.
. Meantime, my younger sister quietly produced some of her own
compositions, intimating that since Emily's had given me pleasure, I
might like to look at hers. I could not but be a partial judge, yet I
thought that these verses too had a sweet sincere pathos of their own.
We had very early cherished the dream of one day being authors. We
agreed to arrange a small selection of our poems, and, if possible,
get them printed. Averse to personal publicity, we veiled our own
names under those of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell; the ambiguous
choice being dictated by a sort of conscientious scruple at assuming
Christian names, positively masculine, while we did not like to
declare ourselves women, because--without at the time suspecting that
our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called 'feminine,' we
had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on
with prejudice; we noticed how critics sometimes use for their
chastisement the weapon of personality, and for their reward, a
flattery, which is not true praise. The bringing out of our little
book was hard work. As was to be expected, neither we nor our poems
were at all wanted; but for this we had been prepared at the outset;
though inexperienced ourselves, we had read the experience of others.
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