full and delightful life, 374 00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:11,640 momentarily, at least.' 375 00:24:11,640 --> 00:24:14,760 'I have talked face to face with an original, 376 00:24:14,760 --> 00:24:17,200 a vigorous and expanded mind.' 377 00:24:17,200 --> 00:24:20,040 'I have known you, Mr Rochester, 378 00:24:20,040 --> 00:24:22,960 and it strikes me with terror and anguish 379 00:24:22,960 --> 00:24:25,920 to feel I absolutely must be torn from you for ever.' 380 00:24:25,920 --> 00:24:28,720 'I see the necessity of departure.' 381 00:24:28,720 --> 00:24:32,200 'And it is like looking on the necessity of death.' 382 00:24:33,680 --> 00:24:37,720 I'm sure she was thinking of her lover. Or her not-lover. 383 00:24:40,760 --> 00:24:43,760 I think that Jane Eyre is a wonderful novel. 384 00:24:43,760 --> 00:24:47,240 It can drive me to tears and laughter at the same reading. 385 00:24:48,320 --> 00:24:52,320 And, for me, that spirit has really been captured 386 00:24:52,320 --> 00:24:54,800 by artist Dame Paula Rego. 387 00:24:54,800 --> 00:24:56,760 Oh, yes. That's a strange one. 388 00:24:57,800 --> 00:24:59,640 She has produced a series of works 389 00:24:59,640 --> 00:25:02,160 based on texts from the book. 390 00:25:03,240 --> 00:25:06,920 Many of the pieces cover the cruel treatment of Jane as a young orphan, 391 00:25:06,920 --> 00:25:10,400 often in the house of her aunt, Mrs Reed. 392 00:25:11,840 --> 00:25:14,400 This is marvellous. This is marvellous. 393 00:25:14,400 --> 00:25:18,320 They punish her by throwing her all alone in this big room. 394 00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:20,640 She's flat on her tummy. 395 00:25:20,640 --> 00:25:23,320 Oh! She's all crumpled. 396 00:25:23,320 --> 00:25:25,520 Mm. I called this Crumpled. 397 00:25:25,520 --> 00:25:28,120 It's wonderful. This is one of my favourites, this. 398 00:25:28,120 --> 00:25:30,880 Because it's just...how it was. 399 00:25:30,880 --> 00:25:33,080 How it was for her. Yes. 400 00:25:33,080 --> 00:25:35,360 Has it ever been like that for you? 401 00:25:35,360 --> 00:25:37,880 I've felt crumpled, yes. Scared stiff. 402 00:25:39,560 --> 00:25:42,840 And these pictures reflect the characters as they are written. 403 00:25:42,840 --> 00:25:47,640 Not the more sentimental versions often portrayed in adaptations. 404 00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:50,680 Jane was ugly. She says so herself. 405 00:25:50,680 --> 00:25:53,680 But nine times out of ten, if you see a movie, 406 00:25:53,680 --> 00:25:55,720 the girl is prettily plain. 407 00:25:55,720 --> 00:25:57,760 You know. Sort of, no makeup. 408 00:25:57,760 --> 00:25:59,840 That's the concession to ugliness. 409 00:25:59,840 --> 00:26:02,160 But you actually make no bones about it. 410 00:26:02,160 --> 00:26:04,240 Yeah. That is not a beautiful woman. 411 00:26:05,520 --> 00:26:07,600 That is Jane. 412 00:26:07,600 --> 00:26:11,840 In Charlotte's novel, Jane does eventually find love. 413 00:26:11,840 --> 00:26:16,360 In the form of the aloof, unattainable Mr Rochester. 414 00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:21,360 You're showing him with this dark, sort of glowering look. 415 00:26:21,360 --> 00:26:24,560 Yeah. What do you think of Rochester? 416 00:26:24,560 --> 00:26:26,600 Well, I think he's a pompous twit. 417 00:26:26,600 --> 00:26:29,160 And I think he's not kind. 418 00:26:29,160 --> 00:26:32,560 And he's very...very nasty to women. 419 00:26:32,560 --> 00:26:35,560 He cares about Jane, though, do you not think, in the end? 420 00:26:35,560 --> 00:26:38,600 I think he's pleased that he's alive. 421 00:26:38,600 --> 00:26:40,640 Yes. Cos he could've been dead. 422 00:26:42,160 --> 00:26:47,040 Charlotte does allow her unfortunate heroine a happy ending. 423 00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:51,960 After all the passionate love and shocking Gothic carryings-on, 424 00:26:51,960 --> 00:26:53,920 this is what happens. 425 00:26:54,880 --> 00:26:57,480 'Reader...I married him.' 426 00:26:58,520 --> 00:27:01,640 'A quiet wedding we had...he and I' 427 00:27:01,640 --> 00:27:03,800 'When we got back from church, 428 00:27:03,800 --> 00:27:06,240 I went into the kitchen and I said, 429 00:27:06,240 --> 00:27:10,800 "Mary, I have been married to Mr Rochester this morning."' 430 00:27:10,800 --> 00:27:14,440 'Mary, bending again over the roast, 431 00:27:14,440 --> 00:27:16,960 said only, "Have you, Miss?"' 432 00:27:16,960 --> 00:27:18,920 '"Well, for sure."' 433 00:27:22,240 --> 00:27:24,760 It's so funny, to end up with something so... 434 00:27:24,760 --> 00:27:27,600 casual and...nonchalant. 435 00:27:27,600 --> 00:27:29,600 Brilliant. 436 00:27:33,520 --> 00:27:37,720 Charlotte based her clever, passionate and witty books 437 00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:40,720 on her own rich and varied emotional life. 438 00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:46,680 Her sister Emily drew on her childhood fantasies 439 00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:49,200 for her only published novel. 440 00:27:51,000 --> 00:27:53,880 But Anne Bronte was different again. 441 00:27:53,880 --> 00:27:57,920 Her greatest work was a campaigning novel... 442 00:27:57,920 --> 00:28:02,240 now seen as a ground-breaking feminist classic. 443 00:28:09,500 --> 00:28:11,540 By 1845, 444 00:28:11,540 --> 00:28:14,020 Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte 445 00:28:14,020 --> 00:28:17,260 were all living with their father Patrick back in the parsonage. 446 00:28:19,380 --> 00:28:22,100 The two older girls had returned from Brussels. 447 00:28:23,180 --> 00:28:26,940 But there were no takers for their planned school in Haworth. 448 00:28:28,300 --> 00:28:30,580 Probably because of its remote location. 449 00:28:31,660 --> 00:28:35,580 The Bronte sisters, now in their late 20s, 450 00:28:35,580 --> 00:28:38,100 and yet to start writing their novels, 451 00:28:38,100 --> 00:28:41,380 still needed to find a way to earn a living. 452 00:28:43,180 --> 00:28:46,740 Then Charlotte came upon something that would change their lives for ever. 453 00:28:46,740 --> 00:28:51,060 On a little writing desk like this, she found a notebook 454 00:28:51,060 --> 00:28:53,420 full of Emily's poems. 455 00:28:53,420 --> 00:28:56,100 Like this one. Maybe even this one. 456 00:28:57,420 --> 00:29:00,980 She wrote, 'I know no woman that ever lived 457 00:29:00,980 --> 00:29:03,380 ever wrote such poetry before.' 458 00:29:04,700 --> 00:29:08,980 Emily was furious that Charlotte had invaded her privacy. 459 00:29:08,980 --> 00:29:11,300 She didn't even want her poetry read. Wow! 460 00:29:11,300 --> 00:29:15,620 But she was persuaded that they should publish a collection of their works. 461 00:29:15,620 --> 00:29:19,140 This is the very first edition 462 00:29:19,140 --> 00:29:21,700 of Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. 463 00:29:23,380 --> 00:29:25,580 They decided to adopt pseudonyms, 464 00:29:25,580 --> 00:29:29,180 because they recognised that there was a kind of double standard 465 00:29:29,180 --> 00:29:31,580 in the way writing was reviewed. 466 00:29:31,580 --> 00:29:35,940 And they wanted to be viewed as writers, not particularly women writers. 467 00:29:37,060 --> 00:29:40,740 There's one here that I like by Ellis, nee Emily. 468 00:29:40,740 --> 00:29:42,780 And it's called To Imagination. 469 00:29:42,780 --> 00:29:45,460 'So hopeless is the world without, 470 00:29:45,460 --> 00:29:48,780 The world within I doubly prize.' 471 00:29:48,780 --> 00:29:52,300 'The world where guile and hate and doubt 472 00:29:52,300 --> 00:29:55,620 and cold suspicion never rise.' 473 00:29:55,620 --> 00:29:58,300 'Where thou and I and liberty 474 00:29:58,300 --> 00:30:01,260 have undisputed sovereignty.' 475 00:30:02,820 --> 00:30:06,740 It must rank as one of the biggest failures in the history of publishing. 476 00:30:06,740 --> 00:30:09,140 There were two copies...sold. 477 00:30:09,140 --> 00:30:12,780 Oh, no! Despite some very favourable reviews. 478 00:30:13,900 --> 00:30:16,460 And Charlotte sent some of the remaining copies 479 00:30:16,460 --> 00:30:19,500 to authors, accompanied by this note. 480 00:30:19,500 --> 00:30:23,500 'Sir, my relatives Ellis and Acton Bell and myself 481 00:30:23,500 --> 00:30:27,260 have committed the rash act of printing a volume of poems.' 482 00:30:27,260 --> 00:30:31,300 'The consequences predicted have, of course, overtaken us.' 483 00:30:31,300 --> 00:30:34,900 'Our book is found to be a drug. No man needs it or heeds it.' 484 00:30:36,020 --> 00:30:39,540 'In the space of a year, our publisher has disposed but of two copies.' 485 00:30:39,540 --> 00:30:41,620 'And by what painful efforts 486 00:30:41,620 --> 00:30:43,820 he succeeded in getting rid of these, 487 00:30:43,820 --> 00:30:45,980 to himself only knows.' 488 00:30:45,980 --> 00:30:48,700 Oh, that's tragic. But funny, as well. 489 00:30:48,700 --> 00:30:50,980 Yeah. Bless her. I mean, she's... 490 00:30:50,980 --> 00:30:54,940 making a joke of it. That's right. It must have been a crushing disappointment. 491 00:30:54,940 --> 00:30:58,620 But she was determined erm... to carry on with the publishing. 492 00:30:58,620 --> 00:31:00,780 It had given a zest to life. 493 00:31:01,900 --> 00:31:05,180 Having lost money on their volume of poetry, 494 00:31:05,180 --> 00:31:09,180 the Bronte sisters resolved to focus their formidable energies 495 00:31:09,180 --> 00:31:12,020 on a more lucrative side of the literary business. 496 00:31:13,060 --> 00:31:16,340 They set to work writing novels. 497 00:31:17,860 --> 00:31:20,300 Every evening, at about nine o'clock, 498 00:31:20,300 --> 00:31:22,620 Patrick would leave his study... 499 00:31:23,740 --> 00:31:25,780 ..wind up that clock, 500 00:31:25,780 --> 00:31:28,420 and then make his way to bed. 501 00:31:30,500 --> 00:31:33,660 With him gone, the three girls... 502 00:31:33,660 --> 00:31:37,580 would come into the dining room and promenade around this table, 503 00:31:37,580 --> 00:31:40,940 reading extracts of their work to one another. 504 00:31:40,940 --> 00:31:44,820 This production line produced three classic novels. 505 00:31:44,820 --> 00:31:49,300 Emily's Wuthering Heights, Anne's Agnes Grey and Charlotte's The Professor. 506 00:31:49,300 --> 00:31:52,180 And the first two were accepted for publication. 507 00:31:53,220 --> 00:31:55,380 Charlotte's was rejected. However, 508 00:31:55,380 --> 00:31:58,580 she just sat down and, in a few weeks, she produced... 509 00:31:58,580 --> 00:32:00,540 Jane Eyre. 510 00:32:01,620 --> 00:32:03,660 Jane Eyre was published first. 511 00:32:03,660 --> 00:32:05,620 And was an instant hit. 512 00:32:07,060 --> 00:32:10,860 Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey followed two months later. 513 00:32:10,860 --> 00:32:14,380 They were less successful. But all three of the sisters 514 00:32:14,380 --> 00:32:16,660 were now published novelists. 515 00:32:17,700 --> 00:32:19,980 Their brother Branwell, however, 516 00:32:19,980 --> 00:32:21,940 was in a desperate state. 517 00:32:24,020 --> 00:32:28,020 As a young man, Branwell had been the golden boy of the Bronte family. 518 00:32:29,420 --> 00:32:32,660 He was the guiding force behind their childhood writings, 519 00:32:32,660 --> 00:32:35,180 had poems published in local papers, 520 00:32:35,180 --> 00:32:38,140 and harboured serious ambitions 521 00:32:38,140 --> 00:32:40,180 to become a professional artist. 522 00:32:41,540 --> 00:32:43,740 Here, in the National Portrait Gallery, 523 00:32:43,740 --> 00:32:47,540 is Branwell's only surviving painting of his three sisters. 524 00:32:48,620 --> 00:32:52,620 Originally, he was in the picture. There. 525 00:32:52,620 --> 00:32:54,660 You can see a faint outline. 526 00:32:54,660 --> 00:32:57,140 But, for some reason, 527 00:32:57,140 --> 00:33:00,260 he painted himself out with a pillar. 528 00:33:00,260 --> 00:33:04,300 Which is fortunately beginning to fade, so we know what happened. 529 00:33:05,540 --> 00:33:07,940 It's a slight mystery as to why he did that. 530 00:33:09,020 --> 00:33:11,460 I mean, I think the official reason is that it was... 531 00:33:11,460 --> 00:33:13,900 he thought the composition was better without him. 532 00:33:13,900 --> 00:33:17,220 Or maybe he just painted himself... really rather badly. 533 00:33:17,220 --> 00:33:19,340 But...I think 534 00:33:19,340 --> 00:33:21,580 it's an amazing image... 535 00:33:21,580 --> 00:33:23,540 of what was gonna happen later. 536 00:33:25,140 --> 00:33:28,940 Either through lack of ability or lack of application, 537 00:33:28,940 --> 00:33:32,180 Branwell never made it as a portrait painter. 538 00:33:32,180 --> 00:33:35,100 And he was later dismissed from a succession of jobs. 539 00:33:36,220 --> 00:33:39,620 By the time his sisters started to win fame as writers, 540 00:33:39,620 --> 00:33:42,540 he had been sacked as a tutor. 541 00:33:42,540 --> 00:33:45,580 Seemingly because of an affair with his employer's wife. 542 00:33:46,660 --> 00:33:50,340 He returned, grief-stricken, to the parsonage, 543 00:33:50,340 --> 00:33:53,660 where he sank into serious alcohol and drug abuse. 544 00:33:54,700 --> 00:33:56,860 This is a room that... 545 00:33:56,860 --> 00:33:59,220 eventually, Branwell shared with his father. 546 00:33:59,220 --> 00:34:03,300 What happened was that he came back...paralytic one night. 547 00:34:03,300 --> 00:34:05,700 And he managed to set fire to his bedclothes. 548 00:34:05,700 --> 00:34:07,780 Anne and Emily rescued him, 549 00:34:07,780 --> 00:34:10,060 and Patrick decided he had to keep an eye on him. 550 00:34:11,180 --> 00:34:13,500 Can you imagine what it was like in this house? 551 00:34:13,500 --> 00:34:16,060 His whole life was disintegrating, 552 00:34:16,060 --> 00:34:18,940 this beloved brother and son, in front of their eyes. 553 00:34:20,020 --> 00:34:22,940 But out of it came a wonderful book by Anne. 554 00:34:23,980 --> 00:34:26,060 The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall. 555 00:34:26,060 --> 00:34:29,860 It is one of the best studies of alcoholism, 556 00:34:29,860 --> 00:34:33,060 and its effect on the family and everybody around them, 557 00:34:33,060 --> 00:34:35,140 that I have ever read. 558 00:34:39,540 --> 00:34:42,060 Branwell used to blame his alcoholism 559 00:34:42,060 --> 00:34:44,420 on a sad affair that he had with a married woman. 560 00:34:45,500 --> 00:34:47,620 And it is sometimes a trait of addiction 561 00:34:47,620 --> 00:34:51,020 that people are apt to blame other people for their terrible illness. 562 00:34:52,220 --> 00:34:55,420 The character in Wildfell Hall turns on his wife 563 00:34:55,420 --> 00:34:57,940 and blames her for all his bad behaviour. 564 00:34:57,940 --> 00:35:00,180 And this is a typical passage of that. 565 00:35:00,180 --> 00:35:04,580 'As for him, for the first week or two he was peevish and low.' 566 00:35:04,580 --> 00:35:08,220 'Fretting, I suppose, over his dear Annabella's departure.' 567 00:35:08,220 --> 00:35:10,300 That's his mistress. 568 00:35:10,300 --> 00:35:12,420 'And particularly ill-tempered to me.' 569 00:35:13,500 --> 00:35:15,580 'Everything I did was wrong.' 570 00:35:15,580 --> 00:35:18,380 'I was cold-hearted, hard, insensate.' 571 00:35:18,380 --> 00:35:22,220 'My sour, pale face was perfectly repulsive.' 572 00:35:22,220 --> 00:35:24,460 'My voice made him shudder.' 573 00:35:24,460 --> 00:35:27,700 'He knew not how he could live through the winter with me.' 574 00:35:27,700 --> 00:35:29,820 'I should kill him by inches.' 575 00:35:31,100 --> 00:35:33,460 Anne's The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall 576 00:35:33,460 --> 00:35:36,060 was a revolutionary depiction 577 00:35:36,060 --> 00:35:39,940 of the powerlessness of a woman in an abusive marriage. 578 00:35:39,940 --> 00:35:45,060 And I think it's every bit as good as the better-known Bronte books. 579 00:35:45,060 --> 00:35:47,140 In fact, 580 00:35:47,140 --> 00:35:50,420 all three sisters produced enduring masterpieces. 581 00:35:51,500 --> 00:35:54,580 How did it happen? How was it possible? 582 00:35:54,580 --> 00:35:57,420 Three Victorian spinsters... 583 00:35:57,420 --> 00:36:00,580 living in isolation on the Yorkshire moors... 584 00:36:00,580 --> 00:36:03,260 Award-winning playwright Polly Teale 585 00:36:03,260 --> 00:36:06,300 has written extensively about the Brontes. 586 00:36:07,420 --> 00:36:11,100 I joined Polly to talk about this unique literary family 587 00:36:11,100 --> 00:36:16,140 at the dining room table where so many of the Bronte classics were produced. 588 00:36:16,140 --> 00:36:18,620 When they're writing and walking round this table, 589 00:36:18,620 --> 00:36:20,700 they must've had such a laugh. 590 00:36:20,700 --> 00:36:23,300 And they must've... inspired one another. 591 00:36:23,300 --> 00:36:26,820 It must've been a kind of furnace, mustn't it? With the three of them. 592 00:36:26,820 --> 00:36:30,540 Right from when they were children. Because they did that with Angria and... 593 00:36:30,540 --> 00:36:32,620 the books, the little, tiny books. Yes. 594 00:36:32,620 --> 00:36:37,220 And their father gave them this extraordinary access to literature. 595 00:36:37,220 --> 00:36:42,420 And they read in a way that would've been very unusual for...for girls at that time. 596 00:36:42,420 --> 00:36:47,220 And in fact, you could only go to the local library if you were a man. 597 00:36:47,220 --> 00:36:50,260 So they had to get Branwell to bring the books back for them. 598 00:36:52,380 --> 00:36:55,460 Our books are covered in flour and spatters of gravy. 599 00:36:55,460 --> 00:36:57,540 The library have complained. 600 00:36:57,540 --> 00:37:00,740 Well, not to us. We are not allowed to go there. 601 00:37:00,740 --> 00:37:03,020 Fathers and sons only. 602 00:37:03,020 --> 00:37:06,380 But our brother tells us that a carrot peeling was found, 603 00:37:06,380 --> 00:37:08,700 lying like a bookmark, by the librarian. 604 00:37:09,820 --> 00:37:12,580 I think none of them would have written 605 00:37:12,580 --> 00:37:15,020 but for the existence of the others. 606 00:37:15,020 --> 00:37:18,460 Even Branwell. I think they could almost smell it off him. 607 00:37:18,460 --> 00:37:22,020 These...affairs, these adventures that he was having. 608 00:37:22,020 --> 00:37:24,020 Living this life out there in the world, 609 00:37:24,020 --> 00:37:26,060 whilst they were... 610 00:37:26,060 --> 00:37:28,180 really confined to this... 611 00:37:28,180 --> 00:37:31,780 very domestic world that women occupied. 612 00:37:31,780 --> 00:37:34,020 Do you think they would've written the books 613 00:37:34,020 --> 00:37:36,540 if they'd had the kind of freedom that we have? 614 00:37:36,540 --> 00:37:40,140 Perhaps a lot of the power of the books comes out of that repression. 615 00:37:40,140 --> 00:37:42,700 You know. It's almost like in their writing 616 00:37:42,700 --> 00:37:46,900 there was an opportunity for them to take revenge on a world that... 617 00:37:46,900 --> 00:37:49,100 didn't allow them a voice. 618 00:37:49,100 --> 00:37:51,860 And yet, here, alone in this room... 619 00:37:51,860 --> 00:37:54,060 they could say whatever they wanted to. 620 00:37:56,580 --> 00:37:59,420 It seems that the safe haven of the parsonage 621 00:37:59,420 --> 00:38:03,620 and the bonds that formed between the four Bronte children within its walls 622 00:38:03,620 --> 00:38:06,020 were crucial to their art. 623 00:38:08,620 --> 00:38:12,340 But this was also a very unhealthy place to live. 624 00:38:14,780 --> 00:38:17,380 The average life expectancy in Haworth 625 00:38:17,380 --> 00:38:19,620 was just 25. 626 00:38:19,620 --> 00:38:24,260 Partly as a result of the church graveyard polluting the drinking water 627 00:38:24,260 --> 00:38:26,340 as it flowed down from the moors. 628 00:38:28,420 --> 00:38:32,180 The two oldest Bronte girls, Maria and Elizabeth, 629 00:38:32,180 --> 00:38:37,180 had died of TB, or consumption, as it used to be known, as young children. 630 00:38:39,420 --> 00:38:44,140 In 1848, this terrible disease would strike again at the family. 631 00:38:46,100 --> 00:38:48,580 Branwell was the first to succumb, 632 00:38:48,580 --> 00:38:52,820 dying in September that year at the age of 31. 633 00:38:57,180 --> 00:38:59,940 His sister Emily, aged just 30... 634 00:39:00,940 --> 00:39:03,260 ..followed only three months later. 635 00:39:05,780 --> 00:39:09,460 Anne too developed the symptoms of consumption. 636 00:39:10,620 --> 00:39:14,940 And, as her condition deteriorated, she wrote this heart-breaking letter. 637 00:39:17,780 --> 00:39:21,420 'I wish it would please God to spare me.' 638 00:39:21,420 --> 00:39:24,060 'Not only for Papa and Charlotte's sakes... 639 00:39:25,140 --> 00:39:28,180 ..but because I long to do some good in the world... 640 00:39:28,180 --> 00:39:30,220 before I leave it.' 641 00:39:30,220 --> 00:39:33,580 'I have many schemes in my head for future practice.' 642 00:39:34,620 --> 00:39:37,780 'Humble and limited indeed, but still, 643 00:39:37,780 --> 00:39:40,580 I should not like them to come to nothing... 644 00:39:41,620 --> 00:39:44,380 ..and myself to have lived to so little purpose.' 645 00:39:45,380 --> 00:39:47,980 'But God's will be done.' 646 00:39:52,660 --> 00:39:54,820 Anne came here to Scarborough with Charlotte. 647 00:39:56,340 --> 00:39:58,820 She thought somehow it would make her feel better. 648 00:39:59,820 --> 00:40:02,220 She had been here before, 649 00:40:02,220 --> 00:40:05,180 when she was governess to a family, and she fell in love with it. 650 00:40:08,860 --> 00:40:12,180 Sadly, her condition worsened. They couldn't get her back to Haworth. 651 00:40:13,260 --> 00:40:18,100 And she died here in 1849... aged only 29. 652 00:40:20,020 --> 00:40:23,420 Anne's death was a gentle and brave one. 653 00:40:26,740 --> 00:40:28,860 And almost her last words were, 654 00:40:28,860 --> 00:40:32,540 'Take courage, Charlotte, take courage.' 655 00:40:37,220 --> 00:40:40,180 So...Charlotte was on her own. 656 00:40:42,180 --> 00:40:44,180 She wrote... 657 00:40:44,180 --> 00:40:46,180 'It is over.' 658 00:40:47,180 --> 00:40:50,020 'Emily...Branwell...Anne... 659 00:40:50,940 --> 00:40:53,940 ..all are gone...like dreams.' 660 00:40:54,980 --> 00:40:57,580 'I have watched them fall asleep on my arm... 661 00:40:58,580 --> 00:41:01,100 ..have closed their glazed eyes.' 662 00:41:03,060 --> 00:41:05,740 'I have seen them buried, one by one.' 663 00:41:09,420 --> 00:41:12,900 Desperately lonely, Charlotte threw herself into her work. 664 00:41:13,980 --> 00:41:18,100 And, less than six months after Anne's death, published a new novel - Shirley. 665 00:41:19,100 --> 00:41:21,860 I met biographer Lucasta Miller 666 00:41:21,860 --> 00:41:23,940 at the Red House in Gomersal, 667 00:41:23,940 --> 00:41:26,860 model for the home of the Yorke family in Shirley, 668 00:41:26,860 --> 00:41:29,820 to find out how the now celebrated author 669 00:41:29,820 --> 00:41:31,780 would cope with her terrible loss. 670 00:41:32,900 --> 00:41:37,180 Charlotte came back from Scarborough and there she was, alone with Patrick. 671 00:41:37,180 --> 00:41:39,660 It must've been a nightmare to come back to Haworth. 672 00:41:40,780 --> 00:41:44,740 There's an absolutely heartrending story of Charlotte going down to the dining room 673 00:41:44,740 --> 00:41:47,380 where previously she and her sisters used to... 674 00:41:47,380 --> 00:41:49,500 walk round, talking about their writing. 675 00:41:49,500 --> 00:41:53,380 And...going round and round the table on her own. 676 00:41:53,380 --> 00:41:57,580 Really, it's an absolutely appalling sense of loss and bereavement. 677 00:41:58,940 --> 00:42:01,700 And Charlotte was facing further problems. 678 00:42:03,740 --> 00:42:07,060 The Bronte sisters had written a series of controversial novels. 679 00:42:08,180 --> 00:42:12,860 Jane Eyre was about the relationship between a married man and his governess... 680 00:42:12,860 --> 00:42:15,700 both of Anne's books were campaigning attacks 681 00:42:15,700 --> 00:42:18,060 on conventional Victorian society... 682 00:42:19,100 --> 00:42:23,780 ..whilst Wuthering Heights was considered amoral and ungodly. 683 00:42:24,860 --> 00:42:30,500 When it became known that the authors of these novels were actually women... 684 00:42:30,500 --> 00:42:34,300 Victorian society was scandalised. 685 00:42:34,300 --> 00:42:39,300 A storm was brewing against the work and the morals of the Brontes. 686 00:42:39,300 --> 00:42:43,700 Charlotte's response would be to create a new work of fiction. 687 00:42:43,700 --> 00:42:46,700 She republished Wuthering Heights. 688 00:42:46,700 --> 00:42:51,740 Which gave her the opportunity to write a short biographical notice of her sisters. 689 00:42:51,740 --> 00:42:55,620 She is trying to get the public... almost to forgive them 690 00:42:55,620 --> 00:42:57,740 for having written these shocking books. 691 00:42:57,740 --> 00:42:59,540 It's a piece of Victorian spin. 692 00:42:59,540 --> 00:43:03,580 She creates this myth of the moors and Haworth, as if that was 693 00:43:03,580 --> 00:43:05,940 all there was to their inspiration. 694 00:43:07,020 --> 00:43:09,900 She presents her sisters as being uneducated. 695 00:43:09,900 --> 00:43:12,620 She says neither Emily nor Anne were learned, 696 00:43:12,620 --> 00:43:15,460 when in fact they were voracious readers. 697 00:43:15,460 --> 00:43:18,300 You know. They were highly - And they spoke French. 698 00:43:18,300 --> 00:43:20,340 ..intelligent. They wrote all their lives. 699 00:43:21,420 --> 00:43:25,220 I had already discovered that the Bronte sisters were not the isolated, 700 00:43:25,220 --> 00:43:29,060 uneducated country girls of popular imagination. 701 00:43:30,100 --> 00:43:33,460 They enjoyed an excellent, if unconventional education 702 00:43:33,460 --> 00:43:37,140 and quite a wealth of experiences for young women of the age. 703 00:43:38,180 --> 00:43:40,580 What I hadn't realised was 704 00:43:40,580 --> 00:43:44,780 that this story was partly concocted by Charlotte 705 00:43:44,780 --> 00:43:47,460 to protect the reputations of the sisters 706 00:43:47,460 --> 00:43:50,420 whose loss she mourned so deeply. 707 00:43:51,300 --> 00:43:55,940 But it seems Charlotte may have dealt a much more substantial blow 708 00:43:55,940 --> 00:43:58,500 to the Bronte legacy. 709 00:43:58,500 --> 00:44:01,660 She went through all her sisters' papers after they died. 710 00:44:01,660 --> 00:44:04,580 She prepared some of their poetry to be published. 711 00:44:04,580 --> 00:44:09,020 And in some cases making really quite...substantial changes. 712 00:44:09,020 --> 00:44:11,460 She actually changed words? She changed words. 713 00:44:11,460 --> 00:44:15,420 And, more...tragically, it's also possible that Charlotte 714 00:44:15,420 --> 00:44:17,700 destroyed the unfinished manuscript 715 00:44:17,700 --> 00:44:19,980 of a possible second novel by Emily. 716 00:44:19,980 --> 00:44:22,580 I hope that's not true. That is awful. We can't be sure. 717 00:44:22,580 --> 00:44:24,980 How would she have destroyed it? Will we find it? 718 00:44:24,980 --> 00:44:27,940 Is it likely to be in somebody's attic in pieces? 719 00:44:27,940 --> 00:44:30,180 If she did destroy it, she probably burnt it. 720 00:44:30,180 --> 00:44:33,580 You can be...particularly if you're insane with grief, 721 00:44:33,580 --> 00:44:36,700 you can make strange decisions... can't you? 722 00:44:36,700 --> 00:44:39,140 Thinking...they wouldn't like that. 723 00:44:39,140 --> 00:44:43,580 Try and do what you think is best. I suppose that's what she was doing. 724 00:44:43,580 --> 00:44:46,140 It's just tragic for us if there was a second book. 725 00:44:48,540 --> 00:44:51,300 We will never know if Emily wrote a second novel. 726 00:44:51,300 --> 00:44:54,580 But Charlotte herself produced one more book. 727 00:44:54,580 --> 00:44:58,940 Villette - based heavily on her experiences in Brussels. 728 00:44:59,940 --> 00:45:02,660 She also found some brief respite 729 00:45:02,660 --> 00:45:05,140 from the crippling loneliness she had felt 730 00:45:05,140 --> 00:45:08,140 since the death of her brother and her sisters. 731 00:45:09,180 --> 00:45:11,380 In 1852, 732 00:45:11,380 --> 00:45:13,740 Arthur Bell Nicholls, 733 00:45:13,740 --> 00:45:16,820 the curate to Patrick in Haworth, 734 00:45:16,820 --> 00:45:18,900 proposed to Charlotte. 735 00:45:18,900 --> 00:45:21,380 To begin with, she wasn't particularly interested. 736 00:45:21,380 --> 00:45:23,420 And Patrick opposed it. 737 00:45:23,420 --> 00:45:26,100 But Nicholls won them round. 738 00:45:26,100 --> 00:45:30,140 And in 1854, they married... in the father's church. 739 00:45:31,220 --> 00:45:34,540 The villagers said that she looked like a snowdrop. 740 00:45:35,620 --> 00:45:38,580 He was a nice man. He wasn't at all like... 741 00:45:38,580 --> 00:45:41,700 the rather sadistic heroes of the girls' novels. 742 00:45:42,780 --> 00:45:46,340 But sadly, after a few months, Charlotte died... 743 00:45:47,380 --> 00:45:49,700 ..in the early stages of pregnancy. 744 00:45:50,740 --> 00:45:53,420 Charlotte, only 38 years old, 745 00:45:53,420 --> 00:45:56,260 was laid to rest alongside her mother, 746 00:45:56,260 --> 00:45:58,420 her brother and three of her sisters. 747 00:45:59,540 --> 00:46:04,260 Beneath the church where her father served as rector for more than 40 years. 748 00:46:05,620 --> 00:46:07,700 I hope with all my heart 749 00:46:07,700 --> 00:46:12,780 that the beautiful last paragraph of Emily's Wuthering Heights, 750 00:46:12,780 --> 00:46:16,380 which is actually about the graves of Cathy and Heathcliff and Linton, 751 00:46:16,380 --> 00:46:19,700 could also be applied to the graves of the Brontes. 752 00:46:21,420 --> 00:46:23,460 'I lingered round them... 753 00:46:23,460 --> 00:46:26,140 under that benign sky.' 754 00:46:27,420 --> 00:46:31,060 'Watched the moths fluttering among the heath and harebells... 755 00:46:32,500 --> 00:46:34,900 ..and listened to the soft wind 756 00:46:34,900 --> 00:46:36,900 breathing through the grass... 757 00:46:38,260 --> 00:46:44,980 ..and wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers... 758 00:46:44,980 --> 00:46:49,060 for the sleepers... in that quiet earth.' 759 00:46:52,020 --> 00:46:53,980 Subtitles by deluxe