Mark Bostridge
Charlotte as a Feminist
Over the past decade Charlotte Brontë’s status as a writer has been undergoing something of a sea-change. There has been a sharp move away from the purely biographical interest which has always bedevilled serious consideration of her work towards critical studies which emphasise the rich symbolism and poetic imagery of her novels. Feminist scholars have been hard at work placing Charlotte at the head of a female literary tradition. Today it is difficult to imagine FR Leavis making his famous assertion of Emily’s primacy, that ‘there is only one Brontë’, and getting away with it. Not since the 1870s when Swinburne praised her ‘great and absolute genius’ has Charlotte’s stock as a novelist stood so high.
We have also for the first time reliable texts of Charlotte’s works. The Clarendon edition of the novels have been appearing, novel by novel, for some years now; Tom Winnifrith has edited Charlotte’s poetry and concluded that she was probably the worst poet in the family after her father; even
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
'Within hours, the news spread. A grimy gang of desperadoes had been captured just in time to stop them setting out on an assassination plot of shocking audacity.'
@katheder on the Cato Street Conspiracy of 1820.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/butchers-knives-treason-and-plot
'It is the ... sketches of the local and the overlooked that lend this book its density and drive, and emphasise Britain’s mostly low-key riches – if only you can be bothered to buy an anorak and seek.'
Jonathan Meades on the beauty of brutalism.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/castles-of-concrete
'Cruickshank’s history reveals an extraordinary eclecticism of architectural styles and buildings, from Dutch Revivalism to Arts and Crafts experimentation, from Georgian terraces to Victorian mansion blocks.'
William Boyd on the architecture of Chelsea.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/where-george-eliot-meets-mick-jagger