As documented here on TMR before, I’m a big L.M. Montgomery fan. So a revised edition of a work that examines the creation of Anne Shirley, her most famous character of all? Naturally I was interested. This new edition is a revision of the original 2008 version of the book, which I had somehow managed to miss. In it, Gammel traces her way through Montgomery’s life, journals, and early works to determine the leads for how Anne of Green Gables was born, and how Montgomery related to Anne throughout her life.
Gammel dives into Montgomery’s archives, as well as archives of magazines and books that she would have read as a child and young woman, her writing practice and education, as well as the circumstances of her life. Left with her grandparents by her father after her mother died, Montgomery was a lonely child who grew into a lonely adult, despite her many friendships and romantic entanglements. These all feed into her work, and her characters. Gammel builds on the scholarship around how Montgomery used the parts of her life to create her works.
The most interesting and prominent through-line in the book is Gammel searching out a photo referenced by Montgomery in her journals as being the inspiration for what Anne looked like: a photograph of Evelyn Nesbit, a Gibson Girl, whose life had some faint parallels with Montgomery’s own, albeit much more flashy and scandalous.
One aspect of this book which I felt was not focused on enough was the strife between Montgomery and her husband, and the depression that dogged them both, as well as their substance use. For all of Gammel’s thoroughness in tracing the threads of Montgomery’s life from birth to the end of her life, this felt like an oversight in revising this edition; much of what we know now about Montgomery’s later life and death was made public in 2008, around the same time the first edition was published. Gammel does make some reference, but I would have liked to spend more time on the topic of mental health, and more frankly and openly in the work.
If you’re an Anne fan, this is a well-researched, well-written addition to the body of literature on Montgomery and her writing, and certainly worth your time to really get into the meat of how Anne came to be, what the public origin story was, and what inspirations Montgomery drew upon to create one of the most famous Canadian heroines to date.
IRENE GAMMEL is an English professor and holds the Canada Research Chair in Modern Literature and Culture at Toronto Metropolitan University. She has served as president of the Canadian Comparative Literature Association and as an editorial board member of Canadian Literature. She lives in Toronto, Canada.
Publisher: Sutherland House (October 7, 2025)
Paperback 9″ x 6″ | 324 pages
ISBN: 9781998365715
Alison Manley has ricocheted between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia for most of her life. Now in Halifax, Nova Scotia, she is the Cataloguing and Metadata Librarian at Saint Mary's University. Her past life includes a long stint as a hospital librarian on the banks of the mighty Miramichi River. She has an honours BA in political science and English from St. Francis Xavier University, and a Master of Library and Information Studies from Dalhousie University. While she's adamant that her love of reading has nothing to do with her work, her ability to consume large amounts of information very quickly sure is helpful. She is often identified by her very red lipstick, and lives with her partner Brett and cat, Toasted Marshmallow.
- Alison Manleyhttps://miramichireader.ca/author/alison-manley/
- Alison Manleyhttps://miramichireader.ca/author/alison-manley/
- Alison Manleyhttps://miramichireader.ca/author/alison-manley/
- Alison Manleyhttps://miramichireader.ca/author/alison-manley/
- Alison Manleyhttps://miramichireader.ca/author/alison-manley/
- Alison Manleyhttps://miramichireader.ca/author/alison-manley/
