Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

Statistics

Format: eBook (Kindle) IMG_20180725_073854_175

Length: 320 pages

Genre: Classic, Fiction, Young Adult

Publisher: Puffin Classics

First publication: June 1908

Rating: 5/5 stars

I have only read classics in school. The ones that everybody reads- Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Gulliver’s Travels, David Copperfield etc and the picture books of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. When the July Readathon prompt by Books N Beyond was ‘Read a Classic’, I wanted to try one of the books that have been popular on Instagram. I shortlisted Anne of Green Gables and The Secret Garden, finally settling on Anne.

The Blurb

“Eleven-year-old orphan Anne Shirley has just arrived at Green Gables, and already her guardians want to send her back. First, she’s not the boy the Cuthberts expected. Second, she talks too much. And even with her generous spirit, the redhead’s a trouble magnet. She gets the neighbor drunk and nearly poisons the pastor!

Still, despite a rocky start, the fiery Anne wins over her guardians and her new community. She enjoys life at Green Gables, excels in school, and earns a coveted scholarship. But when tragedy hits, Anne must choose between her dreams and the only home she’s ever known.

In this beloved coming-of-age story, Lucy Maud Montgomery drew from her own experiences growing up in Canada during the nineteenth century to introduce generations of readers to one of literature’s most original and inspiring characters.”

The Book

Anne Shirley is an 11-year-old orphan who has had a life experience that most of 20 year-olds wouldn’t have had. She has worked in farms, raised three sets of twins and has survived in a poor orphanage. She cannot believe her luck when she is adopted by the Cuthberts to live in a cozy house surrounded by beautiful nature in King Edward island. But tragedy strikes early to this quick-witted girl when she learns that her saviors wanted a boy to work in the farms and not a girl who is nothing but trouble. She, however wins people over with her big heart and her crazy antics.

I was not sure if I liked the book in the beginning. Anne seemed to talk a bit too much for my liking and there were parts of the first 3 chapters where I have skimmed through pages because it consisted only of the girl chattering away. Looking at it from the modern child psychologist’s point of view, it could be put down to her seeking the attention that she sorely lacked growing up as a second citizen in strangers’ houses and institutions. However, after she settles down at Green Gables, she begins to calm down and tries to behave so as to make her caregivers proud. She makes friends easily, impressing the other children with her imagination and wit. Similarly, she wins adults over with her earnest thoughts and helpful nature. She is brilliant at school and her stubbornness helps her work hard to catch up with all the lessons that she has missed over the years.

Anne is a scatterbrain and lives in her fantasy world. She loves people fiercely and hates others with the same vigor. I loved how she was given streaks of grey in her character unlike some children’s books written in the early 1900s. It made her much more relatable. The tragedy that strikes her at the end of the book was a little predictable but I was still reading a million words a minute to see what happens next. The characters of Marilla and Rachel can give modern day feminists a run for their money. Anne of Green Gables is a story published in 1908, read 110 years later and is still relevant. It can truly be called a classic. I would one day want to read the entire collection of the six Anne of Green Gables books with my daughter.