'Sibling collaboration and literary after-life: the case of the Brontës'

This article argues that Charlotte Bronte effected a thorough mediation of Emily Bronte's authorial image after her death by becoming her sister's editor. For the 1850 edition of Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey, Charlotte extensively edited Emily's poetry and wrote an influential 'Biographical Notice' and 'Preface'. She also composed new lines for some of the poems, establishing herself as a true co-author of her sister's work. Her purpose, as this article argues, was to soften the 'coarse', masculine image that the critics' reviews had attributed to the writer of Wuthering Heights. Thus, Charlotte created the image of a more innocent, female poet, in a deliberate (?) attempt to replace the existing view of Emily as a rough, unfeminine writer