Two Constantins: Constantin Heger and Constantin Meunier

Constantin Meunier

The BOZAR Museum in Brussels is currently featuring a major exhibition devoted to the work of
Constantin Meunier (1831-1905). The Belgian artist was among the very finest of 19th century sculptors; Rodin was a great admirer of his work, as was Vincent Van Gogh, who once declared Meunier to be "far superior to me".

For followers of the Brussels Brontë story, there is a detail which might give rise to extra interest in the artist - his forename Constantin. The name of course brings to mind Constantin Heger (1809-1896), Charlotte and Emily Brontë's literature professor. Constantin was a rare enough first name back in 1840s Brussels; even today it is not so common. Besides Meunier and Heger, it is a challenge to think of other Belgian public figures or artists so named. (There were some 'Constant's however - such as the painter Constant Permeke, and the football world's Constant Vanden Stock...)

Constantin Heger

It was no simple coincidence that Meunier and Heger shared the same forename. There were in fact real connections between the two men. Constantin Heger was Constantin Emile Meunier's godfather, and the sculptor was given his first name in his honour. Meunier was baptized at Ste. Gertrude's, Etterbeek, on 13 April 1831. Constantin Heger and Marie-Josephe Noyer, who were to marry in September 1831, stood for him as godparents. Marie-Josephe Noyer and Meunier were second cousins, related through the Ghigny family, from Rebecq (Walloon Brabant).

The church where Constantin Meunier was baptized no longer stands, demolished in 1993 when menacing cracks started to appear in its towers. However, the house in Etterbeek where he was born still exists, surviving somewhat uncomfortably between modern constructions on the Chaussée d'Etterbeek 172, opposite the Parc Léopold. There is a memorial plaque to the artist on the façade.

Meunier's birthplace, Etterbeek

When Constantin Meunier was aged around 11, Heger advised his godson to study at Brussels' Athénée Royal, where he himself was then teacher of the junior class (classe élémentaire). Meunier entered the Athénée in 1842, the year the Brontë sisters came to Brussels. However he struggled  with his studies; by 1845, he had already left the Athénée. It is no wonder that Meunier did not get on well at school. He was a rather  sensitive child; it is said of him that up to the age of 15, he used to cry every evening. If Charlotte and Emily Brontë were sometimes sad in Brussels, it was unlikely they were ever as sad as the young Meunier was!

Meunier in later years was a regular guest at the pensionnat which Heger ran with his wife Zoë Parent on the Rue d' Isabelle. Indeed the Heger-Parent Pensionnat was a welcoming place for a number of notable Belgian artists over the years. Some were artists who also gave classes there, such as the painter and illustrator Paul Lauters (1806-1875) and the composer Etienne Soubre (1813-1871). Others were men with family connections to the Hegers, such as Edmond Picard (1836-1924), the controversial writer and lawyer, whose brother Emile was married to Victorine Heger, Constantin's daughter, and the engraver Auguste Danse (1829-1929), Meunier's brother-in-law. It is not surprising that artists were welcome at Rue d'Isabelle, 32. Constantin Heger was a member of the Brussels Cercle artistique et littéraire, and although he never wrote or painted himself, he had a keen interest in the artistic world of his day. His daughter Louise (1839-1933) was a talented singer and painter; she was a popular figure in the artistic world of 19th century Brussels.

There are other links between the two Constantins which are worth highlighting. Both men at a young age witnessed tragedy and suffering in the family home. Constantin Meunier was four years old when his father Simon Louis Meunier died on 10 July 1835, at the age of 45. Serious financial problems seem to have precipitated his death. Heger too was still very young (aged 13) when he lost his father Joseph-Antoine Heger in 1822, also in circumstances of financial ruin.

Further deaths occurred which affected both men profoundly. In 1833, not so long after marrying her, Heger lost his first wife, Marie-Josephe Noyer to (probably) consumption. In 1894, Meunier lost his two dearly-loved sons in quick succession - Karl, who died of consumption in Leuven, and Georges, who died of yellow fever in Brazil.

The Firedamp Explosion, 1889
©MRBAB, Bruxelles

These various personal tragedies perhaps helped both men to empathise with the suffering of others. Both the professor and the artist showed a deep solidarity with those suffering from chronic poverty and harsh working conditions. The theme of humanitarian concern is central to the work of Constantin Meunier, as in his sculptures dedicated to the cruel mining world of the Borinage (near Mons in Southern Belgium). His godfather Heger, for his part, dedicated much effort to teaching and aiding the poor workmen of 19th century Brussels. In Mrs. Gaskell's The Life of Charlotte Brontë (1857), Chapter XI, mention is made of his long hours of work with the Brussels underclass, as a devout member of the St. Vincent de Paul Society. Constantin Meunier's  humanitarianism, however, perhaps owes less to orthodox religious beliefs than that of Constantin Heger.

The name 'Constantin' comes from Latin, meaning firm, resolute. The idea that a man spends his whole life somehow fulfilling his forename seems true when applied to the professor and the sculptor. The two Constantins, Heger and Meunier, dedicated themselves from an early age to their respective passions of pedagogy and art. Over the course of their long lives, they stood firm, never renouncing the ideals which motivated them, above all the belief in the essential dignity of man. Despite many personal tragedies and set-backs, the two men strove tirelessly to combat human suffering and ignorance, and to bring about a more just, enlightened world.

Select Bibliography:

A. Behets, Constantin Meunier. L’homme, l’artiste et l’œuvre (Bruxelles: Office de publicité, 1942); A. Fontaine, Constantin Meunier ( Paris: Félix Alcan, 1923); M. Jerome-Schotsmans, Constantin Meunier : sa vie, son œuvre (Bruxelles: Belgian Art Research Institute, 2012); Anon., La vie de Paul Héger (n.p., n.d.), Belgian Royal Library, ref.:7B 3339.


Brian Bracken

Secrets and spies at Brussels Bronte talk on Villette

Two women watching each other formed one of many memorable scenes of a talk given to the Brussels Bronte Group last month. Only one woman knows she’s being watched, while the other quietly and tidily sifts through private belongings. The two women are Madame Beck, searching through the possessions of the enigmatic teacher Lucy Snowe, the other is Lucy herself, following the headmistress’s moves through not-quite closed eyelids. The talk was “Shoes of Silence and a Face of Stone: Surveillance and Secrets in Charlotte Bronte's 'Villette'.

Students and members of the Brussels group met to hear award-wining historian and biographer Lucy Hughes-Hallett give the talk at the Université Saint-Louis. Group committee members Myriam, Lisbeth, Sharon and Marina brought local cakes and tarts for listeners to buy, along with the regular free tea, coffee, juice and biscuits. The audience was set to watch and learn on a sunny Saturday morning in October.

It was the watching, the surveillance, in Bronte’s final novel that Lucy Hughes-Hallett examined and discussed with the room. She showed how Madame Beck’s school is full of spies, of unobserved observers. These include Monsieur Paul at his window in the neighbouring boys’ school, as well as the many instances of characters appearing or hiding shadows, behind trees, or through unexpected doors and shutters. Above all there is stony faced Madame Beck, running her “school of spies”on “shoes of silence.”

But what is observed, as well as by who and how, was just as important to the talk by Lucy Hughes-Hallett, author of introductions to the Everyman editions of Jane Eyre and Villette. Lucy Snowe is full of secrets, wilfully choosing to withhold information from the reader, Hughes-Hallett explained. These secrets most obviously include the end of the novel, as well as the reason why Lucy leaves home at the start. Even when, late in the book, Ginevra asks directly “Who are you, Miss Snowe?”, Lucy’s reply is the unclear and unsettling “Who am I indeed? Perhaps a personage in disguise.”

Lucy Hughes-Halett

Lucy’s name, from the Latin for “light”, is also revealing in the context of what is shown and what held secret, said Hughes-Hallett, winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize and the Costa Biography Award. Other secrets and hidings central to Villette and discussed at the Brussels talk include the beloved letters covered with an almost ludicrous number of wrappings, and then buried.

Errors made in the perception of others were also covered in the talk. These include the failure to recognise Polly when she grows up as Paulina, and the true identity of Dr John – another secret Lucy chooses to keep from the reader for much of the book.

Fortunately for us, Lucy Hughes-Hallett’s presentation was more revealing than Lucy Snowe’s narrative. Members of the Brussels Bronte Group ended the hour far wiser than Madame Beck, after her 15 minutes considering the “sleeping” protagonist of Villette.

Emily Waterfield

Brontë Society American Chapter

Hello Brontë Brussels Group,

I’m happy to report that a Brontë Society American Chapter Blog is now available. 

Our primary purpose is to offer a visitor an opportunity to talk Brontë. The Brontë Society American Chapter blog home page invites visitors to comment on a selected Brontë topic. The current one is “How I met the Brontës”. Other pages include “Gallery” for photos and “Scribblemania” where Brontë inspired prose and poetry can be shared.

Brontë Brussels Group folks are invited to come visit us and share Brontë. Your blog address is posted on the Brontë Society American Chapter Blog “Links” page.

Randall

Brontë Society American Chapter Representative

You can find the link to the American Chapter Blog on the right hand side, under links. 

Brontë Conference 30.31 August 2014: The Brontës and the Condition of England

The last weekend of August I joined Helen, Judith, Maureen, Jolien and her husband Paul and about 

70 other Brontë lovers/scholars at the Scarman Centre, Warwick University, for the Brontë Society 

Conference 2014. This conference contained five sessions and two additional treats. And indeed we 

were treated! On Friday afternoon Juliet Barker told us what political animals the Brontës were, at 

least when they were young and all at home in Haworth, reading as many magazines as they could lay their hands on and debating the articles read.

The second treat Melissa Hardie-Budden. She is researching the Brontë connection in Cornwall, 

the families of Thomas Branwell and Anne Carne, the maternal grandparents of the Brontës. These 

families were very often in trade. This gave them a wide, though very Cornish, network of connections in all directions of life, including a scientist like Sir Humphrey Davy. There is still a lot more to be done here, but I think Mrs. Gaskell would have been astonished already.

The first Session (on Saturday) was on Patrick Brontë. Dr. Logan, from the Irish branch of the Brontë Society, made clear to us how much Patrick was moulded by the people he met when he was young and still in Ireland. Not only his own kin, but people in a wider circle, who saw how promising a young man he was and helped him to Cambridge University. In Isobel Stirk's story we see Patrick later in life, preaching in the church in Haworth to rich and poor people alike. Patrick would talk to everybody: he wanted to help the poor and needed the rich people to get things done, like healthy drinking water for all the people of Haworth. Brian Wilkes gave us lovely insight in his rich knowledge of all things Brontë and in this case all things Patrick and the world beyond. Marianne Thormählen discussed the case of the Brontë novels being historical fiction or just fiction. Of course Shirley is set in the time of the Luddite Riots, a time Patrick could clearly remember, but there are no historical figures in Shirley, nor in any other of the Brontë novels. 

The theme of the second Session was Religion. Bob Gamble surprised everyone with his research 

done on the education of William Weightman. He calls Weightman and his fellow-students Northern 

Lights, the term used for the lighthouses on the northern shores of Britain, because they were the first students coming from the new University of Durham. And Weightman was not just the flirty, flighty 

young man he looks like in Brontë-lore, but a serious and empathic curate. He could have gone back 

to Durham before the dreadful cholera that killed him, struck Haworth, but he decided to stay and help Patrick with his huge parish.

Sarah Pearson reflected on Charlotte’s ideas on the Condition of the Church of England: it should 

not become too Catholic, nor too Protestant and certainly not too far from the daily life of its people. 

Though Charlotte Brontë is not known for her progressive thoughts on religion these ideas, especially the third one, sound very modern to me.

The third Session was on Industrial Unrest. Ariella Feldman told us, that even in very difficult times for workers, like in the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, workers, rebelling against losing their jobs, would still use a folklore kind of yell when attacking the mills, so maybe not all the fairies left, when industrialisation began. Erin Johnson talked us through the influence of the Captains of Industry in those days and of writers and historians like Thomas Carlyle.

The fourth Session on Women started with an interesting talk of Rebecca Fraser on where the Brontë 

sisters, especially Charlotte and Anne, stood in the Woman Question. Birgitta Berglund, who used 

the "yell" 'Fashion in a Feminist Issue' for her talk, made it even more interesting by showing us very 

literally what a part of the Woman Question, the Great Corset Debate, meant to a woman. She is 

sure that the Brontë's wore corsets, because all women did, even working women. Maybe not as 

tightly laced as she was herself by then by her friend and colleague Marianne Thormählen, but still. 

One wonders how any woman could work with a corset on. Or walk on the moors. Or go on with your lecture like Birgitta. It changed her breathing and therefore her voice, like modern day high-heeled shoes change your walking. Molly Ryder, in her talk on ‘Asylum Metaphors in Villette’, kept to the theme of confinement and gave us an insight into what solitary confinement, not just in a corset, but in an asylum could do to a person, woman or man for that matter.

The fifth and last Session was on War and Empire. Emma Butcher showed how in their juvenalia 

Charlotte and Branwell reimagined the times of the Napoleon

ic Wars and the impact of wartime on

the Condition of England. Sarah Fermi, great organiser of this conference, ended the series of lectures by thinking aloud on the question of colour. There is still a lot of research to do on questions like: did the Brontës meet coloured people? Did they know people who got rich by trading slaves? And what did they think about that? And of course the never answered question: where does Heathcliff come from?

Bonnie Greer had in her speech at Conference Dinner told us how important it is to us, members of 

the Brontë Society, to be the true heirs of the Brontës and let nobody else run away with the Brontë 

history.

Many delegates thought this was the best Conference ever. Maybe a few more historians as speakers 

would have given us an even better idea of the Condition of England in Brontë-times, but I do think 

the organisers of the next Conference will have a whale of a job to surpass this Brontë Society 

Conference 2014.

Marcia Zaaijer

Kate Bush concert “Before the dawn”

My impressions regarding the Kate Bush concert “Before the dawn”. After 35 years of silence as far as concerts are concernd, Kate Bush was back on stage in the Hammersmith Apollo in London for 22 concerts between 26 August and 1 October 2014!

Tickets for the concerts were gone in a few minutes. Stressful minutes for those fans who wanted to go, clicking away on the computer to get what was still to be had, and I finally got a “hospitality package” for the opening night on 26 August: a superb hamper of delicious food and drinks in a magnificent setting (St Paul’s neo-gothic church in Hammersmith London, opposite the Apollo 

theatre) as a starter before the concert, premium seats for the concert and the wonderful souvenir book were all included in the package.

The atmosphere of anticipation beforehand, waiting outside with the crowd to get in the concert hall, was really magical. You could feel the excitement everywhere!

I loved the first part of the concert, which was a series of songs followed by a theatrical performance of “The Ninth Wave”: Kate gave a spectacular show, she had a very strong voice and the whole story was fascinating to watch. 

The second part after the break was in my view a little bit less interesting, still spectacular in a way but also  very confusing. Less strong than the Ninth Wave performance.

The anticipation and expectations in the concert hall grew with the “encore”, and although she performed two beautiful songs, you could feel that the audience was waiting for “Wuthering Heights”, which did not come. The audience was applauding for more, but Kate did not return to oblige. That was a little bit of a disappointment, but overall I was glad to have been there and seen it all.

It was certainly a magical evening. Something to treasure always.

Marina Saegerman

5 September 2014