The Brontë Sister shop helps

  In May 2021, Sotheby's auction house announced an upcoming sale of the Honresfield Library Collection. This seldom seen collection of literary and historical artefacts includes items held by a private family for over a hundred years and contains some remarkable documents. In the collection are Emily Brontë's famed

book of poetry (with Charlotte's handwritten edits), pages from the Brontë sisters' diaries (including sketches of their daily lives), an edition of Bewick's History of British Birds (annotated by the Brontë family and featured in the opening chapter of Jane Eyre), and several letters and books from the Brontës that at the time of writing remain undisclosed.

The chances of these treasures being bought by a private collector and the possibility of them leaving the UK is very high. The short timescale from announcement to the auction date and the large amount of money required gave The Brontë Society, already struggling after a long period of financial difficulties due

to pandemic restrictions closing the Parsonage some cause for concern.

Luckily in June, the Friends of National Libraries (FNL) coalition announced their efforts to raise £15m to purchase the Honresfield Library and keep the entire collection intact.

After wide media coverage, Sotheby's agreed to delay the auction to allow time for funds to be raised. The collection wasn’t quite safe, but everyone felt it was a step closer.

What about Brontë devotees? We wanted to help and two Brontë fans, Carolina and Amber decided they would do just that. They set up a GoFundMe campaign called “Bring the Brontës home to Haworth” and set about promoting their idea over social

media. Donations started coming in soon after and events were planned.

One of the highlights was a weekend-long readathon live on YouTube of Jane Eyre involving many readers (some dressed up) with viewers raising money and helping to spread the word about the appeal.

A raffle lasting a week was organised with prizes being donated by companies big and small including The Brontë Sisters online shop. At the time of writing this we don’t know what the outcome will be, we wait and hope that at least some of the Brontë’s treasured pieces will return to the home of the sisters at The Parsonage, Haworth, Yorkshire.
 

To donate head to:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/bring-the-bronts-home-to-haworth

To learn more about the Honresfield Library Collection head to:

https://www.artnews.com/art-news/market/bronte-manuscript-trove-sothebys-1234594000/ 

Bringing the Brontës Home to Haworth is on Twitter:

@BringBrontesHom