I’VE MENTIONED in previous columns that we’re really excited about working with Frank Cottrell-Boyce in the second part of the year.

I’m delighted that I can finally announce to the world what it is that Frank will be doing.

Frank has devised an innovative installation that will be sited in the Parsonage Cellar – a space not usually visited by daily visitors.

When Patrick Bronte was 70 years old, having seen his wife and two of his children die, he travelled to Manchester for a cataract operation.

After the surgery, he lay still in a darkened room for weeks to heal, being cared for by Charlotte.

It was at this time that she began to write Jane Eyre. Frank has chosen to focus on this aspect of Patrick’s experience through an installation that explores Patrick’s memories and imagination as he recovered from his cataract operation.

The installation is called How My Light is Spent and invites visitors to enter the Parsonage Cellar to share Patrick’s experience of darkness, hear the memories he held dear and see the dreams and visions he shared with Charlotte.

The immersive installation combines light and sound to create what we hope will be a memorable and moving experience for people of all ages.

The installation opens on July 13 and is free with admission to the museum, so if you want to try something a little different, do come along in the summer.

Also new in July is an exhibition of photography by Helen Burrow. The exhibition explores the places that shaped the lives of the Brontes.

Helen’s evocative images are accompanied by selected writing about and by this creative family.

As with the installation, the exhibition is free with admission, as is our Tuesday talk on July 2 at 2pm, which focuses on Patrick’s aspirations to become a writer. The talk will look at his poetry, fiction and non-fiction and ask the question… was he any good?

Our Parsonage Unwrapped evening on Friday 28 June also focuses on Patrick the writer – specifically his poetry.

We’re delighted to welcome a guest speaker for this month’s Parsonage Unwrapped: Dr Simon Avery from the University of Westminster, who will look at Patrick’s volumes of verse and consider what his poems reveal about his social conscience, his relationship with his Irish background, and his sense of the importance of literature in the turbulent political environment of the early 19th century.

Tickets cost £22.50/£20 and are available from bronte.org.uk/whats-on or call 01535 640192.

But before we get to all the above events and experiences, we have Fathers’ Day on Sunday June 16, and we couldn’t not mark Fathers’ Day in the year we’re celebrating the father of the Brontes!

Dads will get into the museum on Fathers’ Day for £5, providing they have a child (of any age!) with them, and can enjoy 10% off in the shop.

So if anyone is stuck for an idea as to what to do on Fathers’ Day, bring Dad to the museum, where he can find out more about Patrick Bronte, and his long, fascinating life.