Elizabeth Gaskell’s biography of her friend Charlotte Brontë – the first full-length biography of a woman novelist by a woman novelist – is a true classic. It transports us with a deft hand straight into 19th-century Haworth, Yorkshire and crafts an extensive account of Brontë’s life, quoting throughout from letters she sent and received. From her challenging, isolated childhood to her death shortly before the age of 39, newly married and pregnant, the enigmatic author of Jane Eyre is portrayed with enormous care. Although its inevitable bias has long caused controversy, it remains a fascinating and vital work – the one to which all subsequent biographies of Charlotte Brontë must relate. It springs to life here in a full cast recording.
