Charlotte Brontë

Born on April 21, 1816, in Thornton, Yorkshire, Charlotte Brontë grew up in the parsonage at Haworth and was the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who became famous writers. She published at first under the pen name Currer Bell, at a time when women writers were often taken less seriously.

Her breakthrough came with Jane Eyre in 1847, a novel that made her widely known for its intense first-person voice and its portrait of a heroine determined to keep her independence. She went on to write Shirley and Villette, and she also wrote poetry and the posthumously published novel The Professor.

Charlotte Brontë died on March 31, 1855. Though her life was short, her novels became lasting classics, admired for their honesty, passion, and close attention to inner life.