AN EXHIBITION in Haworth exploring Anne Brontë's life is the centrepiece of a year of events celebrating the writer's 200th birthday.

Amid The Brave And The Strong is the title of the exhibition through running throughout 2020 at the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

The museum is also putting together a series of events devised with its creative partner for 2020, writer, journalist and broadcaster Samira Ahmed.

Activities through the year include talks, behind-the-scenes events, writing and art workshops, author appearances, musical and comedy performances, a film screening, and children's craft sessions every school holiday.

This year, the 200th anniversary of the birth of the youngest Brontë, marks the end of five years of celebrations of key anniversaries for the four Brontë siblings and their father.

Brontë200 began in 2016 with Jane Eyre writer Charlotte and the filming in Haworth of BBC Brontë biopic To Walk Invisible, and continued with years devoted to Wuthering Heights creator Emily, notorious brother Branwell, and their minister father Patrick.

This year is also the 200th anniversary of the Brontë family's arrival in Haworth, the place where they wrote their famous novels.

Amid The Brave And The Strong was launched earlier this month, when the museum reopened after its winter break, and will run until January 1 next year.

The exhibition explores the life and work of Anne, the least famous of the Brontë sisters, who wrote the novels The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and Agnes Grey.

A spokesman for the Brontë Parsonage Museum said that Anne’s life and work had received much less exploration than those of her sisters.

She said: "Amid The Brave And The Strong will delve into key elements of Anne’s life, from her childhood at the Parsonage, to how her legacy has been shaped by others since her death.

"Throughout her life, ‘dear gentle Anne’ was considered the baby of the Brontë family, but she went on to write one of the first sustained feminist novels in English literature – The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

"Although her work bears the familiar stamps of a classic Brontë novel, Anne’s strong moral beliefs led her to write for purpose as well as pleasure, something which shocked and excited her readers at the time.

"Anne was not to be deterred by criticism however, and right up to her death she had plans and schemes for the future.

"The exhibition tracks the course of her life and gives an insight into Anne’s personality and motivations, which reveal a strong, outspoken and complex genius."

Highlights of the exhibition include Anne’s poignant last letter, some of Anne's original drawings and paintings, and a copy of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall given by Anne to a close friend, which is currently on loan to the museum.

There is also a portrait of Anne by Charlotte, displayed together with the carnelian necklace worn by her in the picture.

A sketching block specifically designed for use in the open air and purchased by Anne in 1843, is on display for the first time after being loaned to the museum.

Pride of place goes to Charlotte’s first ‘little book’, which was written especially for Anne.

The Brontë Society recently paid 600,000 euros for the rare manuscript after Brontë fans around the world pledged money to the literary society’s fighting fund.

The book is one of six hand-written by Jane Eyre author Charlotte when she was just 14, and four of the others are already at the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

The series, entitled The Young Men’s Magazines, measure just 35 x 61mm. The location of the remaining little book has been unknown since around 1930.

Samira Ahmed said she was looking forward to returning to Haworth during 2020 to explore Anne Brontë's life and legacy.

Ahmed will soon unveil programme of talks and events to shine the light on a woman she terms an "oft-overlooked" writer, and highlight still-relevant issues that Anne wrote about more than 170 years ago.

Ahmed said: "Winning a place at Oxford University in 1986, I chose to study the new Women’s Studies option as part of my English Literature degree.

"Alongside reading the exciting African American prose emerging from the likes of Alice Walker and Toni Morrison, I wrote my undergraduate thesis on ‘Property and Possession: The Politics of Marriage in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall’, looking at connections with the eventual 1870 Married Women’s Property Act that granted women some rights 22 years after Anne Brontë’s publication."

Hannah said that at the Parsonage in Haworth, she was mesmerised by the dimly-lit dining room where the sisters walked round the table sharing their stories of their elaborately imagined early fantasy worlds.

She added: "While looking at some of the collection in the Library, I smile to see Anne’s drawing of one of the strong Amazonian women of her imaginary island creation Gondal; standing tall and confident on the rocky seashore, looking out to the horizon and a world of adventure.

"I am still trying to process the impact of Anne Brontë, a young motherless woman with brown curls and a few cherished possessions, on my life and on the long campaign for women’s rights.

"Re-reading The Tenant of Wildfell Hall while preparing for my own employment tribunal for equal pay was an incredibly potent experience. I felt her voice and her sense of indignation speak to me across the centuries."

The Brontë Parsonage Museum has two writers-in-residence for 2020, who will both write new poetry as there research Anne Brontë's life and work, then share their responses digitally later this year.

Toria Garbutt is a spoken word artist from the former mining town of Knottingley in West Yorkshire. She has been a regular support act for Dr John Cooper Clarke.

Her debut album Hot Plastic Moon and her debut collection The Universe and Me were released in 2018, the same year that her first theatre work Northern Souls premiered at the Edinburgh International Festival.

Jasmine Gardosi is a multiple slam champion and Birmingham Poet Laureate finalist.

A previous BBC Arts Young Creative and Poet in Residence for the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, she has performed at Tate Modern and featured on BBC Radio 3’s The Verb and as part of BBC Radio 4’s coverage of the Glastonbury Festival.

The Brontë Society, a registered charity, is one of the oldest literary societies in the English-speaking world and was founded in Bradford in 1893.  Its vision is ‘to bring the Brontës to the world and the world to Yorkshire'.

The Brontë Parsonage Museum was the home of the Brontë family from 1820 to 1861 and was gifted to the Brontë Society in 1928. ¶

The museum houses the world’s largest collection of artefacts and documents associated with the Brontë family and their work, and continues to inspire scholars, writers and artists.

The museum is open every day until March at 10am-5pm, and between April and October at 10am-5.30pm. yes so are to cast tomorrow. Your picture is viewing only because she's not in school's pictures is another's at Silsden Steeton London

Visit bronte.org.uk or call 01535 642323 for further information about talks, events and exhibitions during 2020.