THE BBC will this Saturday show a new documentary about how the Brontë sisters came to write their novels.

Being The Brontes will be screened at 9pm on BBC2 and features an in-depth visit to Haworth by three keen Brontë enthusiasts.

Journalist and broadcaster Martha Kearney, novelist Helen Oyeyemi and columnist and author Lucy Mangan travelled to the Brontë Parsonage Museum, the home of the Brontë sisters, to discover the stories behind their classic novels Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey.

Just two years before these works were published, prospects for the three unmarried sisters were looking bleak. Their brother was battling an alcohol-fuelled breakdown, Charlotte was hopelessly in love with a married man and their father was going blind.

But by 1848 they were a literary sensation. How was it that Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë managed such a sudden and miraculous creative achievement, in the face of adversity?

With help from a range of experts, each presenter explored one of the Brontës in fascinating detail

By re-living the sisters’ daily routines, visiting the key places in their world, studying their private letters and exploring their interactions with each other, they discovered what it was that served as their sources of inspiration.