The
Anne and Emily Diaries
 The
Diaries |
|
On 24 November 1834, Anne and Emily jointly wrote
a 'diary paper', recording some of their preoccupations that day - a typical
Monday at the Parsonage, and expressing their curiosity of how they might
be situated some forty years later. Three years later they produced a second
diary paper, and this time vowed to seal it, store it in the small tin
box in which they kept their papers, and re-open it four years later when
they could compare the changes that had occurred over that period. At that
time they would write another diary paper, which would likewise be sealed
for the following four years. The first two diary papers, 1834 and 1837,
were jointly composed - though written mostly in Emily's hand. For the
subsequent diaries, they wrote one each - again, vowing to exchange and
open them on the fourth anniversary of their creation.
These diary papers were discovered, still enclosed in the small box,
by Charlotte's husband, the Reverend Arthur Bell Nicholls, in 1895 - many
years after the entire Brontë family had died. He sent them to a Brontë
biographer144
with a note which read:
'The four small scraps of Emily and Anne's
MSS I found in the small box I send you. They are sad reading, poor girls!'
The
Joint Diary of 1834 (with pictures)
The
Joint Diary of 1837 (with picture)
Anne
/ Emily Diary of 1841 (Anne's was written at Scarborough)
Anne
/ Emily Diary of 1845
Copyright © 1999 Michael
Armitage
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