Anne of Green Gables: L.M. Montgomery
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The title character of Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables is no ordinary soul. Anne is an orphan sent to be adopted by the Cuthberts, a brother and sister in Avonlea, Prince Edward Island. Matthew Cuthbert can see that as soon as he is introduced to her, “no commonplace soul inhabited the body of this stray woman-child of whom shy Matthew Cuthbert was so ludicrously afraid.” (11) Anne could have just been known by what comes out of her own mouth but Montgomery uses a variety of strong and interesting descriptions to give the reader a clear picture of who this “woman-child” is.
When Matthew first lay eyes on Anne, she is described as having “big eyes full of spirit and vivacity”(11) before we even hear her speak. We understand that she is intense and an active, not passive character. She is “a child of about eleven, garbed in a very short, very tight, very ugly dress of yellowish grey wincey…extending down her back were two braids of very thick, decidedly red hair. Her face was small, white and thin,also much freckled.” (11) The Cuthbert’s were expecting a boy, not a girl. The station master tells him “she’ll be able to explain---she’s got a tongue of her own, That’s certain.”
Upon seeing a canopy of blossoming apple trees, ‘its beauty seemed to strike the child dumb. She leaned back in the buddy, her thin hands clasped before her, her face lifted rapturously to the white splendor above.” (16) The reader understands Anne both by her loquaciousness and when she is silent. That which makes her silent says much about her inner life and the way she sees the world.
Matthew Cuthbert’s sister Marilla is not as understanding that Anne is not a boy. She sends Anne to bed expecting to remedy the situation the following day. Upstairs “a lonely, heart-hungry, friendless child cried herself to sleep.” (25) Anne makes Marilla nervous too. “This odd child’s body might be there at the table her spirit was far way in some remote airy cloudland, borne aloft on the wings of imagination” (28)
Marilla asks Anne about her background. Orphaned since she was 3 months, Anne has been passed around between families who used her for childcare for their ever-expanding broods. They didn’t send her to school and there are whispers of an abusive drunken husband. Marilla asks if the women were good to Anne, she responds “Oh, they meant to be I know they meant to be just as good and kind as possible and when people mean to be good to you, you don't mind very much when they are not quite always. They had a good deal to worry damn you know ... But I feel sure they meant to be good to me.” (34) Anne’s ability to look for the good in all and forgive even the largest of sins at such a young age is other worldly. Marilla reflects on this “what a starved, unloved life she had –a life of drudgery and poverty and neglect.”
When Anne saves Minnie May Barry from the croup the doctor tells Mr. and Mrs. Barry “That little redheaded girl they have over at Cuthbert’s is as smart as they make 'em. I tell you she saved that baby's life, for it would have been too late by the time I got here she seems to have a skill and presence of mind perfectly wonderful in a child of her age. I never saw anything like the eyes of her when she was explaining the case out to me.” (113)
The Barry’s Aunt Josephine is so delighted by Anne she says she will stay with them “simply for the sake of getting better acquainted with that Anne-girl. She amuses me and at my time of life an amusing person is a rarity.” (125) A child that interests a worldly, rich aunt must be fascinating indeed. In reading such a thing, the reader wants to hear even more about Anne.
I read this book to remind me why my third teacher had given me the book. What about me had reminded her of Anne. I was over come with emotion then as I am now that she could have thought me similar. It has not been the last time someone has described me in such a way. I want to be able to convey this strangeness, this uniqueness in my memoir, without being haughty or narcissist. I thought by looking at how Anne is described I might be able to do that very thing but it may still be out of my reach. I also wanted to be reminded of how I thought in junior high and high school. My thought process was closer to Anne’s than Roo in The Boy Friend List. I hoped to be reminded of that.