Withering Sights: Brontes’ Home May Become Apartments

THORNTON, England — The birthplace of the Bronte sisters, among the most famous novelists in the English language, may be turned into apartments, the Times of London reported today.

The newspaper said the property comprising the parsonage where Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte were born, about 150 miles northeast of London, is for sale.

The Town Council and the Bronte Society both decided not to buy it for conversion into a museum, the newspaper said.

The agent for the property’s owners told the newspaper that only developers, who want to turn the $140,000 building into apartments, expressed interest in purchasing the property.

The property was placed on the market last month by its owners, who lived there for 46 years and hoped it would be preserved.

Charlotte, author of “Jane Eyre,” Emily, who wrote “Wuthering Heights,” and Anne, author of a lesser-known novel, were born there.

The sisters’ parents lived in the Thornton parsonage between 1815 and 1820 before they moved to nearby Haworth.

A local arts official told the newspaper that the municipal government had decided it could not justify buying the property.