Abdeali Saherwala | Contributor
Featured Image: Andrea McKenzie (left) and Jane Ledwell (right) have long-lived passions for L.M. Montgomery, a Canadian author who has fascinated readers for over 100 years. | Courtesy of YFile
York writing department professor Dr. Andrea McKenzie has published the book L.M. Montgomery and War “to re-establish Montgomery as a major war writer,” with the help of award-winning poet Jane Ledwell.
Anne of Green Gables is one of the most beloved Canadian novels of all time. It was written by Lucy Maud Montgomery, more commonly known as L.M. Montgomery.
McKenzie chose Montgomery because she is “one of the few Canadian writers whose work is still popular, even a century after its publication.”
“Anne of Green Gables, her best-selling first novel, was published in 1908, and continues to fascinate readers—it’s still being adapted for TV and film. Two TV films and one series (“Anne” in Canada, “Anne with an E” outside Canada) have come out recently and are making serious waves and creating controversy,” says McKenzie.
Ledwell, a native of Prince Edward Island, says: “I have had a long connection with L.M. Montgomery, including working at the Green Gables House—a famous PEI landmark—as a student summer job. I am particularly interested in historical women whose writing lives intersected with Prince Edward Island.”
Ledwell and McKenzie met at an L.M. Montgomery conference in Charlottetown, PEI. According to Ledwell, “Dr. McKenzie was the co-chair of the 2014 L.M. Montgomery Institute conference on L.M. Montgomery and War at UPEI. I got to know her as a member of the steering committee for the Institute and was involved in helping to plan the conference.
“She approached me about being a co-editor for the book that would become L.M. Montgomery and War, and I was pleased to say yes,” she adds.
McKenzie and Ledwell “had to choose the strongest essays—the ones with the best ideas—from all the submissions we received,” says McKenzie.
“This means editing for content, organization, and language and wording. Some of the authors were emerging scholars, which meant guiding them through multiple series of revisions. We also had to decide on themes for the book’s parts and decide which order would make the most sense for readers,” she adds.
In addition, Ledwell mentions that both of them worked with the contributors to refine their chapters, co-wrote the introduction, and went through all the steps with McGill-Queen’s University Press, resulting in the final version of the book.
Both are satisfied with their final product because of their long-lived passion for Montgomery. McKenzie’s favourite Montgomery novel is Rilla of Ingleside, which is about WWI.
“Montgomery poignantly writes of the strain, stress, and grief that girls and women suffered in Canada, but she also portrays their courage and active work during World War One,” she says.
The novel also highlights the pressures that young men faced to enlist and “the horrors they undergo overseas.”
Due to Ledwell’s personal connection with PEI, “Montgomery’s characters are ubiquitous around [her].” Ledwell’s mother read Anne of Green Gables to her when she was eight, her favorite L.M. Montgomery novel was Emily of New Moon.
During their research, both found several interesting aspects about Montgomery. McKenzie found “the contrast between the sparkle of wit and humour in her public works and the frequent depressions and darkness of her private life.”
Ledwell found that Montgomery’s writing has the ability “to build a rich and real community around a character.”
