1702926198000 1702917774000 Standard Record object-110009977 1747159882685 1704298539000 1747159409017 adlib fitz-online adlib-object-110009977 https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/110009977 4f8b3fa0-6a6f-346e-8944-70a5a4ecfdab 4 person reference agent-164539 adlib-agent-164539 9e0f1a9b-0a11-3cf5-b5e0-5fb4d6aa4aaf Turner, J. M. W person reference agent-133923 adlib-agent-133923 c23b36e4-4035-3196-8e11-fa224e74c19b Thackeray, William Makepeace person reference agent-36610 adlib-agent-36610 da599e1b-3eb0-3446-9101-fae40a73fa6d Dickens, Charles person reference agent-164438 adlib-agent-164438 134c98ee-69a6-3752-982b-477276489b51 Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Length mm 180 Width mm 110 Leaf 1 Length mm 180 Width mm 110 Leaf 2 content description This is a letter written from Haworth, Yorkshire by Charlotte Brontë to Miss Margaret Wooler, dated 14 February 1850. The letter is 2 leaves (folded in half) and mounted in the volume. Leaf 1 is numbered 8 in the upper right-hand corner and Leaf 2 is numbered 8a. In leaf 1 of this letter, Brontë sympathises with Miss Wooler's recent bout of eye inflammation. She then writes of the public reception of her novels 'Jane Eyre' and 'Shirley', saying the books are being 'abused here, praised there, knocked about everywhere'. She says 'some of the clergy will not like "Shirley"' due to its depiction of the curates, and thanks Miss Wooler for 'the sincerity and frankness with which you have spoken to me about "Jane Eyre"' and the revelation of her identity as Currer Bell. She agrees with the writer Harriet Martineau's comment that 'I have ever observed that it is to the coarse-minded alone - "Jane Eyre" is coarse'. In leaf 2, she writes of her visit to London the previous October (communicated to Miss Wooler by Ellen Nussey) and though her hosts wished her to stay in month, she found a fortnight to be sufficient. She writes of a dinner she attended with seven of her 'critics', 'some of them had been very bitter foes in print but they were prodigiously civil face to face'. She adds however that the critics were much 'grander, more pompous, dashing, shewy' than the authors she met, such as William Makepeace Thackeray who had a 'very quiet, simple demeanour'. She says she declined introductions to other authors and notable personages, such as Charles Dickens, Lady Morgan, Frances Trollope and Catherine Grace Frances Gore. She writes that one of the highlights of her trip was seeing various works of art, including the watercolour drawings of J. M. W. Turner. She gives her opinion on the theatre she had seen in London, criticising the actor William Macready and saying that 'the stage-system altogether is hollow nonsense'. She notes that she was often a voice of dissent whilst in London, for example failing to praise the 'wordy, intricate, obscure style of poetry' written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She concludes the letter by remarking upon the differences of London and provincial life and states that she would not like to live in London; were she to live in London she would 'go little into company' and particularly 'eschew the literary circles'. A full edition of this letter can be found in Margaret Smith's 'The Letters of Charlotte Brontë', Vol. 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000), pp. 342-344. Brontë(C)/8 1 accession number Brontë(C)/8 110009977 priref 110009977 uri https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/110009977 https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/110009977 reference agent-149638 adlib-agent-149638 7376d833-d0a7-3be0-916e-9c892b7a24d8 The Fitzwilliam Museum 1850 1850 1850-02-14 reference agent-18451 adlib-agent-18451 44ea0a4f-41b1-397c-9880-2ace1de3d0df Brontë, Charlotte geography reference term-106216 adlib-term-106216 825b8379-ec94-388e-9a59-624e40c090d0 London literal London London MS Letter, Brontë to Margaret Wooler object OBJECT