LILY COLE rendered her audience speechless during the Haworth premiere of her latest film.

The awestruck reaction to the screening was a highlight of a weekend of events devoted to Emily Bronte’s 200th birthday.

Social activist and model Cole created the eight-minute film in her role as the Bronte Society’s creative partner during Emily’s bicentennial year.

Filming in Liverpool, she focused on Wuthering Heights anti-hero Heathcliff, a foundling, to explore links between London’s Foundling Hospital and Emily’s novel.

Bronte Parsonage Museum head of communications Rebecca Yorke said the film prompted an excellent discussion afterwards involving both Cole and Foundling Museum director Caro Howell.

Rebecca said: “Balls is a very moving film, short and hard-hitting. While it was playing you couldn’t hear a pin drop.”

Rebecca described the weekend of events, which lasted from Friday to Monday, had been a success.

She added: “It’s been a really brilliant weekend with lots of visitors and new audiences from across the world and our own doorstep.

“There have been younger visitors too, and it’s been really exciting to work with so many different artists.”

Cole’s film can be seen until the end of the year by visitors to both the Bronte Parsonage Museum in Haworth and the Foundling Museum in London.

The Haworth museum is also displaying objects from the Foundling Museum Collection.

Emily’s birthday weekend featured a line-up of artists and specialists from a range of disciplines. The Bronte Society, which runs the museum, wanted to celebrate who it called “one of the most unique and imaginative writers in literature”.

Activities began last Friday with the latest monthly Bronte Treasures talk, offering a unique opportunity for visitors to go beyond the security cord into the Parsonage Library for a close-up viewing of priceless items not on display.

A member of the museum’s curatorial team shared facts and stories about carefully-selected objects, offering a specialist insight into the lives and works of the Bronte family.

I Am Heathcliff, on Friday at 7.30pm, was the launch of a special commission for Emily’s bicentenary year, featuring 16 short stories inspired by Wuthering Heights.

The “beautiful and arresting” tales from some of the stars of modern fiction re-examined a character notorious as a tortured romantic hero.

Kate Mosse, who created I Am Heathcliff, was invited alongside fellow contributors Joanna Cannon, Juno Dawson and Louise Doughty to read from the anthology.

Painting in the Parsonage was held on the Saturday from 11am to 4pm, a drop-in workshop giving visitors a chance to join artist Vic Buta in recreating Branwell’s iconic portrait of his sisters.

Making Your Mark Online, on Saturday, was a workshop for anyone wanting to know more about blogging, vlogging and podcasting. Lucy Powrie, Bronte Society Young Ambassador and acclaimed YouTuber, led participants through the world of online content, with tips for creating content, building a following and developing a brand.

Women, Gothic and Emily, on Saturday at 3.30pm, looked the imposing houses, eerie doubling of names and wandering of unquiet spirits within Wuthering Heights.

The Bronte Society admitted that Emily’s only published novel had cast a looming shadow over Gothic writing right up to the present day.

As a result, novelists Katherine Clements and Beth Underdown were invited discuss the impact of Wuthering Heights on their own writing, and how their work contributes to a continuing Gothic tradition.”

Katherine is a critically-acclaimed novelist whose latest novel, The Coffin Path, is a ghost story set on the West Yorkshire moors.

Beth’s first novel, The Witchfinder’s Sister, last year won the Historical Writer’s Association Debut Crown Award, and was selected for the Richard & Judy Book Club.

This, That and The Other, the headline event on Saturday at 7.30pm, was curated by Melanie Abrahams and featured poets, musicians and wordsmiths offering their personal response to the themes central to Wuthering Heights and pertinent to Emily.

The specially-invited line-up included Patience Agbabi, John Siddique, Jay Bernard, Will Harris and Tobago Crusoe.

Sunday began with Sketching Out Of Doors workshops, and a walk ‘In Emily’s Footsteps’ on the Haworth moors. The walk was led by Michael Stewart, author of Ill Will, a new novel about Heathcliff, and the 14-mile route tied in with the Bronte Stones project.

Poetry at the Parsonage was an open mic session on Sunday afternoon, compered by Mark Connor, a celebrated poet, and Gill Lambert. Lucy Powrie repeated her workshop for under-25s.

SMJ Falconry returned to the Bronte Parsonage Museum on Sunday with their birds of prey, in an event recalling Emily’s love of hawks.

On Monday, Emily’s actual 200th birthday, speakers, journalists and poets gave their personal responses to Emily’s life, poetry and prose, in the event Emily Speaks.

Participants explored Emily’s independence and self-determination in relation to the broader racial, cultural and social histories of the 19th century.

Folk group The Unthanks brought Emily’s weekend to a close with a short performance from their repertoire, and the unveiling of their own Emily-inspired work.

The year of events to celebrate Emily’s 200th anniversary will continue on Tuesday, August 7 with 11.30am and 2pm talks entitled Rebels and Angels, focusing on Emily’s Wuthering Heights heroine, Catherine Earnshaw, described as one of the most controversial women in literature.

The Bronte Parsonage Museum will celebrate its own 90th birthday on Saturday, August 4, when local people are invited to join staff for a celebration.

Organisers want to recreate a photograph taken when the museum first opened in August 4, 1928, when crowds packed the cobbled street outside the Parsonage.

The first 90 visitors through the door on Saturday from 10am will pay what they would have paid in 1928, just 6p.

Visit bronte.org.uk/whats-on or call 01535 640192 for further details of all the events.