The Poetic World of Emily Brontë presents selected poems by Emily Brontë, biographical information about her, and insights to Wuthering Heights. The poems are grouped by thematic topic, preceded by discussions of literary context, Brontë’s life, and Wuthering Heights. Interpretations follow each poem enabling any reader to appreciate and enjoy her poetry.
Emily Bronte is best known for her novel, but her poetry is of equal merit and comprises virtually the only other work by her for us to read. The poems are also of great interest in their biographical value; it is a premise of this book that Emily Brontë’s poetry provides otherwise unknowable information about her personality and beliefs. Conversely, the biographical information gives insights to the meaning of her poems. Knowing her poetry also enriches one’s reading of Wuthering Heights. Unlike any other collection of Brontë’s poetry, this book presents selected poems grouped by thematic topic: nature, mutability, love, death, captivity and freedom, hope and despair, imagination, and spirituality. That approach and the accompanying discussions of the poems aim at ensuring that all readers will take meaning from the poems and develop an affinity for them.
AUTHOR INTERVIEW
Hello, and welcome to Roxy’s Reviews.
Thank you so much for taking the time to visit
with us today.
1.
Tell us a bit about yourself.
I have a blog,
thelivingphilosopher.com, that reveals anything of importance or interest about
me because ideas I have on literature, philosophy, life, alcoholism, human
nature, etc. have been deposited there in one form or another. I value personal
freedom, hold reason as more valuable than emotion, revere self-sufficiency,
and find most of what goes on in the world amazingly horrible (much of which we
have just become acclimated to accept)
or foolish. I read Barbara
Tuchman’s book on the 14th Century a long time ago and remember her
central assessment and partial explanation of that era as a world run by drunken
teenagers—literally, young people who drank a lot. What is our excuse?
2.
What inspires your writing?
For literary writing, I am
inspired to write when I think I have found something new about a literary
work. When I wrote an article on Wuthering
Heights, I had made a discovery about Emily Bronte’s personal numeric
symbolism. For my article on Bronte’s
poems, I was interested in the untreated topic of the centrality of death in
her poetry and how her poetry could serve as consolation for grief. I was inspired to write an article on John
Keats when I discovered that Keats’s personal philosophy was in line with the
Roman Stoicism of Seneca and that his philosophy influenced themes in his
poetry. With regard to my book The Poetic
World of Emily Bronte I wanted to write a monograph on Bronte’s poetry
which would give a clear understanding of it to readers and allow me to spend
long hours reading her work and contemplating her work and life. For other kinds of writing, like blog posts,
I am inspired by things I read in the paper or that have happened to me,
frequently taking a look at such events from the perspective of Roman Stoicism.
I also like to write by assignment, so to speak; if I hear of a writing contest--
anything form 200-word fiction, to writing about the way to live a good life,
to writing a poem on the subject of noise -- I like to write in response and am
heedless of “winning” the contest.
That’s where having a blog is great—if I want to share my writing, I can
through the blog or at least have a repository for everything that I consider
finished work.
3.
Please tell us more about The Poetic World of Emily Bronte?
This book should appeal to
anyone who likes to read poetry or read about poetry. Those can be two very different categories. I like reading introductions to and essays
about literature, which is a different kind of read than the literary work
itself. Also, the biographical content in
my book cannot be discounted. My book is in large part an investigation of Bronte’s
thoughts and personality. I would have liked to write a biography of Emily
Bronte, except there is really nothing new to add as a pure biography to those
already available. I have to imagine that anyone who has read Wuthering Heights would find much to
enjoy in my book because there are so many references to it and insights. I
have at times felt like I was waging my own little campaign to get the public
to stop thinking of Wuthering Heights
as a love story. The discussion of that novel in my book, among other things, furthers
that mission.
4.
In the overview of The Poetic World of Emily Bronte it
states – “Knowing her poetry also enriches one’s reading of Wuthering Heights” – how so?
In her poetry, Bronte, develops
ideas on certain topics, such as childhood, death, nature, and grief. Once one
is familiar with those thematic statements, one can discern them in the novel
where she treats those same topics. One
could take the novel as a starting point and say that knowing it makes her
poetry more understandable; however, in approaching the novel, other factors,
such as plot and one’s preconceived notions, might obscure the ideas, so that
the thematic guidance of her poetry is particularly helpful. Although there is
a school of thought that determining what the author meant to say thematically
is not important, I think that it is. As
a writer, I have something I want to impart as an idea, whether in non-fiction
or fiction; if a reader takes away
something I didn’t even know was there, that’s all right, but it is also worth understanding
what I intended to say.
5.
What advice would you give to
aspiring writers?
I don’t see any reason to write
unless one can’t feel at peace without doing it. Others might read what one
writes, or they might not. An audience
is not necessary. As I read in a letter
by the Stoic Seneca with regard to an audience: “Few are enough, one is enough,
none is enough.” For writing to be satisfying and not frustrating, I think it
does require study and practice. First
comes reading. No one can write anything without reading the kind of thing he
or she intends to write. As a teacher, I
was always amazed when the curriculum called for kids to “write a poem” when
they had never read any or almost none.
That is a pointless exercise in my rather opinionated view. Before John Keats wrote he immersed himself
in Shakespeare and Milton and Dante. When he was not “in cue for writing” as he
phrased it, he would open his Shakespeare. Likewise, at the high school level, students
are asked to write essays when they have never read them. They read fiction and then write about
it—they should also read a lot of essays about fiction (literary essays) before
trying to do that. So in terms of advice
-- read, practice, and write for yourself.
6.
Who are some of your favourite
authors?
Obviously, Emily Bronte would
be on the short list. For poets, I like Shakespeare (I like reading his sonnets
more than his plays), John Keats, Byron, Tennyson, Shelly and Swinburne and
some poems from the WWI British poets. For novelists, I enjoy the 19th
century writers, in particular, Austen, the Brontes, and Trollope. I would not include Dickens, however. I would
add to the list of favourites Wharton and James, and if I were to include
somebody modern, I would say that I enjoy a Ken Follett novel. I like reading
biographies of writers also, and Andrew Motion’s biography of John Keats is one
that I read from time to time. On that
note, I read books that I like over and over, sometimes just parts and at times
all the way through for the umpteenth time.
7.
You were an attorney, what are
the similarities between the world of law and the world of writing? If any.
The shared aspects between lawyering and writing are
thinking critically --analysing and synthesizing information—and communicating
ideas in writing. Some lawyers do that more than others, but any good lawyer
should be adept at critical thinking and clearly putting thoughts on paper with
due observance of grammar, syntax, and best word choice.
8.
When you are not busy writing,
what can you be found doing?
Mostly I attend to the everyday
business of living, which seems like trying to keep things in place, literally
and metaphorically. I spend a lot of
time with my dog and I ride horses, although that latter activity means spending
much of my time in the car getting to the horse. I don’t have to be actually sitting at the
computer to be writing, since I am writing things in my head while doing all
those other things. I read, but would almost never sit down to read any time but
at night.
9.
What is the best advice you
received in life? And what is your secret to success?
I can’t think of any piece of
advice that someone has given to me directly.
I did always want a philosophy for living and developed a couple of
ideas while in college: everything is an end in itself and don’t have regrets
because you would do the same thing given the chance to do it over again. The big help in dealing with life came from
reading the letters and essays of Seneca.
I got the best advice from there. Success is self-satisfaction and
tranquillity of mind. That is a
perpetually moving target, but at times I feel that at least I have the target
in sight.
10. Are
you currently working on any special projects, writing or other? Can you tell
us a bit more about them?
I wrote an abstract in response
to a call for papers by a professor through the Modern Languages Association on
what constitutes the good life, particularly in the global community. If she is interested in the abstract, I will
complete the paper. Actually, I am
writing it anyway and will put it on my blog if she does not accept it.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Laura Inman is an independent scholar, free-lance writer, tutor, and retired attorney. Her interest in Victorian literature has led to the publication of two articles on Emily Brontë: “ ‘The Awful Event’ in Wuthering Heights,” Brontë Studies Volume 33, Part 3, November 2008, 19 2002, and “Emily Brontё’s Defeat of Death and Unintended Solace for Grief,” Victorians: Journal of Culture and Literature, No.121, spring 2012. She holds a J.D. from The Law School of the University of Texas at Austin, a B.A. in French from the University of Arizona, and a Masters in English Education from Manhattanville College in Purchase, New York. She is a New York State certified teacher in English Language Arts and French. She writes essays and creative pieces for on-line magazines and blogs and for her own blog, thelivingphilosopher.com.
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