2024 is L.M. Montgomery’s 150th birthday! The L.M. Montgomery Institute (LMMI) at the University of Prince Edward Island is celebrating with 150 tributes – celebratory statements or greetings – that reflect upon personal connections to Montgomery or on an aspect of her life, work, or legacy.
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To celebrate World Humanitarian Day (August 19), this week we have four tributes from Sarah Emsley, Robert Guy, Kim DeEll Stewart, and Bonnie J. Tulloch that speak to Montgomery’s legacy in guiding her readers to remain curious about what lies beyond the bend in the road, especially when navigating the haunted woods.
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Sarah Emsley on what lies beyond the bend in the road
Dear Maud,
You are like the heroine of Barbara Cooney’s picture book Miss Rumphius, scattering lupine seeds and inspiration, following the advice, “You must do something to make the world more beautiful.” You’ve inspired me and countless others to keep diaries, take photographs, create scrapbooks, write stories, and dedicate our lives to climbing the Alpine Path. You inspired my uncle to tell stories to my cousins, siblings, and me about the adventures of a giraffe named Gerard of Green Gables on our first PEI trip. And you inspired my four-year-old daughter, during a summer we spent immersed in the world of Green Gables, Avonlea, and “Anne” musicals to sing, “You’ve got to go the way that your imagination’s going.” Thank you for inspiring people around the world to be curious and hopeful, even in the face of adversity and sorrow, about what lies beyond “the bend in the road.”
Sarah Emsley
Sarah Emsley is the author of Jane Austen’s Philosophy of the Virtues and essays on Austen, Edith Wharton, L.M. Montgomery, and other writers, and she lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, with her family.
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Robert Guy on Montgomery’s gift of hope
I’ve found myself over the years continually coming back to L.M. Montgomery, who with her endearing characters, enchanting stories, and profoundly relational insights, has deservedly earned herself a place among the modern classics!
In recent days, what has attracted me to more deeply engage with Montgomery’s writings is the gift of hope that she offers to her readers. Though our world can be quite unsettling, disturbing, and overwhelming, Montgomery has consistently depicted in her stories a hopeful outlook, one anchored within the very realities of life, and skillfully conveyed in ways that we can envision and embrace in our own lives.
Thank you, Lucy Maud Montgomery, for facing our world as it is, for finding the courage to convey to your readers what we so deeply need to hear, and for helping us to see the rays of light and the glimmers of hope that we otherwise might miss.
Robert Guy is an independent scholar and writer from Pennsylvania.
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Kim DeEll Stewart on Montgomery’s helping her readers find purpose
Just shy of thirty years into a nursing career, I had to stop due to a physical disability. As far back as I can remember I always enjoyed reading and writing, with L.M. Montgomery being a favoured author. For the years between my going off work to my fiftieth birthday trip to Prince Edward Island in 2023, I always felt like I was lost, as I no longer had the identity and purpose of a nurse. When I visited Montgomery Park and the final resting place of Maud in the Cavendish Cemetery, it was at those two places that I felt what I was called to do.
Thank you, Maud, for speaking to me (I still remember the goosebumps) and helping me find where I now belong. Writing and studying your life and legacy will in turn change my life and build my own sense of belonging. Your legacy changes people’s lives and helps them find purpose again.
Kim DeEll Stewart is a novice scholar in the study of L.M. Montgomery and started her Master's in Literary Studies in May of this year, with a focus on all things Montgomery. PEI is her favourite vacation spot, thanks to Maud.
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Bonnie J. Tulloch on navigating the haunted woods with kindred spirits
In a journal entry dated Sunday, December 14th, 1907, L.M. Montgomery shares her surprise at unknowingly conquering a significant childhood fear: “walk[ing] alone through the ‘Cavendish Road woods’ after dark” (emphasis in original). I first read Montgomery’s novels while navigating my own childhood fears as a beloved family member battled cancer. I was seventeen, on the brink of what many might consider adulthood; and yet, I felt more like a child than ever. Reading Anne of Green Gables for the first time, a story that I was familiar with through the Sullivan productions, brought me a sense of comfort and joy. Having faced many more fears since then, I now realize that everyone is navigating their own haunted woods. Montgomery’s words, however, remind me that we don’t have to walk them alone. Life becomes a lot less frightening when brightened by the light of kindred spirits like her.
Bonnie J. Tulloch is the inaugural winner of the LMMI's Elizabeth R. Epperly Award for Outstanding Early Career Paper in 2018. She has published work on Anne of Green Gables in the Journal of L.M. Montgomery Studies and in two edited collections on Montgomery. She currently serves as the Journal Coordinator for the Journal of L.M. Montgomery Studies.
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Next week the tributes will feature some UPEI/LMMI Avery Scholars.