BARD IN THE BOTANICS

Jane Eyre gets a Highland makeover as Bronte classic crosses border but does it work?

Jane Eyre, Botanic Garden, Glasgow, Four stars: A suitably dreich Botanic Gardens played host on Tuesday night to Jennifer Dick’s brand new adaptation of Charlotte Bronte’s 1847 proto feminist classic, which opens this year’s largely non-Shakespearian Bard in the Botanics summer season. Judging by the line-up, the very current focus this year is on strong women making their way in the world in the face of overriding misogyny. With Dick resetting the action of Bronte’s taboo busting nineteenth century novel from the grim north of England to even bleaker Scottish soil, little orphan Jane is buffeted from pillar to post as she embarks on a gradual getting of wisdom. Until, that is, she meets Mr Rochester, a posh boy himbo with a secret in the attic that comes back to haunt him.