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the-moral-of-the-rose · 1 month

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If anybody wanted to write a crossover between L.M. Montgomery's books, here is a little help with the ages of the characters (@no-where-near-hero maybe it will be a tiny help for your fanfic):

Anne Shirley - born on 5th of March 1865

Gilbert Blythe - born in 1862 or 1863

James Matthew "Jem" Blythe - born in July 1893

Walter Cuthbert Blythe - born in 1894

Anne "Nan" and Diana "Di" Blythe - born in 1896

Shirley Blythe - born in 1888*

Bertha Marilla "Rilla" Blythe - born in 1900*

Gerald "Jerry" Meredith - born 1894

Faith Meredith - born 1895

Una Meredith - born 1896

Thomas Carlyle "Carl" Meredith - born 1897

Jims Anderson - born in August of 1914

Emily Byrd Starr - born on 19th of May 1888

Ilse Burnley - born in 1888 (probably)

Perry Miller - born in 1887

Frederick "Teddy" Kent - 1887 or 1888

Dean Priest - born in 1865

Patricia "Pat" Gardiner - born in 1913

Rachel "Rue" Gardiner - born in 1919

Winnifred "Winnie" Gardiner - born in 1910

Sidney "Sid" Gardiner - born in 1912

Joseph"Joe" Gardiner - born in 1908

Hilary Gordon - born in 1911

Elizabeth "Bets" Wilcox - born in 1913

David Kirk - born around 1893

Jane Stuart - born in May 1918 or 1919

Valancy Stirling* - born 1883**

Barney Snaith - born 1877**

Cecilia "Cissy" - born 1886**

Olive Stirling - born 1884**

Gay Penhallow - born in 1904***

Nan Penhallow - born in 1904***

Roger Dark - born in 1890***

Donna Dark - born between 1894 and 1896***

Virginia Powell - born between 1894 and 1896***

Peter Penhallow - born between 1888 and 1890***

Margaret Penhallow - born 1872***

Brian Dark - born 1916***

Hugh Dark - born in 1887***

Joscelyn Penhallow: born between 1889-1892***

*In both Anne of Ingleside and Rainbow Valley Shirley is two years older than Rilla. But in Rilla of Ingleside, he turns eighteen few months before Rilla... it is pure chaos. Rilla was supposed to be nearly fourteen, according to the RV, in 1914, but she is nearly fifteen in RoI. So I apologize, but I had a lot of trouble here...

**The Blue Castle is the most difficult to place in time. It is set several years before it was published, and in my own opinion: before Tangled Web and Pat of Silver Bush. Why? Because of this reference: "This was before the day of bobs and was regarded as a wild, unheard-of proceeding—unless you had typhoid." (The Blue Castle). Bobs were already "in fashion" at the beginning of Pat of Silver Bush (so, in 1919, when Pat was six years old: it was said that Winnie wanted to have her hair bobbed) and in Tangled Web (which is set in 1922). Yet, the cars, motorboats and movie theaters were a rather common occurence in The Blue Castle's times. But... there might be an explanation. Valancy doesn't live on PEI, which might have been a little "behind" the rest of Canada, as far as modern technology went. It is my own personal opinion, but I think that it might be set just before the war, at the same time as the end Emily's Quest. I know that the clothes seem more "modern" in TBC, but Emily wore "a little sport suit" and dress that was described as followed "there was so little of it". Teddy and Perry both had cars, as sone of Ilse's cousins. I would say that the Blue Castle book might be set around 1912-1913. Still, the timeline is extremely elusive. Please, let me know, dear Blue Castle Book Club's members, what is your opinion? I think I have read some amazing discussion about TBC's timeline a long time ago, but if I remember correctly, everyone was certain that this novel was set post WWI (me included, until this very moment when I tried to place Pat and Tangled Web and remembered the "bob" quote). So I choose 1912 as the beginning of TBC, when Valancy was twenty-nine.

*** the ages of characters in Tangled Web:

"They were first cousins, who were born the same day and married the same day,--Donna to her own second cousin, Barry Dark, and Virginia to Edmond Powell--two weeks before they had left for Valcartier. Edmond Powell had died of pneumonia in the training camp, but Barry Dark had his crowded hour of glorious life somewhere in France." (Tangled Web).

"Virginia Powell, whose husband had been dead eight years and who was young and tolerably beautiful" (Tangled Web).

"Valcartier, Quebec was the primary training base for the First Canadian Contingent in 1914."

- from: https://www.warmuseum.ca/firstworldwar/history/going-to-war/canada-enters-the-war/training-at-valcartier/

So, from this I assumed that Virginia's husband died in 1914 (so Tangled Web is set in 1922-23). Gay is 18 at the beginning, so she would be born in 1904. If Donna and Virginia were 18-20 when they got married, they would be 26-28 (so still "young"). at the beginning. Peter was 14 when Donna was 8, so he'd be 32-34 at the beginning of the book (same age or a bit older than Roger). Hugh was 35 at the beginning. I guess Joscelyn was a bit younger- most of LMM's heroines are at least two years younger than their love interest. I'd say she might have been 20-23 when she got married, so she'd be around 30-33 at the beginning of the book. I would say Brian is about six years old - he doesn't seem to attend school yet, but is big enough to be sent to the harbour. Margaret Penhallow was about fifty at the beginning of the book.

So sorry that this post was rather long, but it was a great fun to write (even if it took me A LOT of time). Thank you for reading. Please, let me know if you agree. Any feedback will be very welcome!

#lm montgomery #emily of new moon #anne of green gables #tangled web book club #tangled web #aogg #blue castle book club #the blue castle #Pat of silver bush #Rilla of ingleside #Rainbow Valley #I know I haven't included marigold or kilmeny #But I don't know how to place Kilmeny tbh #And I need to reread marigold before i will be able to include her here #I think I will reblog or add them later on

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shirleyjblythe · 3 months

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Who’s on this cover?

Something I see so many different opinions on, and would love to know yours.

#l.m. montgomery #rainbow valley

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checkoutmybookshelf · 6 months

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You Have My Attention: Anne of Green Gables First Lines

The icon of Canadian girlhood needs no introduction, as Anne of Green Gables is a global phenomenon at this point. What those of you who read the first book at like age ten and then didn't bother exploring further might not know, however, is that LM Montgomery wrote a whole Anne series. So how did she catch a reader's attention? Let's find out!

"Mrs. Rachel Lynde lived just where the Avonlea main road dipped down into a little hollow, fringed with alders and ladies’ eardrops and traversed by a brook that had its source away back in the woods of the old Cuthbert place; it was reputed to be an intricate, headlong brook in its earlier course through those woods, with dark secrets of pool and cascade; but by the time it reached Lynde’s Hollow it was a quiet, well-conducted little stream, for not even a brook could run past Mrs. Rachel Lynde’s door without due regard for decency and decorum; it probably was conscious that Mrs. Rachel was sitting at her window, keeping a sharp eye on everything that passed, from brooks and children up, and that if she noticed anything odd or out of place she would never rest until she had ferreted out the whys and wherefores thereof."

-- Anne of Green Gables

"A tall, slim girl, 'half-past sixteen,' with serious gray eyes and hair which her friends called auburn, had sat down on the broad red sandstone doorstep of a Prince Edward Island farmhouse one ripe afternoon in August, firmly resolved to construe so many lines of Virgil."

-- Anne of Avonlea

"'Harvest is ended and summer is gone,' quoted Anne Shirley, gazing across the shorn fields dreamily."

-- Anne of the Island

"(Letter from Anne Shirley, B.A., Principal of Summerside High School, to Gilbert Blythe, medical student at Redmond College, Kingsport.)

Windy Poplars,

Spook's Lane,

S'side, P. E. I.,

Monday, September 12th.

DEAREST:

Isn't that an address!"

-- Anne of the Windy Poplars

"'Thanks be, I’m done with geometry, learning or teaching it,' said Anne Shirley, a trifle vindictively, as she thumped a somewhat battered volume of Euclid into a big chest of books, banged the lid in triumph, and sat down upon it, looking at Diana Wright across the Green Gables garret, with gray eyes that were like a morning sky."

-- Anne's House of Dreams

"'How white the moonlight is tonight!' said Anne Blythe to herself, as she went up the walk of the Wright garden to Diana Wright's front door, where little cherry-blossom petals were coming down on the salty, breeze-stirred air."

-- Anne of Ingleside

"It was a clear, apple-green evening in May, and Four Winds Harbour was mirroring back the clouds of the golden west between its softly dark shores. The sea moaned eerily on the sand-bar, sorrowful even in spring, but a sly, jovial wind came piping down the red harbour road along which Miss Cornelia’s comfortable, matronly figure was making its way towards the village of Glen St. Mary."

-- Rainbow Valley

"It was a warm, golden-cloudy, lovable afternoon. In the big living-room at Ingleside Susan Baker sat down with a certain grim satisfaction hovering about her like an aura; it was four o'clock and Susan, who had been working incessantly since six that morning, felt that she had fairly earned an hour of repose and gossip."

-- Rilla of Ingleside

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asymphonyofstarlight · 2 months

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LM Montgomery gang I just spent an hour and a half reviewing every single cover edition of Rainbow Valley I could find — the wiki has about eighty in various languages — and I have come to the firm conclusion that not a single one is canonically accurate at all for the RV-era group. Some of my basic observations were that the girls were all just generally interchangeable for each other (never knew if it was Nan or Faith) & Jerry never seemed to exist & disproportionate amounts of Rilla and Shirley who were barely in the book & since I was going mainly off hair color it was kind of a train wreck in general, I think. Also there were a strange number of blonde girls and only one was white-blonde enough to be Mary Vance so where did they all even come from?? Of course the majority are all Blythe children (and Anne sometimes) because this is Anne’s series but it made me laugh given RV is also partially the Merediths’ story. And some of them simply make absolutely no sense (looking at the Ukrainian one in particular). Then there’s that one super vintage edition where it’s just a singular blonde girl — why??

I feel like the most apt descriptor for most of the covers is “up to interpretation.”

(Also noticed the Slovakian edition is called Anne of Glen St. Mary instead of RV — ~interesting~.)

#rainbow valley #anne of green gables #lm montgomery #okay so fun fact i have to be up in six hours #incredible use of my time !!#highly recommend it btw #curious if anyone else sees this post #and looks — all the editions are on the aogg wiki bless them #foreign editions are fascinating btw

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nerdyrevelries · 1 month

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Castles in the Air

I'm extremely excited to announce that the game I've been working on for the past 4 years is coming to Kickstarter! Castles in the Air (CitA) is a tabletop RPG inspired by the novels of Louisa May Alcott and L.M. Montgomery. Players start as children with boundless dreams who will change over the years based on the relationships they form and choices they make. I think it's a really special game, and I'm looking forward to being able to share it with everyone.

For more information or to sign up to be notified when the Kickstarter launches on May 14th, please check out the game's page on the Storybrewers Roleplaying website. If that name sounds familiar, Storybrewers is the company that created Good Society: A Jane Austen RPG. I feel very honored that they reached out to me about publishing Castles in the Air. While Castles in the Air is a standalone game, its mechanics are inspired by Good Society, and if you like Good Society, I think you'll like CitA too as it allows you to tell similarly compelling stories.

I will be creating some blog posts talking about the literary inspirations for different parts of the game in the weeks leading up to the Kickstarter and during its run. I will be using this as a master post to keep track of all of them, so make sure to check back here or follow my blog if you are interested.

Blog Posts

Meg March: The Nurturer

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anneofgreengablesthings · 6 months

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The L.M. Montgomery Literary Society posted this lovely photo of the three boys LMM dedicated Rainbow Valley to. It caused me to wonder who they were and what connection they had to Maud. I wrote a little bit of what I discovered below in honor of Veteran's Day/Rememberance Day. It seems they were members of the church her husband Ewan pastored in Zephyr. Maud and Ewan gave a going away dinner for the young men of their congregation and she wrote that her heart ached as she looked around the table at the young men they had come to know well.

Robert Brookes was the oldest of the three, at 32. Before leaving Canada, he left his farm to the care of his sister and her husband, and left documentation willing most of the land to them, as if he knew he would not return. Maud was close with him and his sister as they were close in age to her in a congregation of mostly young people or elderly. He took furlough to England, like Jims' father did. His sister wrote him there that she had a new baby daughter and he was thrilled to hear about his niece, writing "I want you to take good care of that little girl. I’m willing to go back and do my duty to the end, then when I come back she’ll be great company for me.” He returned to the front and was killed in the Third Battle of Ypres, reportedly while helping a wounded man to safety. He was quoted in local newspapers for his brave words, (link)and for how cheerfully he had given up his successful farm and went to defend his country. He was very close to his sister and wrote her many letters, similar to Walter and Rilla's relationship. His sister was understandably devastated. Maud remained close friends with her and supported her through this.

Maud ran an aid society and sent care packages to each soldier from Ewan's church. She was greatly incensed to receive a letter from a friend calling the war a "commercial" one. As a result of this she doubled down on her efforts to check on "the boys" and their families, becoming closest to these three.

Goldwin Lapp was just 22 when he was killed, and his parents bought a plaque at church "sacred to his memory" which Maud would later take inspiration from for Walter's plaque in Rilla.

Morley was a teacher who trained as a pilot, perhaps the inspiration for Shirley's flying. He was 23 when killed. His death was noted by LMM in her diary. Here is an article about that.

Most interesting of all, a member of the 116th battalion, mostly made up of Zephyr men, reported hearing a "bugler calling him" for years before the war and even wrote a poem about it. Perhaps this was inspiration for Walter's poem and premonition.

Sorry for the long post! I just found the tie-ins to Rilla and Rainbow Valley fascinating and wanted to share for anyone else interested. This website was a great source.

#rememberance day #veterans day #world war one #lucy maud montgomery #lmm #anne of green gables #rainbow valley #rilla of ingleside #walter blythe #shirley blythe #jem blythe

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hyacinth--girl · 7 months

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Gilbert try not to pick your favourite child based on which one looks most like Anne challenge

#I would call him the blueprint for wifeguy if Jonathan harker wasn’t already holding that title in my heart atm #anne of green gables #anne with an e #rainbow valley #gilbert blythe

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petaltexturedskies · 4 months

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(…) the girls whose hearts were to be wrung were yet fair little maidens a-star with hopes and dreams.

L.M. Montgomery, from Rainbow Valley

#l.m. montgomery #rainbow valley

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discoevsky · 7 months

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Popular Opinion: LM Montgomery’s books are just for children!

Rainbow Valley (The book focusing on kids): Harrison Miller tried to hang herself.

#lucy maud montgomery #anne of green gables #LM Montgomery #Rainbow Valley

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the-moral-of-the-rose · 18 days

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Thank you for voting!

#lm montgomery #anne of green gables #emily of new moon #aogg #the blue castle #blue castle book club #rainbow valley #pat of silver bush #kilmeny of the orchard #magic for marigold #rilla of ingleside

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alwayschasingrainbows · 4 months

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Little Walter Blythe's dreams

"Walter is by way of being a poet. He isn't like any of the others."

(Anne of Ingleside by L. M. Montgomery)

"Walter’s eyes were very wonderful. All the joy and sorrow and laughter and loyalty and aspiration of many generations lying under the sod looked out of their dark gray depths."

(Rainbow Valley by L. M. Montgomery).

#lm montgomery #anne of green gables #walter blythe #little walter #moodboard #anne of ingleside #rainbow valley

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casualoddities · 12 days

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Rainbow Valley - Antique

First USA Edition- Copyright- 1919. Frederick A. Stokes Company.

The inside says (I think) - "Happy Xmas 1919. From Lorne"

#lm montgomery #rainbow valley #1919

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redplaidjacket · 4 days

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A Tintype of a House with Seven Children and a Large Dog

I love browsing this Flickr account that is full of antique pictures bought in flea markets etc.

They're mostly from America, but since they cover the late 19th/early 20th century, they sometimes remind me of the AOGG book series, especially this one.

Seven children?? (Let's pretend Joy Blythe lived). A dog! (Hello Dog Monday!)

If you look closer you can even see that there are 3 boys (Jem, Walter and Shirley), and 4 girls (Nan and Di, Rilla, and another little girl...) in the picture.

#lucy maud montgomery #anne of green gables #rainbow valley #rilla of ingleside

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acrookedbookshelf · 3 months

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Next in line : Rainbow Valley by Lucy Maud Montgomery !

#bookworm #books and reading #booksbooksbooks #book review #booklr #book #bookblr #reading #booklover #books #anne of green gables #rainbow valley #lucy maud montgomery #anne and gilbert

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roses-red-and-pink · 1 year

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For all Anne of green gables fans: what “age” genre do you classify the books as? (Like childrens lit, YA lit, adult lit).

When I go to the library, I always find the books in the childrens section. It makes sense for the first book and maybe Anne of avonlea, but the rest I wouldn’t really classify as childrens lit per say… the only other one I can see being for children is Rainbow Valley.

I think they’re appropriate for children with a high enough reading level, but the later books aren’t really written for children in particular (imo).

Thoughts?

#aogg #anne of green gables #Anne of avonlea #Anne’s house of dreams #rilla of ingleside #anne of ingleside #rainbow valley #Anne of the island #I think I read aogg as a child #but I read the others as a teen

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batrachised · 1 year

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The Curious Case of Walter Blythe

Where to begin with Walter Blythe?

Of all of Anne's children, the narrative repeatedly denotes Walter as an "other," so to speak. He stands out, particularly in contrast to his siblings like Jem. Where Jem is dashing, Walter is sensitive; where Jem is bold, Walter is dreamy; where Jem is brash, Walter is poetic. Jem marches off to WWI like the typical naively gallant soldier, while Walter, from the beginning, recognizes its cost and horror. Walter, due to these characteristics, can sometimes come across as a bit of a shrinking violet. Although he's intended to be sympathetic, child me didn't really appreciate him in comparison to the more practical and humorous characters. Now that I'm older, I recognize just how complex Walter is. Child me saw a dreamy, high-strung boy with nothing deeper; adult me realizes the rock firm sense of character underlying that dreaminess.

As we continue with the Anne series, we learn one of the reasons for LM Montgomery's emphasis on Walter: he dies in WWI. His last words to Rilla in the form of a letter stick with me:

Rilla, the Piper will pipe me 'west' tomorrow. I feel sure of this. And Rilla, I'm not afraid. When you hear the news, remember that. I've won my own freedom here—freedom from all fear. I shall never be afraid of anything again—not of death—nor of life, if after all, I am to go on living. And life, I think, would be the harder of the two to face—for it could never be beautiful for me again. There would always be such horrible things to remember—things that would make life ugly and painful always for me. I could never forget them.

This closes Walter's intended narrative arc. From when he was a child, he had the shadow of death over him--LM Montgomery marks him as doomed in Rainbow Valley--and as an adult, he has to grapple with his fear of the war (a sensible fear, a moral fear that bestows his character with a rich legitimacy I failed to notice as a child) until finally, he accepts it in the above passage. It's a powerful yet heart wrenching acceptance, too, because the passage recognizes there is no happy ending for him here--even if he were to live, he'd suffer from PTSD for the rest of his life (yet another entry in my, "lm montgomery stories do have grit, you know" list).

So, what about Walter's unintended narrative arc?

Or perhaps intended, although LM Montgomery might not have had the vocabulary for it (we can never know). But what I'm referring to here is that Walter could be read as gay. This goes beyond the stereotypical dreamy sensitive man, to the fact that Walter never shows an interest in women at all. Even when his supposed love interest Una is discussed, it's in very tepid terms. After ignoring her and her interest in him for years, he remembers her the night before he dies and hopes all is well with her. Not the usual gushing passages we see from LM Montgomery.

For years, I absently understood this interpretation as reasonable but unintended--until I came across as fascinating academic article that discusses Walter in the context of LM Montgomery's other work, Walter's closet. The article begins similarly to what I've just stated:

Already, we see the themes broadly discussed. Walter as somewhat of a misfit, a social outcast of sorts, in comparison to his male peers of the day. The article expands on the contrast between Jem and Walter:

It also comments on Walter's flouting of gender roles and gender expectations. As the article describes, Walter has "a lack of masculinity" relative to the other characters. Now: this is stereotypical masculinity. Being loud and pugnacious does not make a man. But in LM Montgomery's times, it did. See the following:

it also shows the reaction of the other characters, a reaction that is--possibly--somewhat outsized to someone who simply likes poetry. The implication here is that like the audience, the characters also believe that Walter's characteristics mean that he could be gay.

So, so far we have evidence of Walter not fitting into stereotypical gender roles--but wait! That doesn't mean that he's gay. That just means that in LM Montgomery's time, gender roles were a very tight box to fit into, and so someone with less masculine interests could have a hard time and be viewed as an outcast, a "sissy," as Walter is called.

That brings us to the next point: although Walter's interest in poetry hardly means he's gay, his complete lack of interest in women could.

Here we see the phenomenon from earlier, where the character's reaction to something about Walter seems outsized for what the something is--as if the character knows something, or understand something, we don't.

Beyond the curious lack of interest in romance for a LM Montgomery character, there are also loaded statements that--to be fair!--could mean a thousand things, but in the context of what we've seen so far, seem pointed towards Walter's unique struggles as a non-masculine man.

The author recognizes that LM Montgomery could simply be writing against typical notions of manhood but once again, we hit the issue of Walter's asexuality. Perhaps LM Montgomery simply wanted to go against the grain there too, but the author notes the oddness:

and lastly, here we reach the part of the article that made my jaw drop. While it's impossible to know LM Montgomery's intentions, this example is what cemented my theory--just a theory!--that perhaps LM Montgomery deliberately based Walter on someone or someones she had observed in real life as a pastor's wife.

Now, here's the thing. We can't know whether Walter was intended to be gay, whether LM Montgomery simply wanted a foil to the typical masculine hero, whether he's simply LM Montgomery's pet idea of the ideal man, someone who is more emblematic than real. But to me, the evidence is there. It's not just the lack of traditional masculinity, it's the lack of romantic interest in general. It's not just the fretting over Walter's sensitivity, it's the implied slurs and worries over his salvation. It's not just the lack of romantic interest in general, it's the fact that LM Montgomery implies, even if accidentally, that someone--a boy--similar to him has a crush on him, or is at least, drawn to him.

My theory--and I have literally no evidence for this, to be clear, so I guess it's more something I wonder about--is whether LM Montgomery observed men like this in her work as a pastor's wife and wrote them into her stories. She claimed that she never based her characters on anyone real, but I think it's fairly obvious that her life on the Island, working with its residents, was a source of creative ideas for her. I don't necessarily believe there would be someone specific, but rather, as the passages above state, people with "tendencies" that she had observed over the years. Muddying the waters further is Walter's status as an emblem rather than a character. He doesn't come across as a real person in a lot of ways, unlike the rest of LM Montgomery's characters, which makes my idea much less likely.

If you made it to the end of this long post, I'd love (I mean it) to hear your thoughts!!

#anne of green gables #aogg #walter blythe #anne shirley #rilla of ingleside #rainbow valley #i told ya'll i have the RECEIPTS #when i first read this article i was shook bc i had always been like “ya you can interpret it that way”#but it was the first time I realized it might have some way have been deliberate #world war 1

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