Culture of Yorkshire - Literature

Literature

There are several instances of the county providing an important role in literature, perhaps the most famous literacy association is that between Whitby in North Yorkshire and Bram Stoker's Dracula. When Stoker wrote the novel, he was living in Whitby at the time and parts of it are set there, it includes several parts of Whitby folklore such as the beaching of the Russian ship Dmitri, which became the basis of Demeter in the book. Today there is a Dracula Museum in the town, celebrating the association. In terms of poetry, one of the most well known from Yorkshire is Andrew Marvell from Winestead-in-Holderness, he was noted for writing metaphysical poetry during the 1600s and his association with several other noted British poets from the era.

Then music, the mosaic of the air,
Did of all these a solemn noise prepare;
With which she gain'd the empire of the ear,
Including all between the earth and sphere.

—Andrew Marvell, "Music's Empire"

The Brontë sisters -- Anne Brontë, Charlotte Brontë and Emily Brontë—were all Yorkshirewomen born in Thornton and raised in Haworth, West Yorkshire. Their novels, written in the mid-1800s, caused a sensation when they were first published and were subsequently accepted into the canon of great English literature. Amongst the most noted novels credited to the sisters are Anne's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Charlotte's Jane Eyre and Emily's Wuthering Heights.

In the present day, the most prominent Yorkshire presence in English literature is that of the playwright, author, actor, screenwriter and commentator Alan Bennett, born 1934 in Leeds, where much of his work is set.

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Famous quotes containing the word literature:

    The newspapers, I perceive, devote some of their columns specially to politics or government without charge; and this, one would say, is all that saves it; but as I love literature and to some extent the truth also, I never read those columns at any rate. I do not wish to blunt my sense of right so much.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    Views of women, on one side, as inwardly directed toward home and family and notions of men, on the other, as outwardly striving toward fame and fortune have resounded throughout literature and in the texts of history, biology, and psychology until they seem uncontestable. Such dichotomous views defy the complexities of individuals and stifle the potential for people to reveal different dimensions of themselves in various settings.
    Sara Lawrence Lightfoot (20th century)