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Lucy Maud Montgomery

OBE
L. M. Montgomery
L. M. Montgomery ca. 1935
Born (1874-11-30)November 30, 1874
Clifton, Prince Edward Island, Canada
Died April 24, 1942(1942-04-24) (aged 67)
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Occupation Fiction writer
Nationality Canadian
Education Prince of Wales College, Dalhousie University
Period 1890–1940
Genre Canadian literature, children's novels, short fiction, poetry
Notable works
Spouse
Ewen ("Ewan") Macdonald
​
​
(m. 1911)​
Children Chester (1912–1963)
Hugh (1914–1914)
Stuart (1915–1982)

Lucy Maud Montgomery OBE (November 30, 1874 – April 24, 1942), published as L. M. Montgomery, was a Canadian author best known for a series of novels beginning in 1908 with Anne of Green Gables. The book was an immediate success. Anne Shirley, an orphaned girl, made Montgomery famous in her lifetime and gave her an international following.

The first novel was followed by a series of sequels with Anne as the central character. Montgomery went on to publish 20 novels as well as 530 short stories, 500 poems, and 30 essays. Most of the novels were set in Prince Edward Island, and locations within Canada's smallest province became a literary landmark and popular tourist site – namely Green Gables farm, the genesis of Prince Edward Island National Park. She was made an officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1935.

Montgomery's work, diaries and letters have been read and studied by scholars and readers worldwide.

Early life

Lmmontgomery1884
Lucy Maud Montgomery, 1884 (age 10)

Lucy Maud Montgomery was born in Clifton (now New London) in Prince Edward Island on November 30, 1874. Her mother, Clara Woolner Macneill Montgomery, died of tuberculosis (TB) when Lucy was twenty-one months old. Stricken with grief, her father, Hugh John Montgomery, placed Lucy in the custody of her maternal grandparents, though he remained in the vicinity. However, when Lucy was seven, he moved to Prince Albert, North-West Territories (now Prince Albert, Saskatchewan). From then on Lucy was raised by her grandparents, Alexander Marquis Macneill and Lucy Woolner Macneill, in the community of Cavendish, Prince Edward Island.

Montgomery's early life in Cavendish was very lonely. Despite having relatives nearby, much of her childhood was spent alone. She created imaginary friends and worlds to cope with her loneliness, and Montgomery credited this time of her life with developing her creativity. Montgomery's imaginary friends were named Katie Maurice and Lucy Gray who lived in the "fairy room" behind the bookcase in the drawing room. During a church service, Montgomery asked her aunt where her dead mother was, leading her to point upwards. Montgomery saw a trap door in the church's ceiling, which led her to wonder why the minister didn't just get a ladder to retrieve her mother up in the church's ceiling.

In 1887, at age 13, Montgomery wrote in her diary that she had "early dreams of future fame." She submitted a poem for publication, writing, "I saw myself the wonder of my schoolmates – a little local celebrity." Upon rejection, Montgomery wrote, "Tears of disappointment would come in spite of myself, as I crept away to hide the poor crumpled manuscript in the depths of my trunk." She would later write, "down, deep down under all the discouragement and rebuff, I knew I would 'arrive' some day."

After completing her education in Cavendish, Montgomery spent one year (1890) in Prince Albert with her father and her stepmother, Mary Ann McRae. While in Prince Albert, Montgomery's first work, a poem titled "On Cape LeForce," was published in the Charlottetown paper, The Daily Patriot. She was as excited about this as she was about her return to her beloved Prince Edward Island in 1891. Before returning to Cavendish, Montgomery had another article published in the newspaper, describing her visit to a First Nations camp on the Great Plains. Montgomery often saw Blackfeet and Plains Cree in Prince Albert, writing that she saw many Indians on the Prairies who were much more handsome and attractive than the ones she had seen in the Maritimes.

However, her return to Cavendish was a great relief to her. Her time in Prince Albert was unhappy, for she did not get along with her stepmother. According to Montgomery, her father's marriage was not a happy one.

In 1893, she attended Prince of Wales College in Charlottetown to obtain a teacher's license. Montgomery loved Prince Edward Island. During solitary walks through the peaceful island countryside, Montgomery started to experience what she called "the flash" – a moment of tranquility and clarity when she felt an emotional ecstasy, and was inspired by the awareness of a higher spiritual power running through nature. Montgomery's accounts of this "flash" were later given to character Emily Byrd Starr in the "Emily of New Moon" trilogy, and also served as the basis for her descriptions of Anne Shirley's sense of emotional communion with nature. In 1905, Montgomery wrote in her journal that "amid the commonplaces of life, I was very near to a kingdom of ideal beauty. Between it and me hung only a thin veil. I could never quite draw it aside, but sometimes a wind fluttered it and I seemed to catch a glimpse of the enchanting realm beyond--only a glimpse--but those glimpses have always made life worthwhile." A deeply spiritual woman, Montgomery found the moments when she experienced "the flash" some of the most beautiful, moving and intense of her life.

She completed the two-year teaching program in Charlottetown in one year. Subsequently, in 1895 and 1896, she studied literature at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Death

Lucy Maud Montgomery Se
Gravestone of Lucy Maud Montgomery

On April 24, 1942, Montgomery was found dead in her bed in her Toronto home. The primary cause of death recorded on her death certificate was coronary thrombosis.

Montgomery was buried at the Cavendish Community Cemetery in Cavendish following her wake in the Green Gables farmhouse and funeral in the Cavendish United Church (formerly Cavendish Presbyterian Church).

During her lifetime, Montgomery had published twenty novels, over 500 short stories, an autobiography, and a book of poetry. Aware of her fame, by 1920 Montgomery began editing and recopying her journals, presenting her life as she wanted it remembered. In doing so, certain episodes were changed or omitted.

Legacy

Collections

The L. M. Montgomery Institute, founded in 1993, at the University of Prince Edward Island, promotes scholarly inquiry into the life, works, culture, and influence of L. M. Montgomery and coordinates most of the research and conferences surrounding her work. The Montgomery Institute collection consists of novels, manuscripts, texts, letters, photographs, sound recordings and artifacts and other Montgomery ephemera.

Her major collections (including personal journals, photographs, needlework, two book manuscripts, and her personal library) are archived in the McLaughlin Library's Archival and Special Collections at the University of Guelph.

The first biography of Montgomery was The Wheel of Things: A Biography of L. M. Montgomery (1975), written by Mollie Gillen. Dr. Gillen also discovered over 40 of Montgomery's letters to her pen-friend George Boyd MacMillan in Scotland and used them as the basis for her work. Beginning in the 1980s, her complete journals, edited by Mary Rubio and Elizabeth Waterston, were published by the Oxford University Press. From 1988–95, editor Rea Wilmshurst collected and published numerous short stories by Montgomery. Most of her essays, along with interviews with Montgomery, commentary on her work, and coverage of her death and funeral, appear in Benjamin Lefebvre's The L. M. Montgomery Reader, Volume 1: A Life in Print (2013).

Despite the fact that Montgomery published over twenty books, "she never felt she achieved her one 'great' book." Her readership, however, has always found her characters and stories to be among the best in fiction. Mark Twain said Montgomery's Anne was "the dearest and most moving and delightful child since the immortal Alice." Montgomery was honoured by being the first female in Canada to be named a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and was invested Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1935.

However, her fame was not limited to Canadian audiences. Anne of Green Gables became a success worldwide. For example, every year, thousands of Japanese tourists "make a pilgrimage to a green-gabled Victorian farmhouse in the town of Cavendish on Prince Edward Island." In 2012, the original novel Anne of Green Gables was ranked number nine among all-time best children's novels in a survey published by School Library Journal, a monthly with primarily U.S. audience. The British public ranked it number 41 among all novels in The Big Read, a 2003 BBC survey to determine the "nation's best-loved novel." The British scholar Faye Hammill observed that Montgomery is an author overshadowed by her creation as licence plates in Prince Edward Island bear the slogan "P.E.I. Home of Anne of Green Gables" rather than "P.E.I. Birthplace of L.M Montgomery. Much to Montgomery's own annoyance, the media in both the United States and Canada tried to project the personality of Anne Shirley onto her.

Landmarked places

Montgomery's home of Leaskdale Manse in Ontario, and the area surrounding Green Gables and her Cavendish home in Prince Edward Island, have both been designated National Historic Sites. Montgomery herself was designated a Person of National Historic Significance by the Government of Canada in 1943.

Bala's Museum in Bala, Ontario, is a house museum established in 1992. Officially it is "Bala's Museum with Memories of Lucy Maud Montgomery," for Montgomery and her family ate their meals in the boarding house while staying at another nearby boarding house during a July 1922 holiday that inspired her novel The Blue Castle (1926). The museum hosts some events pertaining to Montgomery or her fiction, including re-enactment of the holiday visit.

Honours and awards

Montgomery was honoured by King George V as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE); there were no Canadian orders, decorations or medals for civilians until the 1970s.

Montgomery was named a National Historic Person in 1943 by the Canadian federal government. Her Ontario residence was designated a National Historic Site in 1997 (Leaskdale Manse), while the place that inspired her famous novels, Green Gables, was formally recognized as "L. M. Montgomery's Cavendish National Historic Site" in 2004.

On May 15, 1975, the Post Office Department issued a stamp to "Lucy Maud Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables" designed by Peter Swan and typographed by Bernard N. J. Reilander. The 8¢ stamps are perforated 13 and were printed by Ashton-Potter Limited.

A pair of stamps was issued in 2008 by Canada Post, marking the centennial of the publication of Montgomery's classic first novel.

The City of Toronto named a park for her (Lucy Maud Montgomery Park) and in 1983 placed a historical marker there near the house where she lived from 1935 until her death in 1942.

On November 30, 2015 (her 141st birthday), Google honoured Lucy Maud Montgomery with a Google Doodle published in twelve countries.

Disputes over royalties intellectual property rights

There have been multiple adaptations of Montgomery's work. Television producer Kevin Sullivan negotiated permission with Montgomery's heirs prior to producing the popular 1985 miniseries Anne of Green Gables, and several sequels, only to have multiple legal disputes with them. In 1999 Sullivan and his partners announced plans to make Sullivan Entertainment a publicly traded company. In their prospectus they described the works based on Montgomery's novels as profitable. Montgomery's heirs sued him, claiming he had not paid them their contracted share of royalties, claiming the movies had failed to turn a profit.

Works

Novels

Anne of Green Gables series

FirstPageGreenGables
Title page of the first edition of Anne of Green Gables, published in 1908
  1. Anne of Green Gables (1908)
  2. Anne of Avonlea (1909)
  3. Anne of the Island (1915)
  4. Anne of Windy Poplars (1936)
  5. Anne's House of Dreams (1917)
  6. Anne of Ingleside (1939)
  7. Rainbow Valley (1919)
  8. Rilla of Ingleside (1921)
  9. The Blythes Are Quoted (2009) — was submitted to publisher the day of her death but not published in its entirety until sixty-seven years later.

Emily trilogy

  1. Emily of New Moon (1923)
  2. Emily Climbs (1925)
  3. Emily's Quest (1927)

Pat of Silver Bush

  1. Pat of Silver Bush (1933)
  2. Mistress Pat (1935)

The Story Girl

  1. The Story Girl (1911)
  2. The Golden Road (1913)

Stand alone novels

Short story collections

  • Chronicles of Avonlea (1912)
    • "The Hurrying of Ludovic"
    • "Old Lady Lloyd"
    • "Each In His Own Tongue"
    • "Little Joscelyn"
    • "The Winning of Lucinda"
    • "Old Man Shaw's Girl"
    • "Aunt Olivia's Beau"
    • "Quarantine at Alexander Abraham's"
    • "Pa Sloane's Purchase"
    • "The Courting of Prissy Strong"
    • "The Miracle at Carmody"
    • "The End of a Quarrel"
  • Further Chronicles of Avonlea (1920)
    • "Aunt Cynthia's Persian Cat"
    • "The Materializing of Cecil"
    • "Her Father's Daughter"
    • "Jane's Baby"
    • "The Dream-Child"
    • "The Brother Who Failed"
    • "The Return of Hester"
    • "The Little Brown Book of Miss Emily"
    • "Sara's Way"
    • "The Son of his Mother"
    • "The Education of Betty"
    • "In Her Selfless Mood"
    • "The Conscience Case of David Bell"
    • "Only a Common Fellow"
    • "Tannis of the Flats"
  • The Road to Yesterday (1974)
    • "An Afternoon With Mr. Jenkins"
    • "Retribution"
    • "The Twins Pretend"
    • "Fancy's Fool"
    • "A Dream Come True"
    • "Penelope Struts Her Theories"
    • "The Reconciliation"
    • "The Cheated Child"
    • "Fool's Errand"
    • "The Pot and the Kettle"
    • "Here Comes the Bride"
    • "Brother Beware"
    • "The Road to Yesterday"
    • "A Commonplace Woman"
  • The Doctor's Sweetheart and Other Stories, selected by Catherine McLay (1979)
    • "Kismet"
    • "Emily's Husband"
    • "The Girl and the Wild Race"
    • "The Promise of Mary Ellen"
    • "The Parting of the Ways"
    • "The Doctor's Sweetheart"
    • "By Grace of Julius Caeser"
    • "Akin to Love"
    • "The Finished Story"
    • "My Lady Jane"
    • "Abel and His Great Adventure"
    • "The Garden of Spices"
    • "The Bride is Waiting"
    • "I Know a Secret"
  • Akin to Anne: Tales of Other Orphans, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1988)
    • "Charlotte's Quest"
    • "Marcella's Reward"
    • "An Invitation Given on Impulse"
    • "Freda's Adopted Grave"
    • "Ted's Afternoon Off"
    • "The Girl Who Drove the Cows"
    • "Why Not Ask Miss Price?"
    • "Jane Lavinia"
    • "The Running Away of Chester"
    • "Millicent's Double"
    • "Penelope's Party Waist"
    • "The Little Black Doll"
    • "The Fraser Scholarship"
    • "Her Own People"
    • "Miss Sally's Company"
    • "The Story of an Invitation"
    • "The Softening of Miss Cynthia"
    • "Margaret's Patient"
    • "Charlotte's Ladies"
  • Along the Shore: Tales by the Sea, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1989)
    • "The Magical Bond of the Sea"
    • "The Life-Book of Uncle Jesse"
    • "Mackereling Out in the Gulf"
    • "Fair Exchange and No Robbery"
    • "Natty of Blue Point"
    • "The Light on the Big Dipper"
    • "An Adventure on Island Rock"
    • "How Don Was Saved"
    • "A Soul That Was Not at Home"
    • "Four Winds"
    • "A Sandshore Wooing"
    • "The Unhappiness of Miss Farquhar"
    • "A Strayed Allegiance"
    • "The Waking of Helen"
    • "Young Si"
    • "A House Divided Against Itself"
  • Among the Shadows: Tales from the Darker Side, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1990)
  • After Many Days: Tales of Time Passed, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1991)
  • Against the Odds: Tales of Achievement, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1993)
  • At the Altar: Matrimonial Tales, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1994)
  • Across the Miles: Tales of Correspondence, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1995)
  • Christmas with Anne and Other Holiday Stories, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1995)
  • The Blythes Are Quoted, edited by Benjamin Lefebvre (2009) (companion book to Rilla of Ingleside)

Short stories by chronological order

  • Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories: 1896 to 1901 (2008)
    • "A Case of Trespass" (1897)
    • "A Christmas Inspiration" (1901)
    • "A Christmas Mistake" (1899)
    • "A Strayed Allegiance" (1897)
    • "An Invitation Given on Impulse" (1900)
    • "Detected by the Camera" (1897)
    • "In Spite of Myself" (1896)
    • "Kismet" (1899)
    • "Lillian's Business Venture" (1900)
    • "Miriam's Lover" (1901)
    • "Miss Calista's Peppermint Bottle" (1900)
    • "The Jest that Failed" (1901)
    • "The Pennington's Girl" (1900)
    • "The Red Room" (1898)
    • "The Setness of Theodosia" (1901)
    • "The Story of An Invitation" (1901)
    • "The Touch of Fate" (1899)
    • "The Waking of Helen" (1901)
    • "The Way of Winning Anne" (1899)
    • "Young Si" (1901)
  • Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories: 1902 to 1903 (2008)
    • "A Patent Medicine Testimonial" (1903)
    • "A Sandshore Wooing" (1903)
    • "After Many Days" (1903)
    • "An Unconventional Confidence" (1903)
    • "Aunt Cyrilla's Christmas Basket" (1903)
    • "Davenport's Story" (1902)
    • "Emily's Husband" (1903)
    • "Min" (1903)
    • "Miss Cordelia's Accommodation" (1903)
    • "Ned's Stroke of Business" (1903)
    • "Our Runaway Kite" (1903)
    • "The Bride Roses" (1903)
    • "The Josephs' Christmas" (1902)
    • "The Magical Bond of the Sea" (1903)
    • "The Martyrdom of Estella" (1902)
    • "The Old Chest at Wyther Grange" (1903)
    • "The Osborne's Christmas" (1903)
    • "The Romance of Aunt Beatrice" (1902)
    • "The Running Away of Chester" (1903)
    • "The Strike at Putney" (1903)
    • "The Unhappiness of Miss Farquhar" (1903)
    • "Why Mr. Cropper Changed His Mind" (1903)
  • Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories: 1904 (2008)
    • "A Fortunate Mistake" (1904)
    • "An Unpremeditated Ceremony" (1904)
    • "At the Bay Shore Farm" (1904)
    • "Elizabeth's Child" (1904)
    • "Freda's Adopted Grave" (1904)
    • "How Don Was Saved" (1904)
    • "Miss Madeline's Proposal" (1904)
    • "Miss Sally's Company" (1904)
    • "Mrs. March's Revenge" (1904)
    • "Nan" (1904)
    • "Natty of Blue Point" (1904)
    • "Penelope's Party Waist" (1904)
    • "The Girl and The Wild Race" (1904)
    • "The Promise of Lucy Ellen" (1904)
    • "The Pursuit of the Ideal" (1904)
    • "The Softening of Miss Cynthia" (1904)
    • "Them Notorious Pigs" (1904)
    • "Why Not Ask Miss Price?" (1904)
  • Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories: 1905 to 1906 (2008)
    • "A Correspondence and a Climax" (1905)
    • "An Adventure on Island Rock" (1906)
    • "At Five O'Clock in the Morning" (1905)
    • "Aunt Susanna's Birthday Celebration" (1905)
    • "Bertie's New Year" (1905)
    • "Between the Hill and the Valley" (1905)
    • "Clorinda's Gifts" (1906)
    • "Cyrilla's Inspiration" (1905)
    • "Dorinda's Desperate Deed" (1906)
    • "Her Own People" (1905)
  • [1905 to 1906, continued]
    • "Ida's New Year Cake" (1905)
    • "In the Old Valley" (1906)
    • "Jane Lavinia" (1906)
    • "Mackereling Out in the Gulf" (1905)
    • "Millicent's Double " (1905)
    • "The Blue North Room" (1906)
    • "The Christmas Surprise At Enderly Road" (1905)
    • "The Dissipation of Miss Ponsonby" (1906)
    • "The Falsoms' Christmas Dinner" (1906)
    • "The Fraser Scholarship" (1905)
    • "The Girl at the Gate" (1906)
    • "The Light on the Big Dipper" (1906)
    • "The Prodigal Brother" (1906)
    • "The Redemption of John Churchill" (1906)
    • "The Schoolmaster's Letter" (1905)
    • "The Story of Uncle Dick" (1906)
    • "The Understanding of Sister Sara" (1905)
    • "The Unforgotten One" (1906)
    • "The Wooing of Bessy" (1906)
    • "Their Girl Josie " (1906)
    • "When Jack and Jill Took a Hand" (1905)
  • Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories: 1907 to 1908 (2008)
    • "A Millionaire's Proposal" (1907)
    • "A Substitute Journalist" (1907)
    • "Anna's Love Letters" (1908)
    • "Aunt Caroline's Silk Dress" (1907)
    • "Aunt Susanna's Thanksgiving Dinner" (1907)
    • "By Grace of Julius Caesar" (1908)
    • "By the Rule of Contrary" (1908)
    • "Fair Exchange and No Robbery " (1907)
    • "Four Winds" (1908)
    • "Marcella's Reward" (1907)
    • "Margaret's Patient" (1908)
    • "Matthew Insists on Puffed Sleeves" (1908)
    • "Missy's Room" (1907)
    • "Ted's Afternoon Off" (1907)
    • "The Girl Who Drove the Cows" (1908)
    • "The Doctor's Sweetheart" (1908)
    • "The End of the Young Family Feud" (1907)
    • "The Genesis of the Doughnut Club" (1907)
    • "The Growing Up of Cornelia" (1908)
    • "The Old Fellow's Letter " (1907)
    • "The Parting of the Ways" (1907)
    • "The Promissory Note" (1907)
    • "The Revolt of Mary Isabel" (1908)
    • "The Twins and a Wedding" (1908)
  • Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories: 1909 to 1922 (2008)
    • "A Golden Wedding" (1909)
    • "A Redeeming Sacrifice" (1909)
    • "A Soul that Was Not At Home" (1915)
    • "Abel And His Great Adventure" (1917)
    • "Akin to Love" (1909)
    • "Aunt Philippa and the Men" (1915)
    • "Bessie's Doll" (1914)
    • "Charlotte's Ladies" (1911)
    • "Christmas at Red Butte " (1909)
    • "How We Went to the Wedding" (1913)
    • "Jessamine" (1909)
    • "Miss Sally's Letter" (1910)
    • "My Lady Jane" (1915)
    • "Robert Turner's Revenge" (1909)
    • "The Fillmore Elderberries" 1909)
    • "The Finished Story" (1912)
    • "The Garden of Spices" (1918)
    • "The Girl and the Photograph" (1915)
    • "The Gossip of Valley View" (1910)
    • "The Letters" (1910)
    • "The Life-Book of Uncle Jesse" (1909)
    • "The Little Black Doll" (1909)
    • "The Man on the Train" (1914)
    • "The Romance of Jedediah" (1912)
    • "The Tryst of the White Lady" (1922)
    • "Uncle Richard's New Year Dinner" (1910)
    • "White Magic" (1921)

Poetry

  • The Watchman and Other Poems (1916)
  • The Poetry of Lucy Maud Montgomery, selected by John Ferns and Kevin McCabe (1987)
  • A World of Songs: Selected Poems, 1894-1921 (The L.M. Montgomery Library), edited by Benjamin Lefebvre (2019)

Non-fiction

  • Courageous Women (1934) (with Marian Keith and Mabel Burns McKinley)

Images for kids

  • Day256cgreengablesk

    Birthplace of Lucy Maud Montgomery

  • LMM Leaskdale

    Leaskdale Manse, home of Lucy Maud Montgomery from 1911 to 1926

See also

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