My literature prep for Yorkshire

I read Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights in middle school, but when the recent Jane Eyre movie with Michael Fassbender came out in 2011, I decided to read the book again. I first ordered a used copy from Amazon UK, but when I was only 1/3 of the way through my Kindle Christmas present arrived, and I finished the book on the Kindle.

I read an annotated version by Penguin, which included a lot of references to Charlotte Brontë's life as well as other things going on in England in her life time. Because I was a bit giddy at the idea of getting free books for my Kindle (Project Gutenberg public domain copies), I downloaded the sisters' poetry and Elizabeth Gaskell's biography of Charlotte.

I don't remember now what pushed me to buy an annotated version of Agnes Grey, the first novel of Anne Brontë, but I read it about a year ago. I think I felt like having read Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights I should give the third sister a try. I really liked the story, though the denouement left me wanting more, and the editor's notes helped me discover the youngest of the Brontë children. They also made Charlotte look like one of the bossiest older sisters to exist! I had an image of Charlotte Brontë as just this wonderful person, but seeing her from Anne's perspective created a lot of doubt for me.

I've since downloaded a free version of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne, but I haven't gotten to it yet because I want to first get through Elizabeth Gaskell's biography of Charlotte to have more information on Charlotte.

I first tried to read the biography when I got my Kindle and filled it with lots of classic literature in the public domain, but it starts out really slow with lots of descriptions of the region. Motivated by my trip, I began reading it again and this time I actually understood the geographical references because I've been poring over maps of the area to prepare my trip. The biography is a bit soft compared to modern standards (Elizabeth Gaskell leaves out details or events she thinks unflattering for Charlotte), but I wanted to have a good overall understanding of the Brontë family before going to the museum, and as the family was very close the biography includes a lot of information about the rest of the Brontë family.

A few weeks ago I also came across some interesting videos made by the British Museum:
http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/videos/wuthering-heights-landscape
http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/videos/brontes-early-writings

If you go to either of those links, you'll see more videos below covering a number of other topics. Ann Dinsdale of the Brontë Parsonage will possibly be the person giving my VIP tour as she is one of the curators of the museum.

And then it was kind of cheating, but I watched (again) the BBC version of Jane Eyre since it's much longer than the 2011 movie and is more faithful to the story.

I've just discovered that the BBC did The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, so I'll have to track down a copy of that once I've read the book.

Ideally I would like to finish the biography (currently 50%), the Tenant of Wildfell Hall, the sisters' poetry, and also possibly re-read Wuthering Heights before going to the museum, but I don't think I'll have time to get all that reading done. Shirley and Vilette, by Charlotte, will have to wait. I should be able to benefit from my VIP visit if I can finish the biography and get started on the Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

I might possibly try to read The Secret Garden again since it's short, easy, and one of my first memories of a story set in Yorkshire.

So that's my literary prep for my trip to Yorkshire. Coming up: a post about getting in shape.