'I fear you will burn my present letter on recognising the handwriting':1 The Self-Fashioning of Patrick Branwell Bronte in his Epistolary Writing

During the period 1845-48 Patrick Branwell Bronte can be seen using his skills as a writer to fashion multiple personas which enabled him to disguise the coarse nature of his reality, and deny responsibility for his numerous failures. Branwell adopted this method of self-presentation in his epistolary writing, and manipulated the form in order to present the personas which assisted in his denial. The coarseness of Branwell's life broke forth into his correspondence and, in his state of desperation, he adopted the alter egos of Henry Hastings and Northangerland, the fictitious representations of his coarseness. The letters of Branwell are a greatly overlooked source. Yet, he clearly adopted the creative techniques he honed in his juvenilia and poetry for his epistolary writing. The consideration of Branwell's letters is essential in assisting our understanding of him as a writer.