Take Courage: Anne Bronte and the Art of Life - Hardcover

Ellis, Samantha

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1784740217 ISBN 13: 9781784740214

Publisher: Chatto & Windus, 2017

Synopsis

'I was wowed and moved' Tracy Chevalier

Anne Brontė is the forgotten Brontė sister, overshadowed by her older siblings -- virtuous, successful Charlotte, free-spirited Emily and dissolute Branwell. Tragic, virginal, sweet, stoic, selfless, Anne. The less talented Brontė, the other Brontė.

Or that's what Samantha Ellis, a life-long Emily and Wuthering Heights devotee, had always thought. Until, that is, she started questioning that devotion and, in looking more closely at Emily and Charlotte, found herself confronted by Anne instead.

Take Courage is Samantha's personal, poignant and surprising journey into the life and work of a woman sidelined by history. A brave, strongly feminist writer well ahead of her time -- and her more celebrated siblings -- and who has much to teach us today about how to find our way in the world.

Praise for How To Be A Heroine

'Any woman with a remotely bookish childhood will find great pleasure in How to be a Heroine' Sunday Times

'Genius.... A fantastically inspirational memoir that makes you want to reread far too many books' Observer

'Not so much self-help as shelf-help... A truly brilliant read' Marie Claire

'Delightfully honest and warmly funny' Daily Mail

'The best kind of book: one that I gobbled up, wanting to go slow to savour it but unable to stop reading until it was all gone' Observer

About this title

Review:

"I thought that everything had already been said about the Brontės. But Samantha Ellis has looked at the family from a new angle, and in doing so brought Anne out of the shadows and placed her front and centre amongst her splashier siblings. I was wowed and moved" (Tracy Chevalier)

"The Brontės have spawned innumerable spin-offs and imitations, and Ellis cites and analyses many of them, from Hollywood movies to graphic novels, from television adaptations to stand-up comedy and online magazines. She has obsessively pursued them into every cultural realm, and she has read all the biographies, both scholarly and popular... It takes some time for an ageing reader to settle into this startling frame of reference, but once adjusted, the rewards are considerable" (Margaret Drabble Times Literary Supplement)

"This is a very personal book about what the short life of Anne Bronte can tell us about wringing every drop out of existence... A great pleasure to read and a more fitting tribute to Anne than her gravestone in Scarborough." (Daisy Goodwin The Times)

"Her personal approach is the source of both the book's immense charm and also its considerable power... ultimately the book is a deeply moving depiction of how reading and writing allows us to forge an emotional and intellectual connection with someone who died over a century before we were born... brilliant" (Irish Times)

"Take Courage is as much an account of Ellis’s own discovery of Anne's work as it is that of her subject’s life, and herein lies the book's unique appeal. Ellis – who is, it should be noted, as intelligent and perceptive a reader as she is an evocative storyteller – truly writes from the heart, which isn’t to say she hasn’t done her research... a deeply sympathetic and interesting re-evaluation of a woman ahead of her time who has much to teach us all about living courageously" (Lucy Scholes Independent)

"A lively, intelligent tribute to the forgotten Bronte sister, Anne... Her indignation is salutary" (Lucy Hughes-Hallet Observer)

"A fascinating and compelling read... what Ellis does extraordinarily well is to convey the emotion of her own deeply personal voyage of discovery about Anne and herself... [makes] you long to rush off and reread Anne's novels and poetry: what more could you ask for?" (Juliet Barker Mail on Sunday)

"Anne is the Cinderella of the Bronte sisters... Anne was, in fact, the secret firebrand of the family... The dominance of the two elder sisters means that there remains a need to bring her out of the shadows. In Take Courage, Samantha Ellis has risen to the challenge... Take Courage is almost as much about Ellis's vicarious relationship with her subject as it as about Anne Bronte. If scholarly footnotes are your thing, it isn't for you. But if you want to share in a biographer's emotional journey, you will find insights aplenty. The account of Anne's death from TB at the age of 29 is truly moving" (Lucasta Miller Sunday Times)

"A lovely and imaginative investigation into a serious and searching woman whose last words were "take courage". It's inspiring stuff" (Eithne Farry Sunday Express)

"It really feels as if Anne Brontė is finally having her moment in the sun... Often overlooked due to the higher profile of sisters Jane and Emily and even her wastrel brother, Branwell, in Take Courage, Samantha Ellis skilfully reclaims Anne as a truly modern, feminist writer whose work is just as relevant today" (Red)

Book Description:

Anne Brontė -- literary wallflower or radical heroine? Samantha Ellis stomps off to Haworth to find out

About this edition

• Publisher: Chatto & Windus
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1784740217
• ISBN 13: 9781784740214
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352