Tales of Glass Town, Angria, and Gondal Selected Early Writings

In their collaborative early writings, the Brontës created and peopled the most extraordinary fantasy worlds, whose geography and history they elaborated in numerous stories, poems, and plays. Together they invented characters based on heroes and writers such as Wellington, Napoleon, Scott, and Byron, whose feuds, alliances, and love affairs weave an intricate web of social and political intrigue in imaginary colonial lands in Africa and the Pacific Ocean. The writings of Glass Town, Angria, and Gondal are youthful experiments in imitation and parody, wild romance and realistic recording--a playful literary world that they would draw upon for their early and later work. In this generous selection, the early writings of the Brontë's are presented together for the first time. Christine Alexander's Introduction explores the rich imaginative lives of the Brontës, and the tension between their maturing authorship and creative freedom. The edition includes Charlotte Brontë's Roe Head Journal , and Emily and Anne's Diary Papers . The edition also has a key to characters and place, detailed notes, and a map of Glass Town and Angria.

Christine Alexander is co-author (with Margaret Smith) of The Oxford Companion to the Brontës (2003). Her critical study on The Early Writings of Charlotte Brontë (1983) won the British Academy Rose Mary Crawshay Prize and she has edited a multi-volume Edition of the Early Writings of Charlotte Brontë (1987, 1991, vol. 3 forthcoming).