Audiobook · read by volunteers
Selected Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell
Anne Brontë (1820–1849) · Charlotte Brontë (1816–1855) · Emily Brontë (1818–1848)
Read by Ellis Christoff · 60 chapters · 3 h 35
About the book
Three sisters, three pen names and one slim volume that almost nobody bought. In 1846 Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë paid to publish their poems under the names Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell, choosing disguises that gave nothing away about their sex. This selection gathers verses from their joint volume and offers a chance to hear the voices behind the novels that would soon make them famous. Here are moorland weather and imagined kingdoms, longing and doubt, faith and grief, written in plain, intense language that seldom flinches. Emily’s lines often burn with a stubborn independence, Anne’s are quiet and searching, and Charlotte’s mix feeling with careful restraint. Each short poem stands on its own, so the collection can be sampled or heard from beginning to end, sixty brief tracks in all. A single reader carries you through the whole book. It is a good listen for anyone who knows Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights or The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.
Introduction
The poems in this collection come from the three Brontë sisters: Charlotte, born in 1816 and died in 1855; Emily, born in 1818 and died in 1848; and Anne, born in 1820 and died in 1849. They grew up in a Yorkshire parsonage, with limited means and a great deal of imagination, and they wrote from childhood.
Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell was published in 1846. It was the sisters’ first work to appear in print, and they chose male-sounding pseudonyms to avoid the prejudice against women writers that was common at the time. The book sold very few copies, but it was the beginning of a literary career for all three: within two years, Charlotte’s Jane Eyre, Emily’s Wuthering Heights and Anne’s Agnes Grey were in the bookshops. The poems themselves were written before their novels brought them fame.
This recording offers a selection rather than the complete volume, arranged in sixty short sections and running for about three and a half hours. The poems vary in tone and subject, but they share a directness and a love of wild landscape and inner life. Hearing them aloud is a good way to notice the differences between three voices that are often treated as one.
It is read by LibriVox volunteer Ellis Christoff, and it will appeal to readers of the sisters’ novels, lovers of Victorian poetry, and anyone curious about how great novelists first found their voices. Many readers find that the poems reward a second hearing. Short lines and plain rhymes carry strong feeling, and the sisters’ shared love of the Yorkshire moors gives the collection a unity that goes beyond any single author.
Public domain
Anne Brontë died in 1849: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
Charlotte Brontë died in 1855: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
Emily Brontë died in 1848: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
The LibriVox volunteers dedicated this recording to the public domain.
Sources : LibriVox page · Files at the Internet Archive · Original text