"One last time Maud refused. It was not to save her virtue, she confessed, not from any moral sense - not even a fear of pregnancy or public shame. What held her back was 'the fear of Herman Leard's contempt'. If she yielded, he might despise her. She could risk anything but that."
When I was a little girl in the 1980's, I was entranced by the TV series Anne of Green Gables, starring Megan Fellows. I immediately pestered my mum to buy me the book, but I only wanted the one with the TV tie-in cover. I still own that book, though it is quite tattered and worn from all the times I and my friends read it. I now have a pretty hardback collector's edition as well, but I still won't part with that old paperback copy.
Like many women, Anne Shirely was part of my childhood. I grew up reading of her adventures, watching her on TV and later on VHS. Now I hear that she has a whole new show - Anne With An E - but I have yet to see this latest incarnation, and my loyalty to the Megan Fellows' version is, as yet, untested.
Having read the Anne books and the Emily of New Moon series in childhood, I felt I had to read this biography of the author, Lucy Maud Montgomery. House of Dreams by Liz Rosenberg, explores the life of Maud and how she came to create her most enduring fictional heroine, amid neglect, abandonment and poverty. Because unlike her books for little girls, Montgomery's own life was far from joyful. An avid diarist, Montgomery documented nearly all her sorrows and struggles. Unless something so terrible happened that she couldn't write about it, she wrote everything down and so left a detailed written legacy of her life.
If you have read any of her novels you will be familiar with stories of happy, nurturing family life, lasting romance and silver linings aplenty. I expected that Montgomery's own life would be similar, but in fact, it was the opposite. Perhaps this is the reason she sings joy from every page of her books - perhaps writing happy novels of courageous heroines moving steadily towards their own happy endings, was a coping mechanism for the often troubled author.
Estranged from her father, her mother having died when she was young, Montgomery was raised by emotionally distant grandparents. There she was expected to earn her keep and looked upon as a charity case. As she grew up, she struggled to afford an education and made a sporadic living as a teacher. She suffered from manic depression and lost herself in the comfort of books, which were her lifelong companions.
Her real dream was to become a writer, and after a brief stint in journalism, she turned her mind to writing books for little girls. But the struggle to get published was followed with the realization that an authors life is precarious, the income sporadic and the publisher's are the ones who hold all the cards. Nevertheless, with quiet determination she kept writing and is now regarded as one of the most successful classic children's authors. Her work endures to this day and has recently found a new young audience thanks to Anne With An E.
I have always admired Montgomery's books, but having read this biography, I have a deeper respect for her work, for her unwavering ability to write her way through crisis, to shine light on every page for her young readers to bathe in, despite the fact that she herself was held prisoner by the darkness of her own mind. It is an extraordinary accomplishment.
The fact that publishers and film-makers are still enthusiastic about her work, nearly eighty years after her tragic death, is evidence of the brilliance of her characters and her lyrical storytelling ability.
House of Dreams brings L M Montgomery out of the shadows and shines a light on an author who has long been over-shadowed by her own initial heroine, Anne Shirley. Her life wasn't easy, but it was certainly interesting, with a broken engagement; a dalliance (and a sexual near-miss!) with a man who was already spoken for; court cases with publishers; illegitimate grandchild; wayward son; and mental health struggles in a time when depression wasn't really recognized as a medical condition. It's a pretty book too, being illustrated throughout with lovely line drawings, and a charming dust jacket.
If you like the Anne and Emily books and want to learn more about this prolific children's author, then you will probably enjoy House of Dreams as much as I have. And if you just want to read the original Anne of Green Gables, you might like the same beautiful collectors edition that seduced me...Enjoy!
xxx
No comments:
Post a Comment