Welcome to the Australian Brontë Association website
Saturday 13 July 2024, Sophie Frazer
"THE ORB OF MY LIFE IS NOT TO BE SO ROUNDED": THE AMBIVALENCE OF THE BILDUNGSROMAN IN CHARLOTTE BRONTË'S VILLETTE
Charlotte Brontë's final, desolate novel Villette (1853) is a narrative of exile and displacement: one woman's flight from her home in England to an indeterminate future in a foreign city. A distinctly phenomenological novelist, in Villette Brontë maps the affective crisis of displacement onto the transmogrifications of sensory life. Avowedly ambivalent about her progress in the world, protagonist Lucy Snowe disavows material success and even, at times, acts with nonchalance about her very survival. In this way Brontë emphasises both the temptations and perils of conforming to the conventional plot of female development, eschewing marriage for her heroine in preference for an enigmatic and suitably indeterminate conclusion. In this paper I will read the phenomenal character of Brontë's narrative of oscillation between worldly success and the banality of insignificance, tracking the emotional expressiveness of the sensing body to bring out the loss inherent in Lucy's escape from the confines of a conventional female bildung.
Saturday 14 September 2024, Stephanie Russo
EMILY BRONTË, BIOFICTION AND FILM
Emily Brontë is not only one of the most famous novelists in English history; she is also the subject of novels, television series and films in her own right. However, while novelists write into the gaps of the historical record, the notoriously enigmatic and fanatically private Emily is a particular difficult subject for biofictions. In this talk, I trace how a wide range of novelists and screenwriters have represented Emily Brontë's life, writing career and death over the past century. I focus, in particular, on the persistence of the belief that there must have been a secret romance that holds the key to deciphering Wuthering Heights.
Saturday 9 November 2024, Chris Browne
COLLECTING THE BRONTËS
Chris Browne has been a book collector for more than fifty years and during that time has put together a personal library of around 15,000 books. His main interests are early 19th and 20th century English literature and the history of English publishing and printing. Accordingly, he has collected first, early, illustrated and interesting editions of his favourite authors, which include the Brontës. Chris's talk will naturally focus on his own collection of books by and relating to the Brontës from the twin perspectives of both an avid reader and an ardent collector. He will talk about his personal favourites, early editions, illustrated editions and some items of special interest. He will also give his personal reasons for collecting and reading the works of the Brontës, and will reflect on why they are still very relevant today.
The Australian Brontë Association meets approximately every two months. At each meeting a talk is given on some aspect of the Brontë's life and works or the world in which they lived.
The ABA is independent of the (UK) Brontë Society but it grew out of a group of Australian members of the Brontë Society and we still maintain strong links with the parent body. The Australian Representative of the Brontë Society is a member of the Australian Brontë Association.
The current President of the ABA is Annette Harman.
EMAIL ADDRESS: ausbronte@gmail.com | Contact