November 30 – Happy Birthday, Lucy Maud Montgomery

nPosted on November 30, 2017

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nI’ve read about authors whose books languished – either unpublished, or mostly unknown and unread – during their lifetime, but became popular after they died.

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nThis is not one of those stories.

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nLucy Maud Montgomery, born on this date in 1874 on Prince Edward Island in Canada, was an instant hit with her very first novel, Anne of Green Gables.

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nMontgomery was prolific – that means she wrote a lot – with 20 novels, 530 short stories, 500 poems, and 30 essays to her credit. Even her non-published writings have been read, and even studied, as scholars have pored over her diaries and letters to learn which aspects of her writing are autobiographical.

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nAuthors are generally told to “write what you know.” This makes some sense – if you are, say, an Israeli girl who moves to Morocco, who else is going to write your story, if you do not?

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n(On the other hand, I’m glad that some authors take major flights of fantasy, or we wouldn’t have the Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Alice in Wonderland, Harry Potter at Hogwarts, or science fiction!)

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nMontgomery wrote about her beloved Prince Edward Island and other Canadian locations, and she wrote about a girl who, like herself, thrilled at the beauties of nature. Of course, the Anne books and Montgomery’s other novels are fiction, but her life inspired much in her books, and her books inspired interest in her life.

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nGreen Gables farm – an actual farm that was owned by Montgomery’s cousins – is a popular tourist site. Starting in the early 1900s, visitors from around the world began to visit Green Gables and the nearby town, and because of that interest, the farm and surrounding lands were made into Prince Edward Island National Park. Even now, the Green Gables farmhouse is one of the most-visited historic sites in all of Canada!

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nToday, get your Anne on. You can watch many different versions of Anne of Green Gables – movies, made-for-TV movies, TV series – both live-action and animated.

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nThere have also been radio productions, plays, musicals, and web productions!

nHere is a compilation of several different versions of an important scene from the story.

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nAlso on this date:

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nPlan ahead:

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• nDecember holidays 

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• nDecember birthdays

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• Historical anniversaries in December

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