These Books Made Me

Anne of Green Gables Part 2

• Prince George's County Memorial Library System • Season 3 • Episode 9

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We're back with part 2 of Anne of Green Gables, because we, like Anne, can talk the hind leg off a mule. Anne's a capital R Romantic and obsessed with beauty. She sees it everywhere from the Lake of Shining Waters to the fashion of the day. Speaking of the fashion a la mode, we delve a little deeper into the trends and beauty standards of Anne's (and Lucy Maud Montgomery's) time. Once again we ponder whether the 1985 Sullivan rendition might have improved the story a bit by abandoning the bank failure storyline and having (spoiler) Matthew die in the harness as it were. We're all a little traumatized by film Matthew's death and at least one of us is still heartbroken over Jonathan Crombie's death. All of us are quite torn about which adult in Anne's life would make the best adoptive parent and we chat with some library users about their own adventures with runaway imaginations. We learn which character from the book we each are too. Will this quiz be a perfect graveyard of buried hopes?

These Books Made Me is a podcast about the literary heroines who shaped us and is a product of the Prince George's County Memorial Library System podcast network. Stay in touch with us via Twitter @PGCMLS with #TheseBooksMadeMe or by email at TheseBooksMadeMe@pgcmls.info. For recommended readalikes and deep dives into topics related to each episode, visit our blog at https://pgcmls.medium.com/.

We cover a lot of ground in this episode and used some books and articles as jumping off points. Here’s a brief list of some of them if you want to do your own further research:

Don't internalize beauty norms, Anne!  https://misfortuneofknowing.wordpress.com/2014/02/27/dear-anne-shirley-redheads-can-wear-pink-2/

She's always a woman to me... https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=gsw_pub

Passing that Bechdel test with flying colors: https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1522&context=theses

Darlene:

Hi, I'm Darlene.

Heather:

I'm Heather.

Hannah:

I'm Hannah.

Darlene:

And this is our podcast These Books Made Me. Today we're gonna be talking about Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery. Friendly warning. As always, this podcast contains spoilers. If you don't yet know who gets drunk on what she thinks is raspberry cordial, proceed with caution. We have a special guest this week. Could you introduce yourself?

Erica:

Hi, I'm Erica.

Heather:

So as we mentioned last time we had way too much to say about Anne of Green Gables for one episode. So we're resuming our discussion. If you haven't listened to part one, we are now in the depths of despair and irons have entered our souls. We now return to Anne of Green Gables with the short biographical sketch of author Lucy Maud Montgomery.

Hannah:

The author of the Anne books, Lucy Maud Montgomery, who went by Maud, was born on November 30th, 1874 in Clifton, which is now called New England, Prince Edward Island, Canada to parents Clara and Hugh Montgomery, Clara died of tuberculosis before her daughter had reached the age of two and Hugh sent her to be raised by her grandparents, Alexander and Lucy Woolner McNeil, while he left and started a new family in Prince Albert. Montgomery's grandparents were strict and her childhood was not a happy one. Like her character Anne, she often retreated into a private fantasy world, taking refuge in her imagination and becoming an avid reader of such authors as Charles Dickens, Lord Byron and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Montgomery resolved early on in life to become a writer and in young adulthood began submitting and getting short pieces of writing published. Her first work was published when she was an adolescent, in a local Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island paper called The Daily Patriot. Montgomery left her home with her grandparents around this time and lived with her father and his new family for about a year, but would return to Prince Edward Island to continue her education there. From 1893 to 1894, she completed coursework at Prince of Wales College and applied for her teaching license. Montgomery had a short teaching career on the island and taught at three different schools. She took a hiatus from teaching(1895 to 1896) to study English literature at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She would quit teaching and return to Cavendish after her grandfather's death in 1898, to take care of her grandmother. Montgomery would remain with her in Cavendish and care for her until her grandmother's death in 1911. While caring for her, she sent off many pieces of writing to magazines and began to earn a living through her work. In 1908, Montgomery would publish her first and most famous novel, Anne of Green Gables. It was rejected multiple times and it took several years for her to find a publisher, Montgomery married Ewen Macdonald, a reverend, and moved with him to Leaksdale, Ontario in 1911. They would have three sons together, one stillborn. Macdonald and Montgomery moved to Toronto in 1935 and lived there until Montgomery's death on April 24th, 1942. She would be buried in a cemetery on Prince Edward Island.

Heather:

In part one we discussed Anne's red hair and its impact on her life. Anne's ideas about beauty play a major role in the book. Now we want to dive a little deeper into the beauty standards of the time and their impact on the novel nd on Anne

Anne:

A red-haired person cannot play the Lily Maid.

Diana:

Your complection is just as fair

Rachel Lynde:

Lawful heart. Her hair's as red as carrots.

Gilbert:

Carrots

Diana:

In three years. I'm gonna wear my hair up

Marilla:

What have you done to your hair? Grown so tall and stylish.

Diana:

She's only 17 and I think she looks ridiculous.

Gilbert:

Carrot.

Diana:

I'm going to wait until I'm 18.

Matthew:

Puffed sleeves.

Anne:

Marilla, look at the puffs. If I were very beautiful and had nut brown hair. Would you keep me?

Gilbert:

Carrots

Darlene:

A lot of the perspective that we get about people and beauty is through Ann's eyes. And so the fact that she pinpoints why she thinks other people are pretty, Anne already has like a really bad perception of herself. But you know, through the text we find that, I forget how they phrase it, but like plumper bodies are better and she thinks that women with like brown or black hair are more beautiful.

Anne:

If I were very beautiful and had nut brown hair, would you keep me?

Hannah:

Yeah, I think maybe we should just, maybe we should describe a little the beauty standards that are, we see in the book and also in the research that we did. Like Diana is described, sort of one, of the ideals, like she has raven black hair and I think she is described as having like rosy cheeks and a pale complexion. And how did they describe her physically? I'm trying to remember. But she's described as not skinny and I think that was what the, when we looked into the beauty standards, the ideal of the time was I feel like they, they were trying to create what the corset, an hourglass, the hourglass was sort of the ideal, but they, a skinny body was such as Annes' was not held up as an ideal. Although as I was doing, looking into this, you kind of go back earlier into the 1800s and I'm kind of on tentative ground here cuz I'm I didn't look this super deeply. Cause I was trying to really focus on this time period that late 1800s where the book is set, but there was kind of that Victorian consumptive ideal of the very like thin, pale, wasting away romantically. And I kind of wonder in a way if, how Anne of is described as in trying to kind of evoke that in kind of of a throwback way a little bit, this is my possibly completely wrong theory, evoke with how she describes Anne a little bit.

Darlene:

Well, it has to come from somewhere, right? Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. So I mean, it could be that, it could be that she was like trying to evoke I guess those sort of like beauty standards. Was there a difference between when Anne was written and the time place it took in? Cause I thought that there was a little bit, right? Like wasn't it that Anne takes place in the 1870s

Hannah:

Took place in, I believe the 1880s, which was I think around the time L.M. Montgomery was growing up,

Darlene:

Growing up. Okay.

Hannah:

She wrote Anne of Green Gables in 1905. It was published a few years later in 1908, but she said it back right to I think her, her sort of girlhood. Um, although the, I think they said the series a little later in the early, um, 20th century. But the book is set, you know, like 1880s.

Darlene:

Okay. And as a kind of aside, I wonder what what the author looked like because it kind of is like a self-insert a little bit, I mean, and the fact that she's in Prince Edward Island and I think she grew up in a really like similar place. Yeah. I just, I I guess and you know, she didn't have the best home life. Granted Anne is like an orphan and she did have her grandparents, uh, the author, but just< l augh>.

Hannah:

I mean,

Darlene:

It almost, and that was something like, that was, I don't know, like, like insecurities that she dealt with. Maybe not the red hair unless she was redheaded. No, I didn't actually look her up

Hannah:

< laugh>. That's a really good point. I wonder what she looked like. I didn't think to, I might have seen a picture or two in passing, but they, they were black and white.

Darlene:

Mm.

Hannah:

It almost feels like Anne could have written this book as an adult a little bit, doesn't it?

Darlene:

Mm-hmm. Yeah,< l augh>. I mean, it kind of feels that way. And II think that even in your author bio you kind of talked about how she kind of managed the sort of sad family life that she had through the power of like her own imagination and then that made her want to be a writer. The imagination is actually something that factors like prevalently in this book and sort of like the beauties of, and the dangers of an overactive imagination. Mm-hmm.. It is what gets Anne into a lot of trouble. But yeah. Did, was there anything like different about it kind of on this reread, because it is a reread from you guys?

Erica:

One of the things that, that I thought about for the, for the first time vis-a-vis imagination is we know that Anne's parents died when she was like three months old. So she, like, she does not have any memory of them. And she went immediately to, um, a place that did not want her. And that, you know, had she was being brought up to as, as soon as she was old enough to hold a child smaller than herself, she was probably meant to do that. And something that that occurred to me was like the fact that this imagination, that this vivid imagination flourished even under these terrible conditions, the, it's very nature versus nurture. It must just be part, this has gotta be part of her nature because she was not nurtured into having an imagination. She.

Darlene:

Right.

Erica:

She had to cultivate it herself in the terms of a life filled with drudgery and loneliness and being maltreated. And she's like the fact that, that her, her outlook is so cheerful and in the, the midst of these incredibly bleak circumstances is really quite extraordinary. Um, and not really com- that part is not really commented upon just that that she has this crazy imagination. Why, how it's fas- it, that's fascinating to think about for me because, uh, that had not occurred to me until this time. It's like, where did this imagination come from? It's really something.

Darlene:

Yeah. I took it as like a coping mechanism.

Heather:

Agree

Darlene:

I mean, that's how I read it. Um, because it almost felt like anything, like anytime something bad happened to her, she would like reinterpret it in a way that it was something a little more positive.

Heather:

I do think Erica's point is valid though, because I think about as a child, the things that build your imagination.

Darlene:

Mm-hmm.

Heather:

it's people telling you stories, it's people interacting with you. It's seeing and experiencing different things that make you and had none of that. So like, yes, it's a coping mechanism, but there is the, like how did she even develop this with all of the neglect she had? I mean, I guess she did get some schooling early from the first placement, so she had some little exposure to reading and books I suppose, and some other people. But yeah, there was nothing to nurture that at all. And for it to be as rich as it is for her. Now, I, I guess we could also say like, is it a good coping mechanism to develop window friends, you know, in the glass, like to sort of pour yourself into these imagined friends, to the degree that they really feel real,

Movie Voice:

you can't handle the truth!

Heather:

Because when Marilla tells her like, you need to forget about Katie Morris, your window friend. And, and the echo friend Anne's like, well, I, I can't, that would hurt them for me to give them up completely. And then we don't really hear about them again cuz she doesn't need them anymore. But there is that question of like, man, does she really think these, her reflection is real? You know, there, there's, there's something there where it's like, well maybe that's not the most healthy coping mechanism. Like, she's almost sort of dissociated, which I didn't on reread for Me too. I didn't quite remember that part as, wait, how did this happen? And was that a good thing that happened?. But yes, I mean, I think certainly the other piece of it with just sort of her runaway imagination leading into mishaps and stuff, I, I thought more about like how many books I loved after this book that really used that same device. You know, Emily's Runaway Imagination being one that came to mind. I think that's Beverly Cleary, right?

Erica:

I think so?

Heather:

But that was one where it's like, well clearly that, you know, she must have read this as a girl. And I think we've seen that with some of the other books where it's like, oh, this other book we talked about, or this other book that we read must have, that must have really taken some inspiration from this setup. And you know, I mean it certainly makes its way into other books to like the whole idea of Peter Pan or Alice in Wonderland. I think there's strong elements of falling into your imagination or engaging with a part of yourself via imagination really strongly.

Hannah:

Someone must have read her a book of poetry at some point.

Darlene:

Yeah. She, she often talked about her like extreme love of poetry and how like musical things sounded, or just like the wording or the phrasing of something there.

Anne:

Oh she weaves by night and day, a magic web with colors gay.

Darlene:

Which is really interesting cuz if she didn't have like, formal education for her to like still pick up on that, like, she would always say like, oh, I just love how that phrase sounds. And, and then she would just take it for her own. Towards the beginning she says like, my life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes.

Anne:

Depths of despair.

Darlene:

And she was like, I read that somewhere and it just sounded so, like, it sounded so apt, so beautiful. And so I just use it. Now speaking of sort of like an overactive imagination though, I think that it was really interesting that she then ends up being with like Marilla and Matthew, Matthew being like really quiet and supportive, but Marilla being very like, pragmatic

Marilla:

20 pounds of brown sugar.

Darlene:

and I don't know, maybe kind of like kind of toning down sort of that imagination because she like helps her recognize how how wild her imagination and like how it gets away from her.

Heather:

It goes in both directions because Marilla and Matthew's kind practicality tempers some of Anne's flights of imagination that maybe aren't the most healthy. But Diana's Aunt Josephine, Mrs. Barry, the formidable Mrs. Barry comments, you know, when Anne is visiting her, it makes her feel younger.

Darlene:

That's true.

Heather:

This is the first person she's engaged with in a long time who sparked something in her that reminds her of a time where there were things that she imagined and that she felt romantically about. You know, it, it takes her out of herself and that's part of why she enjoys Anne's company so much. So I think it's a, it's an argument from Montgomery throughout the book for the middle path, right? To hold onto those parts of your imagination that are part of the what makes you you and, and that allow you to sort of have a beautiful experience of life, but also you need to be able to function as well. Right. Um, yeah.

Darlene:

And it kind of like married itself in a really nice way at the end when she's thinking about how, you know, Matthew's passed away and she decides that she's gonna forego going to college, uh, to stay with Marilla and she talks about like bend the path. And so she's like visualizing it as like bend the path, but she's saying it's not really what I had imagined for myself. I had kind of started to imagine like so many possibilities and so many other things, but then this happened. And rather than say that she's like now stuck doing something, she's just like, oh, this is not how I had imagined it, but it's something new and maybe it'll be like its own adventure. And so she kind of like reframes, you know, something stopping her from her initial plans or like redirecting her initial plans as something positive rather than thinking of it as something negative. Montgomery kind of comes back around to, to that middle path I guess that you were saying, Heather, to kind of say that that's something that you really should still take with you. And I think that that's really what makes her so interesting, right? The fact that like, she would call someone, her bosom friend and she talks a lot about kindred spirits and do you guys think that this book is really in itself a work of romanticism?

Heather:

Yes. Yes. I, I think definitely. I mean the book itself is an exploration of beauty and the facets of beauty and I think it is an elegy of sorts to beauty of landscapes, beauty of character, beauty of human beings, the beauty of knowledge. And it certainly uses a lot of romantic tropes, especially as you get deeper into the series. I know there's the little funny like nod from Diana who like keeps killing off of all of her characters in the writing club< laugh> because she doesn't know what to do with them.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

< laugh>. But at the same time, I thought that was a little tongue in cheek of Montgomery because she sort of does the same thing. Like she kills off Matthew when he stops being a useful plot device because then his death is a useful lens to view grief through and to, to move the plot along in future books against spoilers. Gilbert gets typhoid after Anne has had all of these. Oh, it would be so romantic to like lose your hair in a fever instead of dyeing it green and like these ideas of romanticism that there's like real beauty and tragedy, um, keeps coming through. But I mean, I think it is, it is about, you know, really captures the romantic notion of the breadth of human experience being deeply felt as something you should aspire to, right? Like that is sort of the aspirational quality of the book is engage with that part of yourself that is melancholy when you're feeling sad. That is awestruck when you see the beautiful trees. To really acknowledge those pieces of yourself is something worth doing and important. And Anne is the protagonist for a reason. So I think Montgomery chose her as a model to promote her own ideas of romanticism and that was a choice, right? I don't think it's an accident that Anne is the person we're supposed to fall in love with in these books and view as sort of a model for how to experience the world.

Darlene:

Mm-hmm.. And it kind of reminded me of the idea in social media to like romanticize your life. And I was like, if there's any character that should be the ambassador of romanticizing your life, it is Anne Shirley. Yes.

Hannah:

Yeah, I definitely agree that it's a capital R romantic work flashing back to my, um, college English literature class where we defined the element of romantic literature and I'm blanking on most of, but there's that sense sort of transcendent beauty in nature that, you know, definitely we see in this. But I think also what Montgomery does here that kind of makes it fun is she contrast that sort of those romantic elements with the mundane and we kind of get humor out of that. Like what happens when,

Heather:

When you take it too far< laugh>.

:

Yes. You're, you're the lady of Shalott, but your boat springs a leak

Darlene:

< laugh>. Yeah.

Hannah:

And you sink in the creek and um,

Heather:

Which is not particularly romantic except then Gilbert shows up in his.

Hannah:

Yes.

Heather:

Dinghy

Gilbert:

Anne Shirley, what the heck are you doing

Anne:

Fishing for lake trout

Heather:

And rescues you? Which is completely romantic. So it's, yeah, the inversion is funny.

Hannah:

It's romantic. It's not romantic. Oh, which romantic again,

Darlene:

I forgot who fell out of a boat. And then she was like, I forgot. Someone was like, oh, I hope they don't drown. Is it Jane? Yeah. And then she was like, oh, I wish I had done that. And then, you know, that would be so romantic.< laugh>.

Heather:

Yeah.

Darlene:

I was like, to drown?

Hannah:

Foreshadowing.

Heather:

Well I I think it's really funny that you bring up the like, romanticize your life and social media. I mean that would be the perfect assignment for this book as a modern

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

Like required read for kids is make Anne's social media< l augh>, you know, like.

Hannah:

Yes.

Heather:

What would Anne's Instagram look like? What would Anne's TikTok be? It would be amazing.

Darlene:

Yeah. It would be.

Heather:

Yes. It was so much drama.

Darlene:

<laugh>.

Heather:

like somebody< l augh>.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

It didn't

Darlene:

Yeah. One of my notes while reading this book is like, you can always count on Anne to add in her 2 cents.

Heather:

Absolutely.

Darlene:

So of course, yeah, she would definitely have social media and she would always be commenting on something. Um, but yeah, I feel like she would also be just very aesthetic cuz she, she looks for those things, like it just comes naturally to her. She'll be in a place and she'll just be like, this is beautiful and then will describe it in the most poetic language.

Heather:

Yes. And yes, she would lean hard into like a cottage core lifestyle or something.

Darlene:

Oh for sure.< laugh>.

Heather:

But yeah, I mean, everything about Anne, it fits with like a Keats or a Shelley or like, it's very much the language is that kind of language that she uses. Like.

Darlene:

Yeah,

Heather:

Well I mean, and Tennyson, he comes up in the book like that's, that is the Lady of the Shalott that they're trying to replicate and yeah, she, she clearly just draws so heavily from the romantics capital R as like inspiration for what she's doing. Uh, it's, it's very charming. And I think, yeah, I mean I think that, again, the book itself is a Romantic work and I, I I get the sense that Montgomery would very much argue for that as a world philosophy. Like I think she would be very in keeping with sort of a Rousseauean outlook on< laugh> on how to live your life. You know, I think it, I think it works very well in that sense. And it's nice because we read a lot of children's books that are very melodramatic and they can, they can tip hard into being like too saccharine and I don't feel like this book does that. Like I legit cried when Matthew went and bought the dress material. Like it was like, he just was trying so hard, it was so earnest and it works really well. I legit cry when he dies every time. Like, yes, I guess maybe those things are a little bit like over rock, but for me they don't, they don't tip over that edge to where it feels false in any way. I don't know if it worked for you guys, but

Hannah:

Yeah, I think we all, I mean, Matthew's kind of the archetype of like the really sweet, awkward, shy person. I think we all know a Matthew and you know, I mean he doesn't feel saccharine the fact that he loves Anne and he's, he doesn't really understand fashion and he doesn't want to talk to the person at the store about a dress. But he's trying so hard cuz he knows that it will, it will make her smile. Like, and I, I don't think that it's silly at all to find those, uh, you know, to find those very moving and you know, him trying to do something kind for Anne and then, you know, his death at the end. It's, it's very sad.

Darlene:

It's I know and it's like foreshadowed too. Sorry.

Erica:

No, go ahead.

Darlene:

No, I was just gonna say it's like foreshadowed too. So when it was like coming, it was already trying to tell you that he had heart problems and I was like, no, because again, I've never read it and I've never like watched an adaptation of it. So I didn't know for sure that his death was coming, but once it was like starting to be foreshadowed, I was like, no, I'm gonna be in for some pain.

Erica:

Yeah. It's reading it now, like on whatever iteration I'm on, it gets to, you know, when, you know when Marilla's losing her eyesight and Matthew's getting up there and he's having trouble doing all the farm work and Anne's like, boy, I I really wish I'd been that boy that you asked for. And he's like, I'd rather have you than a hundred boys. And it wasn't a boy that won the Avery scholarship. That's what's, because I know what's coming. I, that's when I start to get, you know, my start to come apart a a little bit. And then of course it gets to the portion of the book like that I think Stephen King played particular attention to, because Stephen King loves to do the, and it would be the last time she would ever feel joy or happiness to< laugh>. It's just, it's so like, it's five-shadowing, it's just, it's so like, well, something big's coming up and then it's the chapter, the name of the chapter is the Reaper Whose Name is Death. And it's like, okay, calm down Montgomery, we, we get it, you know, and, and Rachel like, sh- Rachel like checks his pulse or something and be, and she looks at Matthew's face and like, and there beheld the seal of the great presence. And I'm like, all right< laugh>, come on everybody. Yeah. And like that, that tips the scales for me a little it. Like I, it's the saddest part of the book and it's just those, those two details for me are, are something that pulls me out of it, which actually kind of helps because I don't want to think about this lovely man dying, but like<laugh>, it's, I'm sorry I shouldn't find it funny, but

Darlene:

I do. No, I, yeah, I found it sad, but I was also mad, like I was mad when the bank thing started coming up and then that, that ended up being what caused him shock. And I was like, because they had said like, shouldn't you maybe consider moving your money? And he says, you know, like, no, it's fine. Oh

Erica:

Yeah, the detail comes up like five pages before he dies. Like that's the first time we hear about the bank and we're like, what now?

Darlene:

Yeah. And then when they said what was on the like newspaper that may have caused him shock, I was like immediately taken out of grief and was, well maybe not, but immediately taken out of like sadness and then I was like angry

Heather:

< laugh>. Yeah. That did feel a little bit clipped I think.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

It, it, especially in comparison to like Marilla's vision loss is foreshadowed from so early in the book. She's already getting the headaches and stuff.

:

Mm- hmm.

Heather:

So it did, yeah. Again, going back to Diana killing off characters cuz she wasn't quite sure what to do with them.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

Like I think she knew she needed him to die, but maybe it was like, well I need a mechanism to cause that because they, his heart is a concern throughout.

Darlene:

Mm- hmm.

Heather:

So that's foreshadowed. But it was like the bank thing did feel a little bit sketchy.

Darlene:

Mm- hmm.

Heather:

And like, I, I think that's one where the film made an improvement on the book as well because.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

They leave the bank thing out completely and you know, what kills him is he's been doing all of the fieldwork because they didn't get a boy,

Anne:

If I've been the boy you sent for, I could have spared you in so many ways.

Matthew:

I never wanted, boy I only wanted you for the first day. Don't ever change. I love my little girl. I'm so proud of my little girl

Heather:

You know, fitting full circle, kind of. He made a choice and the choice has, you know, very sad outcome. Um, and Anne comments on it in the film, right? She says something when he's lying in the grass and she's holding him,

Darlene:

Right? Yeah. And she said

Heather:

That like, if I had only been the boy that you sent for something and, and that's when they use that line from the book where he says like, I didn't want anybody but you kind of thing?

Darlene:

Yeah. And he says like, I'm proud of my girl

Heather:

< laugh>. Yeah, I know.

Darlene:

So sad. I'm about to cry again.

Heather:

In the movie Richard F arnsworth, that man has been in so many sad movies,

Darlene:

< laugh>,

Heather:

That that guy can just do a make you cry scene like nobody's business< laugh>. Um, but I do think like that was one of the things in the film I think worked a little better cuz the bank thing was a little, it was too quick and then it was a little too convenient.

Darlene:

Mm-hmm.

Erica:

Um, one of the things that, that, again, that struck me for the first time on this read, um, kind of, sort of apropos to what we're talking about is that, uh, most of like the first Anne's life from ages 11 to 13ish, maybe 13 or 14 are most of the book. And then like a page later, she is described as being much more serious, talking a whole lot less.

Darlene:

Mm- hmm.

Erica:

like the end of the book feels kind of rushed to me. Like they want her to grow up and it, it's almost as though, I don't know, maybe Montgomery didn't know that she was going to write sequels, you know?

Darlene:

Yeah.

Erica:

Because it feels sped up like, well I want to have her in a place where she's old enough to have these things decided and to make up with Gilbert and for Matthew to croak and for everything and for Marilla to go blind and for everything to just happen all at once.< laugh>.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Erica:

It just feels a little bit sped up. Like I'm not necessarily in a bad way because she can't, obviously if, if she spends as much time, uh, from ages 14 to 16 as she did from 11 to 13, the book is a thousand pages long, which would be fine for me, but I get, you know, it's just like, well I gotta sell this manuscript. U m, it, it does that. Did anyone else get that?

Darlene:

No, yeah, I did feel that way. And I mean Hannah did say that it took her a while to get it published and so yeah, I don't think she had any, like, I don't think she thought that she would be writing a series. And I think that also took me by surprise when I was reading it because I knew it was a series. So as I was reading this, I didn't come into it thinking that it would go through so much of her life. I thought maybe she would stay 11, 12 for most of this first book. And then the series is, you know, her growing up, um, you know, then 13 and then maybe 14. Uh, so as things were happening and then she, you know, then she was 14 and then um, it did say that she like got more serious. Like I noted all that and I was just like, that's so interesting that she would include so much in the first book. Like, what is the rest of the series? Like then you know what, what like more could happen in the rest of the series. So yeah, it did feel rushed at the end to me and I just felt like it was just one thing happening after another.< laugh>

Erica:

Each episode we are heading into the stacks and talking to you, well not you, but people like you right here in the stacks today. We want to know, has your imagination ever run away with you?

Person in the Stacks 1:

It happened like multiple times. The first time I let it happen, I was thinking about like how my dream life was gonna be if I was like, I don't know when I grew up or whatever. Like I would move out at 18, get a place in Paris and dream about like, I don't know, living in like a big apartment with a balcony and plants and stuff and living more like, um, living off of my money from a bakery that I make. Like,

Person in the Stacks 2:

Um, one time like when I was younger I really wanted to be an engineer so, um, I would dream up like really futuristic ideas and like floating buses, like school buses cuz that would like, it would make my school bus come faster. So, uh, that's like one instance of my imagination running away from me.

Person in the Stacks 3:

That's basically how I made it through elementary school<laugh>. Cause my imagination was running away with me. So yeah, I guess I have let my imagination run away with me.

Heather:

Anything specific or just daydreaming?

Person in the Stacks 3:

Probably like, I created stories in my mind of like different like maybe characters from TV shows and kind of like put them in different situations. I guess now would be called like fanfiction.

Heather:

uhhuh.

Person in the Stacks 3:

and like making up whole different stories and plotlines and things like that. So like kind o f that idea.

Person in the Stacks 4:

Yeah, I'm pretty sure once at school, um, I was like in class, I was in my third[indistinct] I'm pretty sure. And I was just thinking about like being at home and I kind of got my phone out and started like acting like I was at home and I got in trouble.

Heather:

That's a bummer but relatable< laugh>.

Person in the Stacks 5:

What do you like to imagine it's a[indistinct] mess?

Person in the Stacks 6:

I don't think my imagination's ever run away with me. I'm a grownup< laugh>. That's why we come and read.

Person in the Stacks 7:

One. I got, I did get in trouble before but it wasn't in real trouble ecause I was daydreaming about something bad happening and I made it seem too real and I started crying because it, something happened to my family and then I didn't get in trouble but I just got asked so many questions.

Person in the Stacks 8:

Well I was daydreaming one time about my sister while we was outside and, and I was scared she would go get kidnapped so instead, so I kept her beside me the whole time cause I thought it was like a sign or something cuz otherwise my imagination gets too close.

Hannah:

We're gonna take a, a quiz. Which Anne of Green Gable's character are you? The um, answers are Anne, Marilla Gilbert or Diana

Darlene:

Seeing Gilbert reminds me of that one article that was saying that that was the one thing they hated about like every adaptation beforehand. Like he was just like a paper thin character< laugh>. It's like, how can you really love Gilbert? Cuz there wasn't really much to him aside from being a plot device sort of. Um, but I'm gonna say mine as Anne.

Hannah:

Yeah, me too. It's the easy answer. But

Erica:

I'm gonna go with Marilla out of these four. Probably Marilla

Heather:

I will also go with Marilla though I was tempted by Gilbert, but I think that that's more due to the later books. And also Jonathan Crombie's depiction in the series with Megan Follows. Ugh, my heart.

Gilbert:

Anne Shirley. What the heck are you doing?

Heather:

< laugh>? When he passed away relatively recently, like I cried. I was just, he was Gilbert for me and he portrayed that character so beautifully. But I'll go with Marilla for this.

Darlene:

Okay.

Hannah:

All right. Question number two. Which form of the Anne of Green Gables remake do you like the most? The musicals. The original book is the best. The TV shows or the movies.

Darlene:

That's interesting cuz it's like what TV shows and which movies.

Hannah:

Yeah, it's not clearly defined I think. Hmm. Because it, it is like the, the movies were sort of like releases a mini-series so you could argue that there are movies or series.

Heather:

Yeah. Which one is it? Because mine is definitely the eighties version.

Hannah:

Same.

Heather:

But I don't know if that's counted as a TV show. I'm gonna call it a movie and assume that that's what they're counting it as.

Hannah:

Yeah, me too.

Erica:

Unsurprisingly I am going with the book.

Darlene:

Yeah. After watching the movie. I think I prefer as a movie cuz it still keeps the language but I love the visuals. Sometimes it's so.

Hannah:

It's a great adaptation. If you were an orphan like Anne, who would you want to adopt you? Marilla.

Marilla:

20 Pounds of Brown sugar.

Hannah:

Muriel Stacy

Muriel Stacy:

The most imaginative

Hannah:

Matthew Cuthbert.

Matthew:

Puffed sleeves.

Hannah:

Or Rachel Lynde.

Rachel Lynde:

Oh lawful heart, her hairs is red as carrots.

Hannah:

Weird that Marilla and Matthew are separate choices.

Darlene:

Yeah, but I guess it's like, do you want the pragmatic like really stern parent or< laugh><laugh>? If you were adopted by Rachel you would know everything though, so that sounds fun.

Erica:

You'd have a sore behind as well, probably.

Darlene:

Oh, that's true. Yeah. You better keep in line.

Erica:

If I'm just going like if I'm an orphan like Anne, maybe not orphan like Anne, but an orphan like Anne presented with these four people, like standing in a line in front of me. I'm going with Miss Stacy because she has the prettiest dresses.

Darlene:

Mm. Yeah. Miss Stacy reminded me of like Matilda being adopted by Miss Honey.

Heather:

Yeah. Very much

Hannah:

< laugh>. Yeah. And I think, you know, Anne would be attracted to that. Being able to learn, you k=now, have a teteacher as a parent figure.

Darlene:

Yeah, I'm gonna go with Miss Stacy, but um, Marilla really like, I really like Marilla by the end and you just realize like, like how great of a parent that she is. Yeah. Granted, like if you were thinking about it like you're not gonna, as a kid or like as an orphan, you're not gonna really know that that's really what's best for you. Mm-hmm. but yeah, Marilla's like parenting was really nice. She was just so understanding

Heather:

< laugh>. Yeah. I I guess I'm also gonna go with, I I'm not really sure that this means you're an orphan or you are like Anne personality-wise because my answer for if I was like Anne would be different than if I'm like me. I think I'm gonna split the difference and go with Matthew because I think both Anne might pick him as her most loved person. and I think I would've done okay with him cuz I was like old even when I was small.<laugh>< laugh>. So I think I would've been okay with not a whole lot of like structure and guidance and just somebody that was like, that loved me, you know, be like my grandfather or something. I do think it's interesting that um, Mrs. Allen's not on this list cuz I think she would make more sense as a fourth option and put Marilla and Matthew together, but whatever.< laugh>

Hannah:

Where would you want your adopted parents to live on a farm? A quiet town in a city? Or near the beach?

Heather:

Farm? For me. A hundred percent. Um,

Erica:

Let's see. I will go. I'm gonna, I'm gonna say beach.

Darlene:

I'm gonna go with a quiet town.

Hannah:

I'm gonna go beach. Were you very academically inclined? Not at first. To an extent, yes I was. No, I never was.

Darlene:

I'm gonna go with yes I was.

Erica:

I'm uh, I'm a, I'm a, to an extent I'm gonna be honest.

Heather:

< laugh>, I was a yes

Hannah:

To an extent for me. Would you give up a coveted scholarship to stay home and nurse a loved one? In a heartbeat? No, I would not. I'd be too torn to decide. I would want to, but I wouldn't.

Erica:

Yeah, I'm be, again, this was, uh, looking at this question, I'm thinking I gotta, I gotta go with the first thing that springs to mind and it's, I would want to, but I wouldn't,

Hannah:

What's missing from this is the um, I would do it but it.

Heather:

But regret it.

Hannah:

It would tear me.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Hannah:

It would tear me apart.

Darlene:

< laugh>. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I was like, it's not really like a, in a heartbeat. So I guess like for me, I would just go with, I'd be too torn to decide, but I think I would end up deciding to do it.

Hannah:

Same.

Heather:

I think I'm in a heartbeat, but again, this comes from being old since I was young.< laugh>.

Unknown:

Right.

Darlene:

Very responsible.

Hannah:

What is the worst way to go? Heart attack. Drowning. Choking. Or old age

Erica:

Drowning. No question.

Darlene:

Yeah, that sounds well, choking too.

Heather:

I'm talking with choking. That's unpleasant and embarrassing.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Erica:

<laugh>

Hannah:

Choking and dreading seem similarly awful.

Darlene:

Yeah. Yeah. I went with choking cuz similarly, I don't know that that's the way I'd want to go.< laugh>. Yeah.

Hannah:

How creative would you say you are? Insanely creative? Not creative at all. Quite creative. A little

Heather:

Creative. I think I'm gonna go with a, I'm torn between a little and quite the thing is, is I am not crafty at all.<laugh>. Which maybe I shouldn't conflate with creative, but I do, ah, I'll say a little.

Hannah:

I'm going with quite.

Erica:

I'm going with quite too. I've got, I got things going on. Creative things.

Darlene:

<laugh>. Yeah. I was also stuck between quite and a little, but I'm gonna go with a little

Hannah:

Are you good with household chores? Not really. I invented chores. No I'm not. Yes, I'm very good with them.

Erica:

Not really

Hannah:

< laugh>. Not really< laugh>.

Darlene:

That's so when it says, and

Erica:

I can be, but not really

Darlene:

< laugh>. So when it says are you good with them, are you like good at doing them or keeping up with them?< laugh>.< laugh>

Heather:

I guess I'm gonna say not really. I'm a very good cook, but man I kind of hate everything else about housekeeping. So like I do it well I like yard work. Ugh. I don't know. I'm still gonna say not really because I don't enjoy except two pieces of household chores. I suppose sometimes I phone it in

Darlene:

<laugh>.

Erica:

I like, I am good at doing chores and I like doing chores when I'm sick. Be-, that's the thing that will make me feel better is making my environment look better. But any other time I'm just like, wait, I just, man I gotta wash dishes again.

Darlene:

< laugh>. Yeah, I'm, I'm gonna say, I mean I hate it when I'm tired but I'm gonna say yes. I'm very good with them.

Hannah:

I got Anne Shirley. The little descriptor for the end result is you are the very intelligent and Shirley, you and Anne are brilliant people. Usually individuals who are very smart aren't the most creative. I don't know if that's true, but that's not a problem you have, Anne and yourself are imaginative. You see the best in others and you are both dreamers. Two of you know how to hide your sadness but not your temper.

Erica:

Yeah, I the uh, the phrasing for Marilla is very strange. You are the stern and strict woman known as Marilla Cuthbert, okay. The two of you possess many similar qualities. For one, you aren't the most expressive people in the world, nor are you the softest person on the planet. Like Marilla you have a very wry sense of humor that isn't easy for ordinary people to understand.

Heather:

I got Anne. Who'd you get, Darlene?

Darlene:

We're evenly split. I got Marilla. Each episode we ask whether our book passes the Bechdel test. The Bechdel test asks whether a work features two female characters who talk to each other about something that doesn't involve men or boys. So does it pass?

Heather:

Oh so much.

Darlene:

Yeah. Resounding yes

Heather:

I mean there is so much. talk about housekeeping and imagination and the Lady of Shalott and like, yeah.

Hannah:

Smallpox

Heather:

There's so much there.

Darlene:

Yeah. And even just their like goals for the future and Anne. Yeah. It doesn't seem like romance is really at the top of her mind. Like she really wants to be a teacher.

Heather:

It's far away. Yeah. Like I think she wants her tall, dark, handsome, romantic partner but like down here.

Darlene:

Yeah.

Heather:

She's not into that right now.

Hannah:

Yeah. Okay. So Yeah, there's a lot of discussion of various aspects of life that don't involve men or boys

Darlene:

And you know, Marilla was not entertaining any of those thoughts

Heather:

Anyway.< laugh>? No.

Darlene:

Oh. Except she does tell her about how she, one time.

Heather:

She had a beau.

Darlene:

Yeah, she had a beau.

Unknown:

Yes.< laugh>.

Darlene:

But

Heather:

Then, then they fought and it all fell apart.

Darlene:

Yeah. And it just so happened to be Gilbert's dad.

Heather:

Yes.

Darlene:

Full circle.

Hannah:

But that feels unusual with that Marilla is sharing that.

Heather:

Yes it does. Yes. Like, I mean how many years did it take her to divulge that to Anne< laugh>?

Darlene:

Yeah. Yeah. And it, it felt like a, and it was because it was a life lesson cuz she knows that Anne is still harboring like,

Heather:

Yes.

Darlene:

Ill feelings towards Gilbert for something that he did, you know,

Heather:

The grudge to and all grudges.

Darlene:

Exactly. And so she's just like, maybe you wanna of cool it off because you know, I regret not doing that cuz I was also very headstrong.

Heather:

Well that's it for this episode of These Books Made Me. Join us next time when we'll discuss a book where someone sees their coach in their underwear. If you think you know which book we're tackling next, drop us a tweet. We are@pgcmls on Twitter and#TheseBooksMadeMe.

Unknown:

Yay

Darlene:

That is so vague. Like I actually wouldn't know< laugh>.

Gilbert:

Carrots