


In 2011, Gérard Lhéritier outbid the Society and placed the book in his Musée des Lettres et Manuscrits in Paris, which housed 136,000 other original manuscripts and letters. In a twist, this is the second time the Brontë Society has tried to purchase Young Men’s Magazine. The Parsonage Museum already holds four of the other six miniature books written by Brontë one is missing. The Brontë Society, which runs the Brontë Parsonage Museum, ran a successful fundraiser in which more than 1,000 people, including Dame Judi Dench–a longtime Brontë fan and honorary president of the Society–ponied up donations to help bring the book home to West Yorkshire. The tiny Young Men’s Magazine manuscript was purchased by the Brontë Society at auction for €780,000 ($864,130). She eventually jumps out of the building to her death, leaving Rochester free to marry Jane.Īutographed manuscript of Young Men’s Magazine signed by Charlotte Brontë. The museum states that experts agree that this part of Young Men’s Magazine is “a clear precursor” to the moment in Jane Eyre in which Edward Rochester’s first wife, Bertha Mason, goes mad and lights a fire in the attic where she’s been sequestered. One scene apparently features a killer haunted by his victims to the point of insanity, causing an “immense fire” in his head to literally manifest, burning his bed curtains. Written for a very particular audience (Branwell’s toy soldiers), the book is dramatic and intense.

The Young Men’s Magazine, one of six miniature, handmade books that she made with her brother Branwell when she was 14 years old in 1830, was recently purchased at auction by the Brontë Parsonage Museum, based in Charlotte’s hometown.Ĭharlotte, Branwell, and their two younger sisters Emily and Anne conjured a fictitious place they called Glass Town, situated in West Africa Young Men’s Magazine and the other miniatures document this town. Charlotte Brontë published Jane Eyre in 1847, when she was 31 years old, but she was already making books when she was a teenager in West Yorkshire, England.
