Anndaluz

Amazing out of print book telling the story of the Bronte family in Ireland. Patrick Bronte, father to Emily, Charlotte, Anne and Branwell was from County Down. Wuthering Heights was published at the time of The Great Hunger and the arrival of the starving foundling Heathcliff in Liverpool seemed an obvious reference to contemporary events, something which this book, published in 1893 bears out. Author William Wright (1837 - 1899) spoke to people who knew the family and heard how Patrick used to visit from England. He would have heard how "in a night the fields were smitten black, and the stench of rotting leaves filled the air. The tubers became rotten and repulsive instead of being white and floury.





I knew a man who witnessed one of these scenes. He spoke of Hugh Bronte's address to the Devil as being Sublime in it's ferocity. With bare outstretched arms, the veins in his neck and forehead standing out like hempen cords, and his voice choking with concentrated passion, he would apostrophise Beelzebub as the bloated fly, and call on him to partake of the filthy repast he had provided. The address ended with wild scornful laughter as Bronte hurled the rotten potatoes down the bank.





And there's much more, TBC, I've just spent the last few hours reading the first 200 pages of this book, really it could make a tremendous film.