FernFolio

When Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert request an orphan boy to help around the farm, they are sent, instead, a little girl named Anne Shirley. The child has red hair and freckles and big green eyes, and possesses plenty of spirit and imagination. Shy, gentle Matthew Cuthbert, who is sent to fetch the orphan from the train station and knows he ought to tell her that there has been a mix-up, promptly falls under Anne’s spell, but his sister Marilla, who is far more pragmatic, insists that she will have to go back to the orphanage. But the story of Anne’s lonely childhood and her grief at learning her dream of a real home is not going to become reality, touch Marilla and eventually she, too, concludes that Anne must stay.
Anne’s first months at Green Gables are difficult, at times, for, while she know how to work and tries hard to do her best, Anne is sensitive about her red hair and unable to always control her fiery temper. She becomes very angry when Mrs. Rachel Lynde, a friend and neighbour of Marilla’s, makes disparaging remarks about her hair and looks and character, and, cracks her slate over the head of Gilbert Blythe, a fellow classmate, who calls her “carrots.” Yet she makes good friends among the other students in Avonlea School, and becomes best friends with Diana Barry, whom she adores with all the pent-up affection of her lonely early childhood, and finds in Matthew Cuthbert a kindred spirit, someone with whom she can share her thoughts and dreams.
Though Anne settles into life at Green Gables and Avonlea, she finds herself in plenty of scrapes and misadventures. She accidentally gets her friend Diana drunk on home-made wine, breaks her ankle trying to walk the ridge pole of the Barrys’ kitchen roof, and dyes her hair green trying to rid herself of the hated red colour. But she also studied hard at school and soon shows herself to be an able student, writes deliciously tragical stories which she shares with fellow members of the Story Club, and wins a place at Queen’s to study to become a teacher.
One hundred years old this year, Anne of Green Gables is a Canadian children’s classic, that has been read and enjoyed by countless millions of children all over the world. I recently reread my copy of Anne, given to me on my 8th birthday by my parents, and laughed and thrilled and cried with Anne, just as I did when my mother first read it to me so long ago. Montgomery’s words celebrate the sights and smells of the Prince Edward Island countryside; I defy anyone to read this story and not be transported to the fields and meadows and woods around Green Gables. They also bring to life one small, extraordinary girl, so full of life and exuberance and imagination and spirit, Anne Shirley.
FernFolio Editor