Latest news with #EmilyBrontë
BBC News
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Hundreds join Wuthering Heights tribute on Brontë moors
Hundreds of Kate Bush fans have danced on the Yorkshire moors which inspired the novel - and the song - Wuthering Heights. The event was one of several held across the world on 27 July each year, as people dressed in red to recreate the video to Bush's 1978 event in Haworth was a joint celebration of the singer and the writer Emily Brontë held on Penistone Hill, not far from the famous Brontë Clare Shaw said she was "absolutely delighted by the scale, nature and success of the event", with people coming from the United States and Italy. Ms Shaw set up the event as she wanted to celebrate Bush and Brontë's cultural heritage, but also to highlight local objections to a planned windfarm development in the area. Walshaw Moor, an area near Top Withens - believed to be Brontë's inspiration for the Wuthering Heights farmhouse - is earmarked as the site of 41 turbines planned by Calderdale Energy Park. The company's first consultation on the project ended on 10 Shaw said she supported green energy, but not "in a really important ecological and cultural site".Calderdale Energy Park previously said the scheme "presents a key opportunity to support the government's target to achieve at least 95% of low carbon energy generation by 2030". The event also raised more than £2,000 for a domestic abuse charity, the Women's Aid Federation Of England. It was co-hosted by Happy Valley Pride, the Calder Valley LGBTQ+ after the event, many of those who took part commented on what a fantastic day they had, said organisers. A similar event was held in Birmingham on Saturday, organised by The Heath Bookshop in King's of those to attend was Home Office minister and Birmingham Yardley MP Jess have previously taken place in locations such as Sydney, Copenhagen, Berlin, Folkestone, and Preston. Listen to highlights from West Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North.
BBC News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Kate Bush tribute held on 'Wuthering Heights Day'
A government minister was among dozens of women in Birmingham who took part in an event celebrating writer Emily Brontë and singer Kate Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever also raised funds for women's charities as the group joined thousands of people across the world recreating the video to Bush's 1978 song Wuthering inaugural event earlier was organised by The Heath Bookshop, in King's proceedings were opened by Home Office minister and Birmingham Yardley MP Jess Phillips. Charities set to benefit from the event include Anawim - Birmingham's Centre for Women and WE:ARE (Women's Empowerment And Recovery Educators).Shop owner Claire Dawes said it was a "great event" to put on "as the local community support the many arts events that happen here and always support charity events."The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever events have previously taken place in locations such as Sydney, Copenhagen, Berlin, Folkestone, and the first time this year the event was set to take place on moorland on Penistone Hill, not far from the famous Brontë sister's home in Haworth. Follow BBC Birmingham on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
The Guardian
16-07-2025
- The Guardian
Clean energy should be a priority, not wuthering 'Brontë country' nostalgia
Re Simon Jenkins' article (Ed Miliband would let a turbine farm destroy Brontë country. We need net zero, but at what cost?, 14 July), there might be good reasons for opposing a windfarm on the Yorkshire moors, but Emily Brontë isn't one of them. Nor is the 'turbulent romance' of Wuthering Heights an appropriate filter through which to view the Pennines. The Brontës' local landscape would have changed considerably in their lifetime. They would have seen the rapid industrialisation of nearby towns such as Bradford and Halifax, and the mills that sprang up along the river in Haworth. They would have recognised the benefits of the expansion of the railways despite the impact on the countryside (their brother, Branwell, worked as a railway clerk). The 'historic Brontë village of Haworth' where they grew up was not a rural idyll, but a breeding ground for cholera and typhoid. The Brontë sisters must have applauded the campaign by their father, Patrick, for improved sanitation there, leading to the creation of a local reservoir that doubtless affected the countryside but also saved lives. We cannot afford to cordon off parts of the UK as a nostalgic theme park ('Brontë country'). Nor should we romanticise the lives of a family who grew up in an unimaginably unhealthy environment and died young as a result. The clean energy produced by windfarms is vastly preferable to the polluted environment that Emily Brontë endured, and it is likely that she of all people would have understood why a clean environment should be our first priority. Jane MiddletonBath Some of what Simon Jenkins writes about windfarms in beauty spots, on the necessity to protect the scientific importance of such areas, is unlikely to ruffle many feathers, but much of it sounds more like the Miliband neighbours he references. Only a day tripper wanting to see the moors and dropped off for 20 minutes on a pleasant spring day 'strolls' on the Pennine Way. If you haven't walked to Top Withens on a raw winter day, with sleet biting your cheeks, the wind wuthering, and water being blown uphill instead of flowing down, you cannot understand why the Pennines is such a great place for a windfarm. My great-grandchildren will still be able to walk the Pennine Way, with or without BoddenWakefield, West Yorkshire Simon Jenkins misunderstands what net zero is when he labels it 'a political ambition rather than a plausible target'. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says clearly: 'From a physical science perspective, limiting human-caused global warming to a specific level requires limiting cumulative CO2 emissions, reaching at least net zero CO2 emissions'. And both the IPCC and the UK's Climate Change Committee are clear that it is not just plausible but achievable, with the latter's recent seventh carbon budget providing 'an ambitious, deliverable pathway for the UK to reach net zero by 2050'. So net zero is a scientific concept that is required to stop climate change. Indeed, net zero not only can but must be met if we are to avoid ever more dangerous impacts long into the Redmond-King Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit Simon Jenkins asks what landscapes we will lose in the bid to achieve net zero. He ought, rather, to ponder what will be left of them if we don't achieve this CaplanOxford Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
BBC News
05-07-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Kate Bush fans' Wuthering Heights dance tribute on Brontë moors
Red dresses and extravagant dance moves are likely to be the order of the day later this month on the moors above Haworth in joint celebration of writer Emily Brontë and singer Kate is known as The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever is held on 27 July each year, and sees thousands of people across the world recreate the video to Bush's 1978 song Wuthering Heights, inspired by the Brontë novel of the same name. This year's West Yorkshire tribute will be held on moorland on Penistone Hill, not far from the famous Brontë sister's home in Clare Shaw, a writer who lives near Haworth, said 500 tickets for the "Mass Wuther" event were snapped up "within hours". Ms Shaw said she wanted not only to celebrate Bush and Brontë's cultural heritage, but also to raise awareness of a campaign to protect Top Withens - believed to be Brontë's inspiration for the Wuthering Heights farmhouse - and the surrounding moors from a planned windfarm development. Ms Shaw said wearing a red dress for the event, as Bush did in the video for her classic song, was non-negotiable, meanwhile participants were encouraged to learn the dance moves in explained that the project was co-hosted by Happy Valley Pride, the Calder Valley LGBTQ+ celebration. "There's a really strong element of of celebrating LGBTQ+ as part of the event, which fits perfectly with Kate Bush because she was always a gay icon, even in the days when that wasn't the thing to be," she Shaw said the event would also tie in with a project called Wondering Heights, created for Bradford's City of Culture celebrations, and would fuse Brontë's literary heritage with Bush's pop classic. Created by artist Lucy Barker, the project was described as a "mass dance meditation for everybody", including dance workshops running between 5 and 23 July inspired by the Wuthering Heights routine. Ms Barker and Ms Shaw said they had been working together to make sure as many people as possible who wanted to join in with the "Mass Wuther" were able to. Ms Shaw said: "The project is part of Bradford 2025, and is about making the moor more accessible, but also making dance accessible."So, people who might not be able to attend the event - either because they can't get a ticket or because they have caring responsibilities or mobility restrictions - can take part in different ways."Ms Shaw said she had long been a Kate Bush fan, but added that supporting the campaign against the proposed wind farm was "the driving force" for the "Mass Wuther". The wind farm development is planned for land on Walshaw Moor, near Hebden Bridge - about four miles (6km) from Top Withens. Ms Shaw said: "I've been really heavily involved in the campaign against the wind farm, which I never thought I would find myself saying."I'm absolutely a proponent of green energy, but green energy has to mean green energy. "If you look at a wind farm on a blanket bog, that is a habitat for a multitude of really important creatures, on deep peat, it's not green energy - it's an energy factory located in a really important ecological and cultural site."Calderdale Energy Park, behind the proposals, has said it would apply for permission to build 41 turbines on Walshaw company's first consultation on the project ended on 10 June. Christian Egal, project director, said it could power up to 250,000 homes, cutting annual CO2 emissions by up to 350,000 Egal said: "We are committed to shaping the project by engaging with local people and our first stage of consultation has already received more than 1,000 individual responses."This feedback, alongside detailed technical and environmental assessments, will be critical to shaping the scheme's final design that is sensitive to its moorland location." Listen to highlights from West Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North.
Times
22-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
‘Mass wuther' protest as giant wind farm threatens Brontë moors
O ut on the wily, windy moors above Haworth in West Yorkshire, hundreds of Kate Bush enthusiasts are to gather — to protest against plans for England's biggest wind farm. An annual event billed as 'The Most Wuthering Heights Day Ever' is taking place on Sunday, July 27, on Penistone Hill, above the village where Emily Brontë lived with her sisters, Charlotte and Anne, two centuries ago. Known as a 'mass wuther', it will feature more than 500 people dressed in red dresses and flowing black wigs simultaneously performing the musical legend Kate Bush's ethereal choreography from the video for her 1978 debut hit Wuthering Heights. Although a mass wuther has taken place in various global locations including Melbourne, Berlin and Paris since 2013, it is the first time it has been held in the Brontë country that inspired it.
