English writer Charlotte Bronte: biography, creativity and personal life

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Even people who are not particularly fond of reading have probably heard about the book "Jane Eyre", and maybe they have seen films based on it. The author of this and many other books is Charlotte Brontë.

Childhood

Churchman Patrick Bronte and his wife Maria had six children - five daughters and one son. Charlotte Brontë is third. She was born in the east of England, in the small village of Thornton, and this event happened on April 21, 1816.

According to many surviving testimonies, Charlotte Bronte was not a particular beauty, but at the same time she had a great mind, liveliness, sharpness. Following her, her brother and two younger sisters were born, and shortly after the birth of the last daughter, Ann, their mother died - too late she was diagnosed with uterine cancer. Charlotte was then five years old. A year earlier, the family had moved to Hoert, where her father was offered a new job and which became a real small home for Charlotte.

After Maria's death, her own sister came to Hoert to help Patrick raise his little children. In essence, shereplaced by their mother. Patrick Brontë, meanwhile, decided to take care of their education and sent his two eldest daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, to a specialized boarding school for girls from clergy families. A month later, eight-year-old Charlotte arrived there, and after a while, the fourth sister, Emily. The fifth, Ann, was still too young and stayed with her father and brother. The boarding school teachers said about Charlotte that the girl was smart enough for her age, but at the same time they noted her lack of knowledge in grammar, history, geography and etiquette, as well as illegible handwriting and gaps in mathematics. Everything that young Charlotte Brontë owned up to this point was fragmentary, unsystematic.

Tuberculosis was rampant in the nineteenth century. Many people died because of this disease in terrible agony, and children were no exception. Due to the terrible conditions in the boarding school (damp, unheated rooms, rotten food, the eternal threat of flogging), Charlotte's older sisters, Mary and Elizabeth, also picked up this terrible disease. Patrick immediately took all four daughters home, but Mary and Elizabeth could not be saved.

Initial experiments

The remaining four Brontë children all showed an artistic flair in one way or another from a young age. It is after returning home from boarding school that Charlotte, Emily and their younger brother and sister take up paper and pen for the first time. Branwell, the girls' brother, had soldiers that his little sisters played with. They transferred their imaginary games to paper, recording the adventures of the soldiers from their perspective. ResearchersCharlotte Brontë's works note that in those children's works (the first of which was written at the age of ten) of the future writer, the influence of Lord Byron and W alter Scott is noticeable.

Work

In the early 1830s, Charlotte studied in the town of Row Head, where she later remained - to work as a teacher. Charlotte Brontë also arranged for her sister Emily to visit her for an education. When, unable to endure life in a strange house, Emily returned to her father, Ann came instead.

However, Charlotte herself did not last long there. In 1838, she left there - the reason was eternal employment and the inability to devote herself to literary creativity (by that time the girl was already actively engaged in it). Returning to Hoert, Charlotte Brontë took a job as a governess, something her mother had once dreamed of. Having changed several families, she quickly realized that this was not hers either. And then luck arrived.

The aunt of the Bronte children, who raised them with their father, gave the sisters a certain amount of money to create their boarding house. So the girls intended to do so, but suddenly changed their plans: in 1842, Charlotte and Emily left to study in Belgium. They stayed there for just over one semester, until their aunt's death in the autumn of that year.

In 1844, Charlotte and her sisters decided to return to the idea of a school. But if earlier they could leave Hoert for this, now there was no such chance: the aunt was gone, the father was weakening, there was no one to look after him. I had to create a school right in the family home, inpastorate, near the cemetery. Such a place, of course, did not please the parents of possible pupils, and the whole idea failed.

The beginning of literary activity

As mentioned above, at this time the girl was writing with might and main. At first, she turned her attention to poetry and back in 1836 she sent a letter with her poetic experiments to the famous poet Robert Southey (he is the author of the original version of the tale of "Masha and the Bears"). It cannot be said that the eminent master was delighted, he informed the novice talent about this, advising him to write not so enthusiastically and ex altedly.

His letter had a huge impact on Charlotte Brontë. Under the influence of his words, she decided to take up prose, and also to replace romanticism with realism. In addition, it was now that Charlotte began to write her texts under a male pseudonym - so that they were evaluated objectively.

In 1840, she conceived Ashworth, a novel about a rebellious young man. The girl sent the first sketches to Hartley Coleridge, another English poet. He criticized the idea, explaining that such a thing would not be successful. Charlotte listened to the words of Coleridge and left work on this book.

Three sisters

It has already been mentioned above that all four of the surviving Bronte children had a craving for creativity from childhood. As he got older, Branwell preferred painting to literature, often painting portraits of his sisters. The younger ones followed in the footsteps of Charlotte: Emily is known to the reading public as the author of Wuthering Heights, Ann published the books Agnes Gray and Wildfell Stranger. Hall. The younger one is much less famous than the older sisters.

However, fame came to them later, and in 1846 they published a common book of poetry under the name of the Bell brothers. The novels of Charlotte's younger sisters, Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey, were also published under the same pseudonyms. Charlotte herself wanted to publish her debut work "The Teacher", but nothing came of it (it was published only after the death of the writer) - the publishers returned the manuscript to her, talking about the lack of "fascination".

The creative activity of the three Bronte sisters did not last long. In the autumn of 1848, their brother Branwell died of an illness aggravated by alcohol and drugs. He was followed by Emily in December due to tuberculosis, and Ann in May of the following year. Charlotte is the only daughter of the aging Patrick.

Jane Eyre

The novel "Jane Eyre", which brought Charlotte worldwide fame, she created in 1846-1847. After the mishap with The Teacher, Charlotte Brontë sent Jane Eyre to some British publishing house - and hit the bull's-eye. It was printed in an incredibly short time, and then it caused a strong reaction from the public. Not only readers, but also critics exuded praise for "Carrera Bell" - it was not until 1848 that Charlotte Brontë revealed her real name.

The novel "Jane Eyre" has been repeatedly reprinted. Many adaptations have also been made based on it, one of which is with the now famous actressMia Wasikowska starring.

Charlotte Bronte Personal Life Information

The biography of the writer gives much more information about her work than about potential candidates for her hand and heart. It is known, however, that, despite Charlotte's lack of a "model" appearance, she always had enough gentlemen, but she was in no hurry to get married - although proposals were received. The last of them, however, she accepted - the one that came from her old acquaintance Arthur Nicholas. He was Charlotte's father's assistant and had known the young woman since 1844. Interestingly, Charlotte Bronte's first impression of him was rather negative; she often spoke skeptically about the narrowness of a man's thinking. Subsequently, however, her attitude towards him changed.

You can't say that Patrick Brontë was delighted with his daughter's choice. He persuaded her for a long time to think, not to make hasty conclusions and not to rush, but nevertheless in the summer of 1854 they got married. Their marriage was prosperous, although, unfortunately, very short-lived.

Death

Just six months after the wedding, Charlotte Bronte felt bad. The doctor who examined her diagnosed her with signs of pregnancy and suggested that her poor he alth was caused precisely by this - the onset of severe toxicosis. Charlotte was sick all the time, she did not want to eat, she felt weak. However, until recently, no one could have imagined that everything would end so sadly. On March 31, Charlotte passed away.

The exact cause of her death has not been established, her biographers still cannot come to a common point of view. Some believe that she contracted typhus from her maid, who was just ill at the time. Others believe that the cause of the death of a young woman (Charlotte Bronte was not even thirty-nine) was exhaustion due to toxicosis (she almost could not eat), others - that tuberculosis that did not stop raging was to blame.

Charlotte Bronte: interesting facts

1. The biography of the woman is set out in the work of E. Gaskell "The Life of Charlotte Bronte".
2. An area on Mercury is named after her.
3. The image of the novelist is on one of the British stamps.
4. Unfinished novel "Emma" finished for her K. Saveri. There is, however, a second version of this work from K. Boylan called "Emma Brown".
5. The Brontë Museum is located in Hoert, as well as a lot of places there named after this family - a waterfall, a bridge, a chapel and others.
6. Charlotte Brontë's list of writings includes many manuscripts for children and teenagers, as well as three novels written in adulthood.

Bronte's creative path is a solid example of how to get what you want. It is important to believe in yourself and not give up - and then everything will certainly work out sooner or later!