We’re onto day three of our 12 day Brontë Christmas countdown, and I hope you’re having fun. As you know we’re using the “12 Days Of Christmas” song and giving it a Brontë twist. As we learnt yesterday, whilst the song itself is hundreds of years old, the version we sing today was set down in 1909 by Frederic Austin. A composer of operas and oratorios, he is now most known for rearranging earlier music, especially for his work on what has become an essential Christmas classic.
Before we take a look at our version of three French hens, there’s a Brontë anniversary today: it was on this day in 1893 that the very first meeting of the Brontë Society took place in, appropriately enough, Bradford Town Hall. Their aim then was to ensure the promotion of the lives and works of the Brontë sisters, which I’m sure we can all agree was a very noble endeavour.
The Mayor couldn’t make the meeting so it was instead chaired by a Reverend Keeling, headmaster of Bradford Grammar School, who announced (as reported by the Yorkshire Post newspaper): “the Brontës represented and embodied the true Yorkshire spirit, though they themselves were not a Yorkshire family.” He then went on to say: “Charlotte Brontë had often expressed her preference for the strength of the Yorkshire character over the sentimentality of Cockneys.” The reverend was obviously not a man afraid of expressing an opinion!
Onto the third day of Brontë Christmas. We will leave French hens alone, but turn instead to French letters (no sniggering at the back!). Charlotte Brontë wrote a number of letters in French after leaving Brussels in 1843. Their intended recipient was Monsieur Heger, first the teacher and then colleague of Charlotte during her near two year sojourn in Belgium. More appositely Constantin Heger was Charlotte Brontë’s unrequited love. She sent him more than three letters in French, each more yearning, more desperate than the last. She never received a reply. Indeed, we know that some of the letters were cut into pieces but were then stitched back together again – there must have been frosty scenes in the Pensionnat Heger between Constantin and his wife and employer Clare Heger.
Here is an 1845 letter to Monsieur Heger bearing witness to this passage of events, so we now can say: “On the third day of Christmas the Brontës brought to me three French letters, two captive doves, and a merlin on a bare tree.”
I hope you can join me tomorrow for day four of our twelve day Brontë advent countdown. Until then, as the French (and some Belgians) say, “A demain!”