Lucy Maud Montgomery

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Lucy Maud Montgomery
L.M. Montgomery
L.M. Montgomery ca. 1935
Born November 30, 1874(1874-11-30)
Clifton, Prince Edward Island
Died April 24, 1942 (aged 67)
Toronto, Ontario
Occupation novelist
Nationality Canadian
Notable work(s) Anne of Green Gables

Lucy Maud Montgomery CBE, (always called "Maud" by family and friends) and publicly known as L.M. Montgomery, (30 November 1874–24 April 1942) was a Canadian author, best known for a series of novels beginning with Anne of Green Gables, published in 1908.

Once published, Anne of Green Gables was an immediate success. The central character, Anne, an orphaned girl, made Montgomery famous in her lifetime and gave her an international following.[1] The first novel was followed by a series of sequels with Anne as the central character. The novels became the basis for the highly acclaimed 1985 CBC television miniseries, Anne of Green Gables and several other television movies and programs, including Road to Avonlea, which ran in Canada and the U.S. from 1990-1996.

Contents

[edit] Early life

Lucy Maud Montgomery, 1884 (age 10)

Lucy Maud Montgomery was born in Clifton (now New London), Prince Edward Island on November 30, 1874. Her mother, Clara Woolner Macneill Montgomery, died of tuberculosis when Maud was 21 months old. Her father, Hugh John Montgomery, moved to Saskatchewan when Montgomery was seven years old. She went to live with her maternal grandparents, Alexander Marquis Macneill and Lucy Woolner Macneill, in the nearby community of Cavendish and was raised by them in a strict and unforgiving manner. In 1890, Montgomery was sent to live in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, with her father and stepmother, but returned to the home of her grandparents after a year.

In 1893, following the completion of her grade school education in Cavendish, she attended Prince of Wales College in Charlottetown. Completing a two-year program in one year, she obtained her teaching certificate. In 1895 and 1896 she studied literature at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

[edit] Writing career and family life

Birth place of Lucy Maud Montgomery

Upon leaving Dalhousie, Montgomery worked as a teacher in various island schools. As well, beginning in 1897, she began to have her short stories published in various magazines and newspapers. A prolific talent, Montgomery had over 100 stories published from 1897 to 1907 inclusive.

In 1898 Montgomery moved back to Cavendish to live with her widowed grandmother. For a short time in 1901 and 1902 she worked in Halifax for the newspapers Chronicle and Echo. She returned to live with and care for her grandmother in 1902. Montgomery was inspired to write her first books during this time on Prince Edward Island.

In 1908, Montgomery published her first book, Anne of Green Gables. Three years later, shortly after her grandmother's death, she married Ewan (found in Montgomery's notes and letters as "Ewan") Macdonald (1870 - 1943), a Presbyterian Minister, and moved to Ontario where he had taken the position of minister of St. Paul's Presbyterian Church, Leaskdale in present-day Uxbridge Township, also affiliated with the congregation in nearby Zephyr.

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

Montgomery had three sons: Chester Cameron Macdonald (July 7, 1912–1964); Hugh Alexander Macdonald, who was stillborn August 13, 1914 and inspired the death of Anne Shirley's first child, Joyce, in Anne's House of Dreams; and Ewan Stuart Macdonald (October 7, 1915–1982).

Montgomery wrote her next eleven books from the Leaskdale manse. The structure was subsequently sold by the congregation and is now the Lucy Maud Montgomery Leaskdale Manse Museum. In 1926, the family moved in to the Norval Presbyterian Charge, in present-day Halton Hills, Ontario, where today the Lucy Maud Montgomery Memorial Garden can be seen from Highway 7.

In 1935, upon her husband's retirement, Montgomery moved to Swansea, Ontario, a suburb of Toronto, buying a house which she named "Journey's End", situated on the Humber River. Montgomery continued to write, publishing Anne of Windy Poplars in 1936, Jane of Lantern Hill in 1937, and Anne of Ingleside in 1939.

In the last year of her life, Montgomery completed what she intended to be a ninth book featuring Anne, titled The Blythes Are Quoted. It included fifteen short stories (many of which were previously published) that she revised to include Anne and her family as mainly peripheral characters; forty-one poems (most of which were previously published) that she attributed to Anne and to her son Walter, who died as a soldier in the Great War; and vignettes featuring the Blythe family members discussing the poems. An abridged version, which shortened and reorganized the stories and omitted all the vignettes and all but one of the poems, was published as a collection of short stories The Road to Yesterday in 1974. A complete edition of The Blythes Are Quoted, edited by Benjamin Lefebvre, will be published in its entirety by Viking Canada in October 2009.

[edit] Death and aftermath

Lucy Maud Montgomery MacDonald
wife of
Ewan MacDonald
1874 - 1942

It was reported that Montgomery died of congestive heart failure in Toronto. [2] However, it was revealed by her granddaughter Kate Macdonald Butler in September 2008 that Montgomery suffered from depression - possibly as a result of caring for her mentally ill husband for decades - and took her own life via a drug overdose.[3] But there is another point of view.[4][5]

According to Mary Rubio, who has written a biography of Montgomery Lucy Maud Montgomery: The Gift of Wings (2008), what she believes is her suicide note is actually an entry to be added to her journal and not supposed to be a suicide note. In all, during her lifetime she had published 20 novels, over 500 short stories, an autobiography and a book of poetry. She was buried at the Cavendish Community Cemetery in Cavendish following her wake in the Green Gables farmhouse and funeral in the local Presbyterian church.

Her major collections are archived at the University of Guelph, while the L.M. Montgomery Institute at the University of Prince Edward Island coordinates most of the research and conferences surrounding her work. 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.

[edit] Works

[edit] Novels

First page of "Anne of Green Gables", published in 1908

[edit] Short story collections

  • Chronicles of Avonlea (1912)
  • Further Chronicles of Avonlea (1920)
  • The Road to Yesterday (1974)
  • The Doctor's Sweetheart, selected by Catherine McLay (1979)
  • Akin to Anne: Tales of Other Orphans, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1988)
  • Along the Shore: Tales by the Sea, edited by Rea Wilmshurst (1989)
  • 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)

[edit] Short stories by chronological order

[edit] Poetry

  • The Watchman & Other Poems (1916)
  • The Poetry of Lucy Maud Montgomery, selected by John Ferns and Kevin McCabe (1987)

[edit] Non-fiction

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

[edit] Autobiography

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Lucy Maud Montgomery and Anne. InfoPEI. Retrieved on: December 22, 2007
  2. ^ Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery Volume V: 1935-1942 P. 399
    The primary cause of death on her certificate was "Coronary Thrombosis."
  3. ^ Macdonald Butler, Kate (2008-09-27). "The heartbreaking truth about Anne's creator". Globe and Mail. http://v1.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080919.wmhmontgomery0920/BNStory/mentalhealth/. Retrieved 2009-08-13. 
  4. ^ Adams, James (2008-09-24). "Lucy Maud suffered 'unbearable psychological pain'". Globe and Mail. http://v1.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080924.wmontgomery24/BNStory/mentalhealth/. Retrieved 2009-08-13. 
  5. ^ "Is this Lucy Maud's suicide note?". Globe and Mail. 2008-09-24. http://v1.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080924.wmontgomeryside24/BNStory/mentalhealth. Retrieved 2009-08-13. 

[edit] References

  • Gammel, Irene. "Looking for Anne of Green Gables: The Story of L. M. Montgomery and Her Literary Classic." St. Martin's Press, New York, 2008. ISBN 0-312-38237-5.
  • Heilbron, Alexandra, “Remembering Lucy Maud Montgomery.” Dundurn Press, 2001. ISBN 9781550023626.

[edit] External links

[edit] Texts, images and collections

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[edit] Audiobook

  • LibriVox (free audiobooks of public domain)

[edit] Organizations

[edit] Other information

v • d • e
Works by Lucy Maud Montgomery
Novels

Anne of Green Gables (1908) · Anne of Avonlea (1909) · Kilmeny of the Orchard (1910) · The Story Girl (1911) · The Golden Road (1913) · Anne of the Island (1915) · Anne's House of Dreams (1917) · Rainbow Valley (1919) · Rilla of Ingleside (1921) · Emily of New Moon (1923) · Emily Climbs (1925) · The Blue Castle (1926) · Emily's Quest (1927) · Magic for Marigold (1929) · A Tangled Web (1931) · Pat of Silver Bush (1932) · Mistress Pat (1935) · Anne of Windy Poplars (1936) · Jane of Lantern Hill (1937) · Anne of Ingleside (1939)
Short story collections
Poetry

The Watchman & Other Poems (1916) · The Poetry of Lucy Maud Montgomery (1987)
Non-fiction

The Alpine Path: The Story of My Career (1917) · Courageous Women (1934) (with Marian Keith and Mabel Burns McKinley) · The Selected Journals of L. M. Montgomery, Vol. I–V (1985–2004)
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