Movie Monday: Anne with an E

Anne with an E

When opportunity arises, I feature Movie Monday. I recognize few people have the time or desire to read the amount I do, especially when it comes to the 100 Best Novels list. Luckily, Hollywood loves adapting a classic and I love a good story in any form.

Film Title: Anne with an E

Book Title: Anne of Green Gables

Release Year: 2017

Summary: It's L. M. Montgomery's classic story, but with some modern additions and attitudes.

What I Thought: I know there are so many feelings out there on the Internet about this series. As when I talked about Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, I feel a bit superfluous adding my voice to the cacophony. However, I want to get a conversation going. I know all you Anne-lovers out there have feelings about this series and I want to talk about them! So, consider this a mashup between Movie Monday and Let's Talk About.... Just know, there are spoilers ahead. Proceed at your own risk.

Let's start at the beginning. It is, after all, a very good place to start... wait...wrong movie. 

Rilla of Ingleside - L. M. Montgomery

Rilla of Ingleside

Title: Rilla of Ingleside

Author: L. M. Montgomery

Publication Date: 1921

Pages: 304

Genre: Classic / Historical / Fiction

How I Found It: Last one in the series!

Date Completed: 3/9/16

Summary: Anne's flock are nearly grown and each is entering the world on their own in their own way. For the boys, this means joining up to fight in the Great War. For baby Rilla, now nearly a woman in her own right, it means holding down the home fort and facing trials of her own as the last Blythe child left at home in such trying times.

What I Thought: I have talked a lot on the blog about the transition from the Victorian/Edwardian/Gilded Ages to WWI and beyond. Just as with actual history and the ensuing culture, perspectives, and philosophies, literature marked the shift dramatically. To have a series bridge that gap in both content and actual date of authorship and publication, even if only by its last installment, feels unique.

My comments about the shift in the series are well documented at this point. I've amassed quite a collection of posts, as one does with a series this long. I still wish Montgomery had kept her focus on Anne herself, rather than moving on to the Blythe children. This feels like the start of a companion series or a loosely related novel rather than the continuation of the same series. Yet, I wonder if Montgomery was feeling a shift in her own life as she aged - the moving attention from one generation to the next, particularly as the next heads off to determine the world's fate on the battlefield.

Rainbow Valley - L. M. Montgomery

Rainbow Valley

I have so enjoyed reading through the Anne of Green Gables series over the past few years. As I have mentioned previously, I do not think I ever actually read through the whole series in my childhood. If my memory serves, I always got stalled around Anne of Ingleside. This may be the first time I ever actually made it to Rainbow Valley.

By this point in the series, Anne is barely mentioned. After all, her name is not even in the title. Surprisingly, much of the book is not even about her family. Instead, a good portion of the book revolves around the Meredith family. 

The Merediths are a new addition to Glen St. Mary. A widower minister and his four children, they also bring along a maiden aunt who's a bit, well, batty. The Meredith clan become quick friends with the Blythe children and the group spend many hours together in the cherished Rainbow Valley. 

Yet, even with the Blythe children floating in and out of the story, the Meredith kids are the real center of the book. Their hijinks keep the whole town either up in arms or highly entertained over the course of the book. They sing songs in the Methodist graveyard, they secretly take in an orphan girl named Mary Vance, they confuse days of the week and skip church to deep clean the manse, they even make apologetic speeches in church, and write in to the local newspaper to explain their actions. It's all very reminiscent of the lovable, nearly unexplainable situations that Anne herself was getting into in those first few books. 

Anne of Ingleside - L. M. Montgomery

Anne of Ingleside

How can you not love dear, sweet Anne? 

If you've been around the blog for long at all, you know I've been rereading this delightful series by L. M. Montgomery. I read them all as a child, but have thoroughly enjoyed revisiting Prince Edward Island and the wonderful "Anne-girl."

Most people are at least mildly familiar with Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea, the first two books in the series, if only because of the 1980s movie adaptations. The later books, however, document Anne's life beyond Avonlea. Anne of Ingleside is book six of eight. 

When we meet up again with Anne, several years have passed since she and Gilbert left their house of dreams. They now live in a large home they have dubbed Ingleside with their growing gaggle of children. Since Jem's birth in book five, the Blythes have added Walter, twins Diana and Anne ("Nan") and Shirley. Not long into this novel, Anne delivers Bertha Marilla ("Rilla") into the world. I was, once again, struck by how Montgomery never actually references pregnancy and only alludes to Anne's expectant condition. 

Like the early books, Anne of Ingleside returns to a format more akin to a series of vignettes or short stories than one cohesive novel. In the novel, nearly every Blythe family member has a story or two where they shine. Gilbert and youngest son Shirley are, oddly, left out. In fact, Gilbert factors very little into the plot lines outside of mentions of his doctoring work. 

Anne's House of Dreams - L.M. Montgomery

Anne's House of Dreams

To say that life has been a bit stressful lately is an understatement. Consequently, I am struggling to get through the heavy tomes of the 100 Best Novels list.  Right now, in my life, I need reading to be an escape and require little thought.  It could not be a better time for a return to Prince Edward Island.

Last fall, in my effort to read a book a week, I indulged in the first three books of the series: Anne of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlea, and Anne of the Island.  This trio captures Anne's teenage years.  Here, we meet the imaginative, passionate character that we all treasure in her rawest form.  This winter, I read Anne of Windy Poplars. As I mentioned then, L.M. Montgomery uses the fourth book of the series to transition Anne to her adult years.  The same girl is still there, but she is becoming a woman.

Anne's House of Dreams completes the transition.  The book opens as Anne and Gilbert Blythe are married.  Their three year engagement is over.  They leave Avonlea to settle in Four Winds, where Gilbert will start his career as a doctor. In Four Winds, they settle into their "house of dreams."  Its little garden and sweet history charm Anne instantly.  It proves to be the perfect place for them to begin life together.

Anne of Windy Poplars - L.M. Montgomery

Anne of Windy Poplars

Rereading L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables series has been a bright spot in the middle of the dreary winter weather.  Despite her aging, Anne remains young at heart and full of endless positivity.  Anne of Windy Poplars captures her over the course of three years.  She has procured a position as a principal while Gilbert, to whom she is now engaged, works his way through medical school.  Montgomery broke the book into three sections, one for each year of their separation.

The first year consists mainly of letters written by Anne to Gilbert describing her new home in Summerside, PEI.  While the second and third years also have some letters, they are mainly Montgomery's traditional prose.  It is unclear why she chose to write the sections in such different ways, aside from providing a change of pace.  The letters and the prose both describe the colorful characters and situations for which we know and love Anne Shirley.  In many ways, I saw Windy Poplars as a sort of series of vignettes about life in Summerside.  The pages fill with gossip about these fictional characters; Anne delights in inputting her helping hand in situations where she can, to both positive and negative results.

For lovers of Green Gables and the Avonlea citizens, there is sparse mention of them in these pages.  To me, Windy Poplars is a transition novel for both Anne and Montgomery.  Anne has grown up and with adulthood comes the gradual movement away from her childhood home and into a life of her own.  Montgomery has given significant pages to the people of Avonlea and certainly felt ready to explore new faces and scenery.  Still, to skip over Anne's holidays at home nearly completely left me missing the people there.  

One particularly interesting part of reading Windy Poplars was comparing it to the movie Anne of Avonlea with Megan Follows as Anne.  The movie takes story lines from Windy Poplars, Anne of Avonlea, and Anne of the Island without much dedication to accuracy.  The movie twists the plots and characters to make it a more cohesive story.  While I understand the need to make a more viable screenplay, and while I still love the movie as an independent piece, I do still wish there was a well done movie series following the Anne series which stayed true to Montgomery's words.

Do you have a go-to feel good book or series?  When authors of long series bring in new characters and settings, is that something you enjoy or detest?

Pages: 268
Date Completed: February 1, 2013

Anne of the Island - L.M. Montgomery

Anne of the Island

November has settled in nicely.  I find it hard to believe there are only six weeks remaining in the year.  And, after today, only five books remaining to reach my goal.  The reality of that amazes me.  For the first time, I can predict every remaining piece of the puzzle.  It is an exciting place to have reached!  I have plans for some exciting posts come the end of the year, so make sure you stay tuned to see what comes next.

In the mean time, I should not jump ahead so - one page at a time, as it were.  I have continued on with the Anne of Green Gables series.  If you remember, I read the first two books, Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea earlier this fall.  They are easy reads and take me back to my childhood.  As Anne Shirley's story continues in this third installation, we see her college years in Kingston and Anne's love life finally blooms.

Anne of Avonlea - L.M. Montgomery

Anne of Avonlea

Any worry I might have had over falling behind in my personal challenge this year is quickly evaporating.  Months of planning have proven themselves worthwhile and now, three days before our wedding, I am finding myself with time to relax and enjoy the week (This is also due in part to my extremely helpful husband-to-be). Festivities start tomorrow, but tonight I have a quiet evening and took advantage of it to finish Anne of Avonlea.  What a refuge this book has been the past few weeks.  L.M. Montgomery's beautiful prose and the beautiful simplicity of her plot would lift any spirit, but especially that of a bride-to-be who is worn out from trying to balance all the aspects of her life.  Just as Anne of Green Gables did for me last month, Avonlea has proven itself a welcome refuge from the business of life.

Anne of Green Gables - L.M. Montgomery

Anne of Green Gables

I am not exactly sure what it was that prompted me to return to Green Gables.  For the last several months, I have had an urge to read through L.M. Montgomery's beloved series again.  Because I believe firmly in indulging such inexplicable compulsions, I finally took the time to reread this story.  As a child, I owned the box set of all eight Anne books and, I believe, only read through them once in completion.  In addition to the books, I remember countless viewings of the 1980s movie version starring Megan Follows.  What little girl growing up in the 1990s didn't watch it and the sequel, Anne of Avonlea, over and over?  Obviously, rereading the book stirred a lot of those memories; however, I think that, even more than memories, Anne herself creates a stronger pull to childhood.