Most Famous Family of Writers

The Bronte Sisters were one of the most famous families of writers in the 19th century. The literary legends consist of Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Bronte. They were born in the village of Thornton and later moved to Haworth Village, West Riding, in Yorkshire, England.

The family of poets and novelist sisters had a brother called Branwell. Being very close, the family shared imaginative storytelling and play set in a complex imaginary world. Charlotte Bronte’s most well-known work was Jane Eyre, Emily’s was Wuthering Heights, and Anne’s was The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

Their birthplace in Thornton is a pilgrimage to commemorate their literary contributions, and their later home in Haworth is the Bronte Parsonage Museum.
The family inherited scribes and literary men in Fermanagh.

Family Lineage

Patrick Bronte, the Bronte sisters’ father, had a Bachelor of Arts degree and was the author of cottage poems, The Rural Minstrel, besides many other rural poems, pamphlets, and news articles.
Patrick Branwell, the family’s son, was also a painter, writer, and casual worker. He was the author of Juvenilia, which he wrote as a child with Charlotte under the Northanger Land pseudonym.

National Portrait Gallery, London, exhibits Patrick Branwell’s painting. Later, he removed his image from the picture to avoid cluttering its exquisiteness. Branwell’s Father, Patrick, and sisters considered him a genius possessing various talents and precisely an inclination toward literature. But he became addicted to alcohol and laudanum. In 1848, sadly, he died of tuberculosis.
Charlotte’s most famous work was Jane Eyre and three other novels.

Her other works include:

Shirley in 1849
Villette in 1853
The professor in 1857

Emily Jane was also a poet and novelist who wrote just one Wuthering Heights novel.
Anne, also a poet and novelist, works consisted mainly of the autobiographical novel Agnes Grey. Her second novel was The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

Literary Evolution of the Family
The family’s children were interested in writing from early childhood, and it became a passion with time. It started with 12 wooden soldiers, which the family owned. Soon the sisters’ family started noting their ideas for stories around these toys consisting of the imaginary African Kingdom of Glass Town, followed by The Empire of Angria. Their stories were contained in little books the size of a matchbox.

The pages’ most intriguing feature was their close writing style, capital letters, no punctuation, embellished illustrations, detailed maps, landscapes, and other features. These fictional works laid the foundation for literary masterpieces.
The three sisters combined first work was first published in 1846 using the male pseudonyms, CurrerBell for Charlotte, Ellis Bell for Emily, and Acton Bell for Anne.
It was only in 1847 when Charlotte’s Jane Eyre, Emily’s Wuthering Heights, and Anne’s Agnes Grey, works were published, out of which the latter two novels attracted critical acclaim.
Wuthering Heights was praised for its originality of subject and narrative style and criticized for being outrageously violent and immortal. Charlotte and Anne’s works were flattering and became what we know today as best sellers.
Emily Bronte, also known as the ‘Sphinx of Literature’, wrote a single novel Wuthering Heights and elementary nature poems.

Homage to Emily Bronte

Inspired by Emily’s novel, the famous singer Kate Bush released her debut album ‘The Kick Inside’ in November 1977 under the same name, Wuthering Heights. This song became Kate’s most successful and remained number one in the UK singles chart for four weeks. It was one of the best-selling songs of the  1970s.

Family Meeting Fatal End

From the family of Bronte: Branwell died in September 1848, Emily in December 1848, and Anne five months later in May 1849. Charlotte passed away at 38 due to tuberculosis or typhoid fever. By 1860, Mr Brontë and his son-in-law, Arthur Bell Nicholls, were the only family members residing at the parsonage. He survived his entire family. After six years following Charlotte’s death, the melancholy father died in 1861, aged 84.

The family might be gone, but the sisters left behind a legacy of superb writing works that have captivated people’s imaginations for generations and have been the inspiration for many poets, songwriters, and their books have touched the hearts of millions of people around the world. Although the sisters died young, their legacy will go on forever.