The Life of L.M. Montgomery

 Hello everyone, and welcome back! If you have been following my blog, you know that I love reading. Last time I wrote about one of my favourite British authors, Jane Austen, who published her novels during the first half of the nineteenth century. Today, I will write about my favourite Canadian author, L.M. Montgomery. She lived almost a century later and produced many great works, some of which might be familiar to you.

Here is the source that I used for my research: https://lmmontgomery.ca/about/lmm/her-life

https://www.anneofgreengables.com/blog/l-m-montgomery-a-woman-history-cant-forget

    Lucy Maud Montgomery was born on November 30, 1874, in Clifton (now called New London) on Prince Edward Island. Her mother passed away when she was 21 months old. Shortly after, her father left her with her maternal grandparents in Cavendish, deciding to head east and eventually settling in Saskatchewan and remarrying. 

    Even if Montgomery lived only with her grandparents, she wasn't lonely. She used her imagination, spent time in nature and poured herself into books and writing to keep busy. She started keeping a journal and writing poetry when she was only nine years old. At six, she began attending a one-room school near where she lived in Cavendish. 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/189420050@N03/51193318242

    She completed all her early education at that school, except while visiting her father in Saskatchewan between 1890 and 1891. It was while residing with her father that she published her first piece, a poem called On Cape LeForce. Between 1893 and 1894, Montgomery studied for her teacher's license at the Prince of Wales College, completing the two-year curriculum in one and graduating with honours. She left teaching between 1895 and 1896 to study selected courses in English literature at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, becoming one of the first women of her time to seek higher education.

https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/anne-of-green-gables

    In 1905, she wrote her first and most famous novel, Anne of Green Gables. Multiple publishers rejected it, but finally, in 1908, it was published by a Boston publisher. After her marriage to the Reverend Ewan Macdonald in 1911, she moved to Ontario to be with her husband and only returned to PEI for occasional visits and in death, where she was buried near her home in Cavendish in 1943.

My opinion

    I believe that L.M. Montgomery used her life experience in her novels. I have read most of her works, and they all have similar aspects. First of all, most of the main characters are orphan girls, like Anne Shirley in the Anne of Green Gables series or Emily Byrd Starr in the Emily of New Moon trilogy. In the latter, the main character, Emily, is taken in by her mother's family (just like Montgomery was when her father left). In some of her other novels, like The Blue Castle, the main character only lost one of their parents. Also, most of L.M. Montgomery's books take place on Prince Edward Island, a place that was very dear to her. Knowing that she spent most of her years in this province, it's no wonder why she chose it as the setting for so many of her novels. It inspired me to learn that she pursued higher education, which was rare for women of her time. She was probably a trailblazer for many young women who looked up to her as an author and teacher, showing them that anything was possible if they worked hard enough.

Question

    Before ending this blog post, I would like to ask you a question: How many of L.M. Montgomery's novels use Prince Edward Island as their setting?

You will find the answer to this question in the link I provided at the beginning of the post.