CHARLOTTE BRONTE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21467, 15 April 1933, Page 7 (Supplement)

CHARLOTTE BRONTE

STORY OF ** JANE EYRE " " Jane Eyre " was written, in a sense, to order. Charlotte Bronte had prepared a book called " The Professor." This was rejected by publisher after publisher until it reached one who saw certain marginal pencil notes on the manuscript which Miss Bronte, in her ignorance of publishers' ways, had omitted to erase. Fortunately the last publisher, says a London writer, had a lofty disdain for the opinions of his rivals, and thought that a writer who could arouse so much criticism as the marginal notes on tho manuscript seemed to imply would be able to write something that would intrigue the public. He therefore returned " Tho Professor " with a suggestion that Charlotte should write him a longer book such as the public demanded at that time. This was in August, 1847, when Charlotte Bronte was 31. Miss Bronte set to work, and in the October of that year completed " Jane Eyre," which was an instant success. But for the fact that she died when only 39 Charlotte Bronte would have completed more than foui* novels. Hers was a gifted, family who came of Irish peasant stock, originally named Brunty. Her father started life as a working weaver, then went to Cambridge University and was ordained a clergyman. He became vicar of Howarth, near Keigliley, Yorkshire, where Charlotte and her two sisters, Emily and Anne, also famous writers, resided. Tragedy dogged tho Bronte family. All Charlotte's sisters died before quite young. Charlotte herself died nine months after marriage to her father's curate in 1855, leaving the vicar a pathetic figure in fiis lonely old nge, while her husband, the Rev. A. B. Nicholls, lived to mourn her loss until 190G, or more than half-a-century, during which period her popularity as a writer had in no way abated.