Historical Fiction: Anne of Green Gables

 

This is my all-time favorite book. In 2009 Johns and I went to Prince Edward Island to fulfill a lifelong dream of seeing where Lucy Maude Montgomery lived, worked and wrote her famous novels. In this post, I will focus on how historical fiction can help us understand the socioeconomic/historical/political events of a time period. Any time the subject of east coast Canada comes up in conversion, for example, I feel some familiarity with it. To be fair- since 2007 John and I have taken frequent trips to Toronto to see his sister- but even before I went for the first time in 2007 I felt familiar with it- because I had read and reread the Anne books so many times I could already picture the landscape and understand a little of the politics. Here are some examples of history revealed within fiction.

The description of Mrs. Rachel Lynde on page 3 of Anne of Green Gables is our first glimpse of what woman do with their daily lives. “She was a notable housewife; her work was always done and well done; she “ran” the Sewing Circle, helped run the Sunday school, and was the strongest prop of the Church Aid Society and Foreign Missions Auxiliary. Yet with all this, Mrs. Rachel found abundant time to sit for hours at her kitchen window, knitting “cotton warps” quilts- she had knitted sixteen of them.”

In a glimpse of what higher education was like in the early 20th century, the students applying for teacher-license entrance took an exam and the pass/fail results were published in the local newspaper. “Father brought the paper home from Bright River not ten minutes ago- it came out on the afternoon train, you know and won’t be here tomorrow by mail- and when I saw the pass list I just rushed over like a wild thing. You’ve all passed, every one of you.” (Diana Barry, 204)

A description of the high-fashion dress that Matthew gave Anne reveals the fashion taste of the era: “Anne took the dress and looked at it in reverent silence. Oh, how pretty it was- a lovely soft brown gloria with all the gloss of silk; a skirt with dainty frills and shirrings; a waist elaborately pintucked in the most fashionable way, and a little ruffle of filmy lace at the neck. But the sleeves- they were the crowning glory! Long elbow cuffs, and above them two beautiful puffs divided by rows of stirring and bows of brown silk ribbon 156.)

A description of the birch path in Avonlea is one example of a vivid illustration of scenery- realistic enough to give the reader a picture of what the terrain really looks like. “It was a little narrow, twisting path, winding down over a long hill straight through Mr. Bell’s woods, where the light came down sifted through so many emerald screens that it was as flawless as the heart of a diamond. It was fringed in all its length with slim young birches, white-stemmed and lissom boughed; ferns and starflowers and wild lilies-of-the-valley and scarlet tufts of pigeon berries grew thickly along it; and always there was a delightful spiciness in the air and music of bird calls and the murmur and laugh of wood winds in the trees overhead, 83.”