News | June 30, 2023

Handwritten Poems, Miniature Books and First Editions Trace Brontës' Evolution in New Exhibition

Mark Webster Photography / University of Leeds

An arrangement of items on display. Top left: Fireside Tales by Charlotte Brontë; top right: first edition of Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey by Emily and Anne Brontë; bottom right: Visits in Verreopolis by Charlotte Brontë; underneath: autograph letters by Branwell Brontë.

Becoming the Brontës follows Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne Brontë on a chronological journey from their Yorkshire childhood to the beginning of their literary careers and finally their lasting legacy as genre-defining authors.

Opening today at the Treasures of the Brotherton Gallery in Leeds, the exhibition features an array of fascinating manuscripts, handwritten letters, and personal sketches, together on public display for the first time. It is co-curated by the British Library, the Brontë Parsonage Museum and the University of Leeds’ Brotherton Library. Many of the items on display come from the Blavatnik Honresfield Library, a unique literary collection that was saved for the nation in a campaign led by the Friends of the National Libraries and a consortium of libraries and writers’ houses including the organisations involved in this exhibition.

The exhibition features incredible items on display together for the first time including:

A rare, surviving notebook filled with over 30 of Emily’s poems, with annotations by Charlotte, including the handwritten line: “Never was better stuff penned”
First editions of Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Agnes Grey and Shirley previously owned by the family’s faithful servant Martha Brown
Emily’s own annotated copy of the first Brontë book, Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, published under the sisters’ pen names to hide their gender
Eight miniature books, handwritten and crafted by Charlotte during childhood and adolescence, including two that are bound in packaging originally used for Epsom salts
A pencil sketch by ten-year-old Emily that shows a small hand reaching through a broken window, evoking the image of Cathy grasping Lockwood’s hand in Wuthering Heights
Letters from the sisters that reveal their frustration at errors in first editions of Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey and the challenges they faced together to get their work seen by publishers

Mark Webster Photography / University of Leeds

A curator cradles Visits in Verreopolis, a miniature handwritten book by Charlotte Brontë.

Mark Webster Photography / University of Leeds

A curator holds a magnifying glass over Charlotte Brontë’s Fireside Tales, a handwritten manuscript

British Library

Double page of a notebook of handwritten poems by Emily Brontë written between March 3, 1844 and January 2, 1846

Brontë Parsonage Museum

A drawing by Emily Brontë of a small hand reaching through a window, evoking a scene from Wuthering Heights

Brontë Parsonage Museum

A handkerchief embroidered with the initials ‘A.B.’, believed to have belonged to the Brontë family

Sarah Prescott, Literary Archivist at the University of Leeds, said: "The display features some of the most significant Brontë items to come to light, and it’s unlikely that they will be on public display together again in our lifetimes. These items give us intimate insight into the lives, hopes and ambitions of some of the most famous and well-loved writers in English literature.”

Ann Dinsdale, Principal Curator at the Brontë Parsonage Museum, added: “The Brontë Parsonage Museum is proud to have been part of the consortium that fought to save the Blavatnik Honresfield Library for the nation. These wonderful manuscripts offer an unique insight into the intense collaboration and creativity that bound the Brontë children together, making clear their long apprenticeship as writers.”

Becoming the Brontës runs through October 28.