Take Courage

“I thought that everything had already been said about the Brontes. But Samantha Ellis has looked at the family from a new angle, and in doing so brought Anne out of the shadows and placed her front and centre amongst her splashier siblings. I was wowed and moved” – Tracy Chevalier “The Brontes have spawned innumerable spin-offs and imitations, and Ellis cites and analyses many of them, from Hollywood movies to graphic novels, from television adaptations to stand-up comedy and online magazines. She has obsessively pursued them into every cultural realm, and she has read all the biographies, both scholarly and popular… It takes some time for an ageing reader to settle into this startling frame of reference, but once adjusted, the rewards are considerable” – Margaret Drabble Times Literary Supplement “This is a very personal book about what the short life of Anne Bronte can tell us about wringing every drop out of existence… A great pleasure to read and a more fitting tribute to Anne than her gravestone in Scarborough.” – Daisy Goodwin The Times “Her personal approach is the source of both the book’s immense charm and also its considerable power… ultimately the book is a deeply moving depiction of how reading and writing allows us to forge an emotional and intellectual connection with someone who died over a century before we were born… brilliant” Irish Times “Take Courage is as much an account of Ellis’s own discovery of Anne’s work as it is that of her subject’s life, and herein lies the book’s unique appeal. Ellis - who is, it should be noted, as intelligent and perceptive a reader as she is an evocative storyteller - truly writes from the heart, which isn’t to say she hasn’t done her research… a deeply sympathetic and interesting re-evaluation of a woman ahead of her time who has much to teach us all about living courageously” – Lucy Scholes Independent

Samantha Ellis, the daughter of Iraqi-Jewish refugees, is the author of the books How to be a Heroine and Take Courage. Her plays include How to Date a Feminist, Cling to me Like Ivy and Operation Magic Carpet. Her journalism has appeared in the Guardian, TLS, Spectator, Literary Review and more. She worked on the first two Paddington films. She lives in London.

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