Tea with Jane Eyre

Jane flees Thornfield (Haddon Hall) in 2011 film.

Charlotte Bronte's 200th birthday last year inspired me to re-read Jane Eyre, and I decided to make this part of my Read Harder Challenge by watching two film adaptations for comparison to the original text. I'd been meaning to re-watch the 2006 BBC version with Toby Stephens and Ruth Wilson, and I'm always eager to watch the 2011 theatrical version with Michael Fassbender and Mia Wasikowska. What a pleasure to read the book*, watch both adaptations and compare! It also was great fun to pair the book with tea and a sweet treat, as you'll see below.

(*Actually, I alternated between reading the e-book and listening to Thandie Newton's spectacular audio performance.)


I'd forgotten that both the 2006 and 2011 adaptations were filmed at Haddon Hall in Derbyshire (as was the 1996 Franco Zeffirelli version with William Hurt and Charlotte Gainsbourg!). I've visited Haddon Hall in both the summer and at Christmas time, and it's one of my favorite old piles in all of England. It seems perfect for Thornfield Hall--castellated and gloomy in a Gothically romantic way, also boasting a rushing stream and lovely terraced gardens. The 2006 version makes a little more use of the Haddon Hall interiors, whereas the 2011 version uses Broughton Castle (another lovely place to visit!) for many of the interior shots.


So, which adaptation did I like better? The 2011 adaptation will always be my favorite, but the 2006 TV movie is quite good in its own right. Excellent performances from Toby Stephens and Ruth Wilson, and a teleplay by Sandy Welch that is mostly true to the original. Welch departs from the book by presenting Rochester as a naturalist, and by introducing house party discussions of the scientific study of twins (???), as well as musings on the paranormal. There's even a scene with a table transformed into a talking board. (Why add a talking board when you already have gypsy readings?)

The 2011 theatrical version is stripped-down, but effectively so. I like the Rivers family as a frame, and I do prefer Fassbender's darker Rochester--he has a bit more menace to him and doesn't babble so much as the original. Mia Wasikowska truly does seem little and plain(ish) in this adaptation, but also strong-willed. I think the scene that really seals the 2011 version as my favorite is when Rochester begs Jane to stay after the revelation of his dark secret. "I cannot get at you, and it is your soul that I want!" (Watch the scene--you know you want to!) I also love the ending--very compressed from the original, but somehow more satisfying to me.


I've probably mentioned my Haddon Hall china from Minton before. I first saw the pattern at the Haddon Hall gift shop, but it just wasn't feasible to ship a set back to the U.S. Fortunately, I later found pieces from various sets at Replacements.com. They don't match perfectly, but I think that makes the collection all the more charming. And, of course, the Haddon Hall china seemed perfect for a Jane Eyre tea!

For my tea treat, I made parkin, a spicy oat cake from the north of England, particularly popular in Yorkshire (home to the Brontës).

[Parkin] is eaten in an area where oats rather than wheat was the staple grain for the poor. It is closely related to tharf cakes - an unsweeted cake cooked on a griddle rather than baked.[7] The traditional time of the year for tharf cakes to be made was directly after the oat harvest in the first week in November. For festive occasions, the cake would be sweetened with honey. In the seventeenth century (about 1650) sugar started to be imported from Barbados[b]- and molasses was a by-product of the refining process. Molasses was first used by apothecaries to make a medicine theriaca, from which name the word treacle is derived.[8] As molasses became plentiful, or treacle as it became called at that time, it was substituted for honey in the preparation of tharf cakes. (From wikipedia)

After a disastrous attempt with a different recipe, I had success with this: Parkin--a Guy Fawkes Night Tradition. The recipe is accompanied by a helpful explanation of Parkin's connection to the 5th of November, and it uses U.S. measurements and ordinary ingredients. (I happened to have golden syrup on hand, but according to the recipe corn syrup will suffice.)


It looked a bit like a pan of brownies when it came out of the oven, but oh, the glorious spicy smell!


This parkin was very moist and filling. If Jane Eyre had tucked some of this in her pocket, she might not have suffered so much on the moors before the Rivers family took her in! For tea I needed something strong to match the spice of the bread, so I chose the Irish Breakfast from David's Tea in honor of Charlotte Brontë's Irish heritage through her father, Patrick Brontë (originally Brunty or Prunty from County Down, Ireland).

Some related links for your edification and amusement:

--The Best Yorkshire Recipes (some nice options for sweet treats here)
--A Jane Eyre tea blend from Adagio
--Every Meal in Jane Eyre, Ranked in Order of Severity, from The Toast
--A Tea with Jane Eyre necklace at Etsy
--Jane Eyre Tea Cozy patterns for knitters!
--Walnut Tea Sandwiches inspired by Jane Eyre
--Jane Eyre, the Fragrance, from Ravenscourt Apothecary (this is a NEAT site!)
--And finally, this long-time favorite: Dude Watchin' with the Brontës from Hark, a Vagrant.

Also, some of my previous Jane Eyre-related blog posts:
--Brontës on the Brain (Nov 2013)
--The Problem of Kissing in Jane Eyre '11 (Aug 2011)
--Derbyshire Top Ten, including photos of Haddon Hall (July 2011)
--I saw Jane Eyre yesterday (April 2011)

[Crossposted at Livejournal]

Brontës on the Brain

I finished a first draft of my latest project, which had been dragging on FOREVER. The ending is a bit sketchy, but at least I have something to work with, so YAY!

I am very good at rewarding myself for finished tasks, and this weekend was no exception. Friday night, I re-watched Cary Fukunaga's Jane Eyre (2011), my favorite of all the adaptations.


It's no secret that I adore Michael Fassbender. He's probably too handsome for this role, but he has such a lovely intensity. And he can be ugly when the situation requires it. I love the early scenes with Jane in which his face tightens, his mouth flattens into a sneer, and his eyes flash with contempt for the world.


And Mia Wasikowksa is appropriately small and plain, but also projects the necessary fierceness. It is only in this adaptation that I fully experience the seductiveness of Rochester's attention to her, and the tragedy of having to walk away from the freedom, inspiration, and affection offered to her at Thornfield.


I also watched Les Soeurs Brontë (1979), which has become available on US DVD only recently, as far as I can tell. (I bought it on Blu-ray.) It's a beautiful film, shot partially on location in a way that capitalizes on the wide, bleak vistas of the Yorkshire moors.


I'd gathered in advance that the film was more about Branwell than the sisters, but I still found myself resenting the time devoted to his addictions and failures. In the documentary that accompanies the feature film, the director states outright that "in the final version of the film, it's like a vampire story, if you will, or virgin-vampires, in a way, who appropriate and accomplish the artistic destiny of their brother." BLECH! One could argue that Branwell was the one with the most external conflict, the most drama, and that his life translates better to the screen. As Claire Bazin says in the documentary, the imaginations of the sisters "were fertilized and developed by an interior richness, by their internal life." How do you represent that rich interior life on film? I don't know. What films have effectively represented the dramatic interior life of a writer?

(And anyway, the sisters did have dramatic lives--traveling to Brussels, opening their own school back in Yorkshire, governessing for crazy families, etc.)


Surprisingly, Emily Bronte was my favorite character in the film, and it wasn't just because (in this incarnation, at least) she liked to roam the moors in trousers and shoot guns. She was strange and passionate--a true brooding heroine. I never knew or had forgotten that the titular heroine of Charlotte's Shirley was based on her. I am not a fan of Wuthering Heights or Emily's poetry, but I think I would watch the heck out of a film that was mostly about her. Isabelle Adjani was absolutely mesmerizing to watch (and you can bet I'll be watching La Reine Margot and Camille Claudel ASAP).

I need to watch again, but for now my verdict on Les Souers Brontë is that it's a must-watch for obsessive Brontë fans, but may also be of interest to French film buffs. The cinematography is gorgeous.

In other news, I hope something comes of this notion of a BBC Brontë biopic (mentioned in 11th paragraph).

[Cross-posted at Livejournal]

The problem of kissing in JANE EYRE '11

[Warning to those completely in the dark about the plot of JANE EYRE -- spoilers ahead!]

You all know I'm obsessed with the latest adaptation of Jane Eyre.

I've seen others comment on the lack of development in Jane and Rochester's romance, a lack of chemistry between them, and a general weirdness in their physical interactions (i.e. KISSING) on screen.

I . . . have some thoughts.



I agree that the film didn't, couldn't, spend enough time developing their very complex relationship in two hours. In some ways, I was glad to see much less of Rochester torturing and provoking Jane. In all other ways I compensated by mentally projecting what I knew about their "courtship" onto the brief scenes in the film. Not all viewers had details hovering in their minds from 5+ readings of the book, so I understand why they might feel disappointed.

I disagree about the chemistry, however. The more I watch the film, the more I see it in the subtle moments -- gestures, facial quirks and bits of dialogue. (That moment when he's on the horse and she lays her cheek on his thigh? It's wonderfully intimate, but also foreboding. So perfect!) And yet I do remember, after the proposal and subsequent kiss, thinking "Umm, that was a little awkward."

For all I know, it could have been a Clark Gable sort of situation. Since Michael Fassbender seems to exist solely on cigarettes for nutrition, perhaps Mia Wasikowska could barely stand to kiss his ashy mouth and therefore seems to be shrinking away during their embraces.

But after listening to the director's commentary, I don't think Cary Fukanaga would have put up with that.

He makes the point early on that, at eighteen, Jane is practically a child and has never kissed a man. We all know this -- most girls of her time would not have been making out with the boys in the neighborhood -- but in Jane's case I would stress that the only men she's ever had contact with on a regular basis (who else was there other than John Reed and Mr. Brocklehurst?) were cruel and physically intimidating. She has no idea how to be held by a man, much less kiss him, and even before the kiss we see her torn between excitement and terror every time she's near Rochester. It's not so much that he's scary (though I would argue he is more so in the book), but that she's grown up to be wary of male violence and has no experience with sexual passion or how to interpret sexual overtures. Imagine how freaked out she would be during every moment alone with Rochester! And then, when he does finally propose and kiss her, the contact of their lips might nearly have been a physical shock. Hence, the stiffness to her body and the sense that she is holding something back.

And then there's this particular adaptation's interpretation of Rochester. Since there's so little time to develop their growing attraction, Fukanaga (or the script, anyway) seems to focus on Rochester's desire for redemption. Jane's clever and "unpolluted" mind paired with her strong moral compass seem just the ticket to him. After his early disappointments and subsequent debaucheries, her purity will somehow cleanse him of his sins. No doubt, at this point, he is charmed by her hesitant, closed-mouthed kisses.

Of course, I also like the way in which their slightly awkward embraces foreshadow the fact that something is off-kilter with their pairing. (To me it works much better than the old "lightning strikes the tree as they embrace" cue.)

I find it interesting that, later on during Jane's "dream kiss" with Rochester, she is slightly more open-mouthed and passionate, but there's still the sense of shock and not really knowing what she's doing.

By the end, she is much more sure of herself, and the physicality in that final scene is intense. She comes to him, falls into him rather than shrinking back -- in fact, she is the dominant figure in the embrace -- and I find it exquisite.

Thoughts? What have I missed?

[Cross-posted at Livejournal]

Derbyshire Top Ten -- a photo recap

This past weekend Steve and I went to the Peak District to celebrate our 20th anniversary. It turned out to be the best weekend trip we've ever taken during an Oxford summer. Beautiful villages and countryside, lovely hotel, friendly people, great weather -- we hardly could have asked for better!

Friday was Chatsworth day -- we got there just as the garden was opening.

[Click each photo to see an enlarged version]


This is the best photo I could get of Chatsworth because the familiar facade (as seen here) was covered in scaffolding! WAH! This is still a beautiful view, however, and I was thrilled to see the house that may have inspired Mr. Darcy's Pemberley in Pride and Prejudice. (It's certainly been used as a location for film adaptations.)


The Chatsworth gardens were exquisite -- better even than those at Blenheim, in my opinion.


The maze took Steve half an hour to solve -- a long time for him. If I had tackled it alone I'd probably still be trapped in there.


Remember in Pride & Prejudice '05 when Lizzie Bennett is wandering through the marble statue room at Pemberley? We saw all the same statues, but the Mr. Darcy bust had been moved to the gift shop. Hee!

After finishing up at Chatsworth, we set out on what we thought would be a 1.5 hour walk to Haddon Hall -- a walk that turned out to be much longer. We arrived at the admissions booth 5 minutes after they closed. BAH! We had no choice but to put it on the agenda for Saturday.


However, first up on Saturday was a walk along the Edges. It was a long hike to the top, but the great view was well worth the effort.


This was a particularly interesting section of tall rocks that attracted a large group of climbers.


Eventually we turned back and took a path down the hill through what seemed to me an enchanted forest. This was my favorite part of that morning's walk.

After lunch we made our way back to Haddon Hall, and I'm so glad we alotted more time because I needed every minute. As a huge fan of the latest film adaptation of Jane Eyre, I was dying to see where they filmed it. (Apparently four different adaptations have been filmed here!) Here's a passage from Wikipedia for some context:

[Cary Fukunaga] looked at some 60 residences for one to represent Thornfield Hall but settled on the previously-used Haddon Hall as it had not undergone much redecorating. The conditions were very cold and Fukunaga admitted that Wasikowska nearly got hypothermia on the second day while shooting the rain sequence; however, he could not imagine filming anywhere else, saying "Northern England – Yorkshire and Derbyshire, the moors and dales – they look like they’re something straight out of a Tim Burton horror film. The trees are all twisted by the wind; the bracken and the heather on the moors have this amazing hue. And the weather is so extreme and it changes all the time. The house even, Haddon Hall, is just so steeped in history, the spaces, the galleries, they sort of just breathe and you feel the presence of the history."

I quite agree with that last sentence -- I absolutely fell in love with Haddon Hall.


The Lower courtyard. [Funny tidbit -- the chapel in which the wedding scene is filmed in JE '11 is actually in the opposite corner to this main entry, but in the movie Rochester drags Jane outside and up a hill to get there, right? I mean, I've seen the film five times, so I think I have that right.]


The gardens were absolutely gorgeous. We even saw the little enclosure where Rochester and Miss Ingram were playing with the feather (see here and here), but unfortunately there were a couple of kids sitting in it, so I didn't get my own photo.


The sun was blinding, and thus my face is all screwed up, but you can still see how giddy I was. Haddon Hall may not be as opulent as Chatsworth, but to me it seemed to have much more warmth and character. It definitely was the perfect setting for a gothic romance.

I'll leave you with a haunting little clip from Jane Eyre 2011 that I'm almost certain was filmed at Haddon Hall (click the little rectangle to make it full screen):

I Would Do Anything For You
Jane Eyre at MOVIECLIPS.com

Friday Favorites - better late than never?

First off, there's still time to enter my "Six weeks to THE REVENANT" giveaway of BLOOD MAGIC. Check it out here. I won't be tabulating entries until Sunday morning, so do please enter. (If you don't win this time, you'll still be entered in the giveaway for a finished copy of THE REVENANT. And, of course, there will be more giveaways in the weeks leading up to its release.)

Okay, now for the favorites: Friends and Tea!

My longtime buddy and kindred spirit Michelle flew all the way from Nashville to visit me earlier this week.


We enjoyed a tea at The Victorian Tea Room in the quaint old town square of Guthrie.

On Tuesday we headed to Tulsa for a viewing of Jane Eyre (even better on the THIRD viewing), a visit to the gorgeous Phillbrook Museum of Art, and . . .


Tea with friends Brandi Barnett and Ange Brunner at the Dragonmoon Tea Company.


Here's a clearer view of Brandi and the tea tray -- equally delicious, are they not? ;) (OH, and that's our server Vladimir lurking in the background. He was lovely.)

We had a lovely time! Tea always makes gatherings more festive.

If only my launch party could be one huge tea party . . .

Happy weekend, everyone!

[Cross-posted from Livejournal]

I saw Jane Eyre yesterday

Yes, I drove down to Dallas to see this movie, for it seems that it won't be coming to my area for the rest of this month.

(But I think it's doing fairly well in the box office, considering its limited release, so perhaps it will come sooner? I hope so, because I want to see it AGAIN!)

I was very pleased. You should know, however, that I've been a fan of Michael Fassbender for quite some time, so I was fully prepared to adore him as Rochester. Yes, he's too handsome. No, he doesn't tease and torment Jane quite as much as he does in the book. I was okay with both of those changes! He's quieter, but still intense. His relative calm made the more passionate scenes all the more dramatic. And in the end? Oh! How I love the final scene!

I quite liked Mia Wasikowska. At times, such as when her grave face would break into a quick smile (in reaction to Rochester), she reminded me of fellow Aussie Anna Torv. She's small and fragile*, but still manages to be fierce. I loved her physicality and her expressive face. (*I hope, once filming was done, that someone handed Mia a plate of cheeseburgers. She was TINY.)

The film locations and cinematography were nothing less than spectacular.

I admired the streamlined script. There's not as much of the Jane/Rochester banter -- and some might find their growing attraction underdeveloped -- but considering the time limitations of a theatrical release I thought Moira Buffini did a lovely job. There's this moment, after the BIG REVEAL, when Rochester says something to Jane that I'm SURE isn't in the book, but it's so intriguing -- I almost think it's a response to Wide Sargasso Sea, but maybe that's because it reminds me of something my friend C once said in Rochester's defense.

I was glad to see that the script cut much of the over-the-top stuff, but the film does lack a bit of the creepy/quasi-ghostly feel of the book.

This review from Salon.com aligns pretty closely with my reaction, and it's not too spoilery.

[cross-posted from Livejournal]