Anne Of Avonlea - Chapter 29

"Anne of Avonlea" was written by L. M. Montgomery and published in 1909, following the enormous success of Anne of Green Gables the prior year.

In this second book, Anne Shirley is sixteen years old and working in Avonlea as the local schoolteacher, determined to be sensible, responsible and worthy of the life she’s been given...

Chapter 29 contrasts poetry and prose...and how we choose to see life...

As Miss Lavendar’s wedding draws near, Anne revels in the romance she feels she has helped shape, even while Marilla briskly reduces it to plain facts.

The chapter explores the difference between living through imagination and viewing life practically, suggesting that both have their place...

Transcript

Hello there,

Thank you so much for joining me for this continued reading of Anne of Avonlea,

The charming old sequel to Anne of Green Gables.

This book was published in 1909 by Lucy Moore Montgomery and,

Believe it or not,

We've actually reached the penultimate chapter.

There's this one and one more and we are at the end of this sequel.

If you haven't already heard the preceding parts of this book and you'd like to,

You can certainly look for the playlist for Anne of Avonlea and you'll find everything there in order.

But for now,

Let's just take a moment here to have a nice deep exhale,

Letting go of the day,

Letting go of whichever baggage we might be bringing along with us into this moment.

For right now,

There's nowhere else we have to go,

Nothing else we have to be doing,

So we can just relax,

Get ourselves comfortable,

And enjoy the penultimate chapter of Anne of Avonlea.

Chapter 29,

Poetry and Prose.

For the next month,

Anne lived in what,

For Avonlea,

Might be called a whirl of excitement.

The preparation of her own modest outfit for Redmond was of secondary importance.

Miss Lavender was getting ready to be married and the Stone House was the scene of endless consultations and plannings and discussions,

With Charlotte IV hovering on the outskirts of things in agitated delight and wonder.

Then the dressmaker came and there was the rapture and wretchedness of choosing fashions and being fitted.

Anne and Diana spent half their time at Echo Lodge and there were nights when Anne could not sleep for wondering whether she had done right in advising Miss Lavender to select brown rather than navy blue for her travelling dress and to have her grey silk made princess.

Everybody concerned in Miss Lavender's story was very happy.

Paul Irving rushed to Green Gables to talk the news over with Anne as soon as his father had told him.

I knew I could trust father to pick me out a nice little second mother,

He said proudly.

It's a fine thing to have a father you can depend on,

Teacher.

I just love Miss Lavender.

Grandma is pleased too.

She says she's real glad father didn't pick out an American for his second wife because although it turned out alright the first time,

Such a thing wouldn't be likely to happen twice.

Mrs Lynde says she thoroughly approves.

Of the match and thinks it likely Miss Lavender will give up her queer notions and be like other people now that she's going to be married.

But I hope she won't give her queer notions up,

Teacher,

Because I like them and I don't want her to be like other people.

There are too many other people around as it is,

You know,

Teacher.

Charlotta IV was another radiant person.

Oh Miss Shirley ma'am,

It has all turned out so beautiful.

When Mr Irving and Miss Lavender come back from their tower,

I'm to go up to Boston and live with them and me only 15 and the other girls never went till they were 16.

Ain't Mr Irving splendid?

He just worships the ground she treads on and it makes me feel so queer sometimes to see the look in his eyes when he's watching her.

It beggars description,

Miss Shirley ma'am.

I'm awful thankful they're so fond of each other.

It's the best way when all's said and done,

Though some folks can get along without it.

I've got an aunt who has been married three times and says she married the first time for love and the last two times for strictly business and was happy with all three,

Except at the times of the funerals.

But I think she took a risk,

Miss Shirley ma'am.

Oh,

It's all so romantic,

Breathed Anne to Marilla that night.

If I hadn't taken the wrong path that day we went to Mr Kimball's,

I'd never have known Miss Lavender.

And if I hadn't met her,

I'd never have taken Paul there and he'd never have written to his father about visiting Miss Lavender just as Mr Irving was starting for San Francisco.

Mr Irving says whenever he got that letter he made up his mind to send his partner to San Francisco and come here instead.

He hadn't heard anything of Miss Lavender for 15 years.

Somebody had told him then that she was to be married and he thought she was and never asked anybody anything about her.

And now everything has come right and I had a hand in bringing it about.

Perhaps,

As Mrs Lynn says,

Everything is foreordained and it was bound to happen anyway,

But even so it's nice to think one was an instrument used by predestination.

Yes,

Indeed.

It's very romantic.

I can't see that it's so terribly romantic at all,

Said Marilla rather crisply.

Marilla thought Ann was too worked up about it and had plenty to do with getting ready for college without traipsing to Echo Lodge two days out of three,

Helping Miss Lavender.

In the first place,

Two young fools quarrel and turn sulky.

Then Steve Irving goes to the States and after a spell gets married up there and is perfectly happy from all accounts.

Then his wife dies and after a decent interval he thinks he'll come home and see if his first fancy will have him.

Meanwhile,

She's been living single,

Probably because nobody nice enough came along to want her,

And they meet and agree to be married after all.

Now,

Where is the romance in all that?

Oh,

There isn't any when you put it that way,

Gasped Ann,

Rather as if somebody had thrown cold water over her.

I suppose that's how it looks in prose.

But it's very different if you look at it through poetry,

And I think it's nicer,

Ann recovered herself and her eyes shone and her cheeks flushed,

To look at it through poetry.

Marilla glanced at the radiant young face and refrained from further sarcastic comments.

Perhaps some realisation came to her that,

After all,

It was better to have,

Like Ann,

The vision and the faculty divine,

That gift which the world cannot bestow or take away,

Of looking at life through some transfiguring or revealing medium,

Whereby everything seemed apparelled in celestial light,

Wearing a glory and a freshness not visible to those who,

Like herself and Charlotte IV,

Looked at things only through prose.

When's the wedding to be?

She asked after a pause.

The last Wednesday in August.

They are to be married in the garden under the honeysuckle trellis,

The very spot where Mr Irving proposed to her 25 years ago.

Marilla,

That is romantic.

Even in prose.

There's to be nobody there except Mrs Irving and Paul and Gilbert and Diana and I and Miss Lavender's cousins.

And they will leave on the six o'clock train for a trip to the Pacific coast.

When they come back in the fall,

Paul and Charlotte IV are to go up to Boston to live with them.

But Echo Lodge is to be left just as it is.

Only,

Of course,

They'll sell the hens and cow and board up the windows.

And every summer they're coming down to live in it.

I'm so glad.

It would have hurt me dreadfully next winter at Redmond to think of that dear stone house all stripped and deserted with empty rooms,

Or far worse still,

With other people living in it.

But I can think of it now,

Just as I've always seen it,

Waiting happily for the summer to bring life and laughter back to it again.

There was more romance in the world than that which had fallen to the share of the middle-aged lovers of the stone house.

Anne stumbled suddenly on it one evening when she went over to Orchard Slope by the woodcut and came out into the Barry garden.

Diana Barry and Fred Wright were standing together under the big willow.

Diana was leaning against the grey trunk,

Her lashes cast down on very crimson cheeks.

One hand was held by Fred,

Who stood with his face bent toward her,

Stammering something in low,

Earnest tones.

There were no other people in the world except their two selves at that magic moment.

So neither of them saw Anne,

Who,

After one dazed glance of comprehension,

Turned and sped noiselessly back through the spruce wood,

Never stopping,

Till she gained her own gable room where she sat breathlessly down by her window and tried to collect her scattered wits.

Diana and Fred are in love with each other,

She gasped.

Oh,

It does seem so,

So,

So hopelessly grown up.

Anne,

Of late,

Had not been without her suspicions that Diana was proving false to the melancholy,

Byronic hero of her early dreams.

But,

As things seen are mightier than things heard or suspected,

The realisation that it was actually so,

Came to her with almost the shock of perfect surprise.

This was succeeded by a queer,

Little,

Lonely feeling.

As if,

Somehow,

Diana had gone forward into a new world,

Shutting a gate behind her,

Leaving Anne on the outside.

Things are changing so fast,

It almost frightens me,

Anne thought,

A little sadly.

And I'm afraid that this can't help making some difference between Diana and me.

I'm sure I can't tell her all my secrets after this.

She might tell Fred.

And what can she see in Fred?

He's very nice and jolly,

But he's just Fred Wright.

It is always a very puzzling question.

What can somebody see in somebody else?

But,

How fortunate after all,

That it is so,

For,

If everybody saw alike,

Well,

In that case,

As the old Indian said,

Everybody would want my squaw.

It was plain that Diana did see something in Fred Wright.

However,

Anne's eyes might be holden.

Diana came to Green Gables the next evening,

A pensive,

Shy,

Young lady,

And told Anne the whole story in the dusky seclusion of the East Gable.

Both girls cried and kissed and laughed.

I'm so happy,

Said Diana,

But it does seem ridiculous to think of me being engaged.

What is it really like to be engaged?

Asked Anne,

Curiously.

Well,

That all depends on who you're engaged to,

Answered Diana,

With that maddening air of superior wisdom always assumed by those who are engaged over those who are not.

It's perfectly lovely to be engaged to Fred,

But I think it would be simply horrid to be engaged to anyone else.

There's not much comfort for the rest of us in that,

Seeing that there is only one Fred,

Laughed Anne.

Oh,

Anne,

You don't understand,

Said Diana in vexation.

I didn't mean that.

It's so hard to explain.

Never mind.

You'll understand sometime when your own turn comes.

Bless you,

Dearest of Dianas.

I understand now what is an imagination for,

If not to enable you to peep at life through other people's eyes.

You must be my bridesmaid,

You know,

Anne.

Promise me that,

Wherever you may be when I'm married,

I'll come from the ends of the earth if necessary,

Promised Anne solemnly.

Of course,

It won't be for ever so long yet,

Said Diana,

Blushing.

Three years at the very least,

For I'm only 18,

And mother says no daughter of hers shall be married before she's 21.

Besides,

Fred's father is going to buy the Abraham Fletcher farm for him,

And he says he's got to have it two-thirds paid for before he'll give it to him in his own name.

But three years isn't any too much time to get ready for housekeeping,

For I haven't a speck of fancy work made yet.

But I'm going to begin crocheting doilies tomorrow.

Myra Gillis had 37 doilies when she was married,

And I'm determined I shall have as many as she had.

I suppose it would be perfectly impossible to keep house with only 36 doilies,

Conceded Anne,

With a solemn face but dancing eyes.

Diana looked hurt.

I didn't think you'd make fun of me,

Anne,

She said reproachfully.

Dearest,

I wasn't making fun of you,

Cried Anne repentantly.

I was only teasing you a bit.

I think you'll make the sweetest little housekeeper in the world,

And I think it's perfectly lovely of you to be planning already for your home dreams.

Anne had no sooner uttered the phrase,

Home are dreams,

Than it captivated her fancy,

And she immediately began the erection of one of her own.

It was,

Of course,

Tenanted by an ideal master,

Dark,

Proud and melancholy.

But oddly enough,

Gilbert Blythe persisted in hanging about too,

Helping her arrange pictures,

Lay out gardens and accomplish sundry other tasks,

Which a proud and melancholy hero evidently considered beneath his dignity.

Anne tried to banish Gilbert's image from her castle in Spain,

But somehow he went on being there.

So Anne,

Being in a hurry,

Gave up the attempt and pursued her aerial architecture with such success that her home of dreams was built and furnished before Diana spoke again.

I suppose,

Anne,

You must think it's funny I should like Fred so well,

When he's so different from the kind of man I've always said I would marry,

The tall,

Slender kind.

But somehow,

I wouldn't want Fred to be tall and slender,

Because,

Don't you see,

He wouldn't be Fred then.

Of course,

Added Diana rather dolefully,

We will be a dreadfully pudgy couple.

But,

After all,

That's better than one of us being short and fat and the other tall and lean,

Like Morgan Sloan and his wife.

Mrs.

Lynn says it always makes her think of the long and short of it when she sees them together.

Well,

Said Anne to herself that night as she brushed her hair before her guilt-framed mirror,

I am glad Diana is so happy and satisfied.

But when my turn comes,

If it ever does,

I do hope there'll be something a little more thrilling about it.

But then Diana thought so too,

Once.

I've heard her say time and again she'd never get engaged any pokey,

Commonplace way.

He'd have to do something splendid to win her.

But she has changed.

Perhaps I'll change too.

But I won't.

And I'm determined I won't.

I think these engagements are dreadfully unsettling things when they happen to your intimate friends.

You