EARTHLY PASSIONS
Sally Wainwright, the director of a new BBC drama about the Brontës, reveals how Yorkshire defined them
Igrew up in Sowerby Bridge, not far from the Brontës’ home, the Parsonage in Haworth. My parents used to take me there as a child, so I have been aware of their work for as long as I can remember. When the BBC approached me to do a series for the bicentenary of Charlotte’s birth, I agreed because I wanted to reclaim them for Yorkshire. Previous programmes had given them southern accents, or made their northern ones sound simple; my take on it was to root them very firmly in their landscape and in their environment. These women were products of the world they grew up in, and that was West Yorkshire.
I wanted to make the setting for To Walk Invisible as authentic as possible. We rebuilt the Parsonage and part of the village to recreate what it would have felt like to live there then. The house, in its position on the cusp of the moors, is almost a character in its own right. When we filmed indoor scenes, we were very aware of the climate and the wind – those aspects of the Yorkshire landscape that are so intrinsic to the sisters’ work.
What is rare about the Brontës is that we are as fascinated by them personally as much as by what they wrote. There is something about their private lives that is both tragic and captivating. It’s a curious mixture of the power of their writing and their own stories.
With this in mind, I began the series in the summer of 1845, when all three sisters found themselves back at home with their brother, Branwell. Around this time, they started to think about trying to publish their work: a decision partly fuelled by desperation. They’d written all their lives but had never published their work because it was considered vulgar for women to do so. Yet they hated their positions as governesses and teachers, and Branwell was sinking further into alcoholism. The absurdity that such intelligent, capable young women had so few options is a theme I have tried to explore in the series. The 1840s was a time when many women ended up in asylums, and you can see why. Women couldn’t express themselves, and there was so much frustrated ambition. It was incredibly rare for a woman to have any agency without being connected to a man.
The myth that the Brontës didn’t really understand the power of what they were writing was started by Charlotte herself. She outlived her sisters and became famous in her own right; when Wuthering Heights and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall were later criticised for being brutal and unfeminine, she apologised, implying that Emily and Anne didn’t know better. This is the first instance of how the three sisters have been reimagined and reinvented over the years.
To Walk Invisible focuses a great deal on Branwell’s addiction as alcoholism often features in his sisters’ novels. In Wuthering Heights, Hindley Earnshaw becomes a heavy drinker, which is how Heathcliff screws money out of him; and in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, the whole plot revolves around Arthur Huntingdon’s alcoholism. My adaptation is essentially the story of the sisters’ relationship with their alcohol-dependent brother and how that affected their development as publishing authors.
When we were casting the series, I felt it was important to find relatively new actresses, so as not to detract from the idea that they were three obscure women who no one would notice – were it not for their remarkable writing.
I also wanted the cast to feel like a family. I asked for a whole week of rehearsal, so they could spend that time in Haworth. They called it ‘Brontë Boot Camp’. Juliet Barker, the author of the wonderful biography of the Brontës joined us, as did a calligrapher, to show them how to write with old ink pens. The cast had a marvellous time, and it not only allowed them to immerse themselves in the Brontës but it gave them an opportunity to get to know each other. They became really close, like siblings, and I believe that really comes across on screen.
There is no doubt that the Brontës’ work is extraordinary. It has appealed to generation after generation and remains unmatched in quality. I hope that To Walk Invisible brings this astonishing family to life.
‘To Walk Invisible’ will air in December on BBC One.