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Measured by surface area, the little book of poems now back in Haworth is the most expensive book in the world. But there’s much more to its value than moneyLast week one of Charlotte Brontë’s “little books” finally made it home to where it was written, the Parsonage at Haworth. It’s a tiny pamphlet, 10cm by 6cm, handmade and handwritten by Charlotte when she was 13.It’s hard to imagine anything more fragile. It was lost for a century, last seen in 1916 at auction in New York where it sold for $520. I had the honour of trying (and failing) to read it a few days ago, at a reception held for it at Maggs Bros, the antiquarian booksellers. I peered at the minuscule (two point maybe?) faded brown handwriting, marvelling at how £1m has been raised to buy this young girl’s work and send it back to where she made it. Continue reading...