{"id":37639,"date":"2011-05-12T08:57:25","date_gmt":"2011-05-12T12:57:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=37639"},"modified":"2024-10-27T17:53:22","modified_gmt":"2024-10-27T21:53:22","slug":"the-books-the-selected-journals-of-l-m-montgomery-vol-2-1910-1921","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=37639","title":{"rendered":"The Books: The Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery: Vol. II, 1910-1921<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Daily Book Excerpt: Memoirs<\/a>: <\/p>\n

Next book on the Memoir\/Letters\/Journals shelf is The Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery: Vol. 2, 1910-1921<\/a>\"\"<\/i><\/p>\n

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\nThe second volume of Lucy Maud Montgomery’s journal covers an 11 year period, and not only is it jam-packed for her on a personal level (she gets married, moves from Cavendish, has three children – one of which is stillborn, her beloved kindred spirit Frede dies in the Spanish influenza epidemic of 1918, and in 1921 she discovers that her husband is insane) but packed on the world stage as well, with World War I. She admits to her journal that she does not love her husband and never has, but that he came into her life at its darkest hour and offered her companionship. If she only knew what a horrid companion he would be for the next, oh, 40 years, would she have still married him? He suffered from mental illness his whole life (something he had not revealed to her when they married), and it intensified during these busy years. His “attacks” took the form of deep religious melancholia, and an almost obsessive-compulsive fascination with hellfire. He was doomed, he knew it. He would lie in his room moaning all day long. He was a minister, and had a busy schedule, and Lucy Maud was forced into the very social role of minister’s wife (well, “forced” is not right: She knew what life she would be choosing when she chose this man). She found the work exhausting, grueling, and more than that: annoying. All she wanted was to go into her study, lock the door, and work on another book. She still managed to do that as well, a feat that boggles the mind when you read the journals and see just how busy her days really were. In the middle of these years she was able to write The Story Girl<\/a>, The Golden Road<\/a>, Anne of the Island<\/a>, Anne’s House of Dreams<\/a>, Rainbow Valley<\/a><\/i>, and Rilla of Ingleside<\/a><\/i>? Are you kidding me? She came out with a book every other year, like clockwork. And these are wonderful books, not, to use her term, “pot-boilers”. I would argue that Rilla of Ingleside<\/i> is one of the best things she ever wrote (she certainly thought it was her best book), and she wrote it with two young babies at home, a mentally ill husband, and a busy schedule of hosting teas and picnics for her husband’s congregation. It’s hard enough to write ONE novel. It’s not just her output that strikes me, but how her work also reflected and deepened her own understanding of what she was going through at any particular time. <\/p>\n

Rainbow Valley<\/i>, a story of Anne and Gilbert’s children, was written 1918, published in 1919, which means she was writing it at a time when it seemed the world war would never end, that the carnage would never stop. (Montgomery took these wars almost personally<\/i>. She also had a number of prophetic dreams during the course of the war, which she utilized in Rilla<\/i>.) She threw herself into writing Rainbow Valley<\/i>, an idyllic hilarious book about six or seven mischievous children and the adventures they had. Yet the shadow of what is to come hangs over the book. Lucy Maud writes in a way that lets the reader know: all of these young children will be “of age” during the cataclysm that is to come. Which of them will survive? Which will die? It’s not “just” a sweet book full of hilarious adventures. There’s a melancholy strain behind it (something she knew how to create very well), and a dread, a sense of impending doom. This was how Lucy Maud dealt with the World War. She imagined herself back into a rural idyllic childhood, yet she also admitted that hard times would come, and these innocent children would be sent off to the slaughter. You get the sense that it was the only book that Lucy Maud could possibly have written at that time. Her work was always so personal. <\/p>\n

And Rilla of Ingleside<\/i>, which she wrote in 1919, is the story of Anne and Gilbert’s children and what happened to all of them during World War I. It is a very patriotic book (Lucy Maud Montgomery was a fierce patriot), a real portrait of the Canadian war effort at a grass-roots level. In its own way, it is an important historical document. During the war, the events overseas take over Montgomery’s journal. Every day she writes about what battle was fought the day before, and the results. So we don’t have a birds’ eye view of the war: we have a ground-level day-in-day-out recreation of the horror of that time, especially for those left behind, worrying about their loved ones who were fighting. Reading Montgomery’s war-era journal is a harrowing experience, because she does not have the comfort of retrospect. She has no idea when it will end. The war lasted four years. A lifetime. Yet every day, she sets down in her journal the battles fought, what she thinks should be done, her prayers for holding this or that hill – she’s become a layperson’s military strategist. It’s fascinating to read. And Rilla<\/i> leans heavily on the material from the journals, lifting passages sometimes word for word. You can tell that Lucy Maud used them as a reference point, because Rilla<\/i> is also a book that takes you step by step through the war. Not just the giant famous battles, that everyone now remembers, but the smaller ones, the tiny victories, the tiny setbacks, and Montgomery manages to convey, in Rilla<\/i>, the sense of an entire community whose soul is on the rack, for four years. <\/p>\n

In later years, Lucy Maud Montgomery was shattered, emotionally, by what she saw as her problems. (I don’t mean to be flippant. She obviously had some tragedy: she had not married well at ALL, and her husband gave her decades of grief and worry. She lost her best friend, her cousin Frede – and she never got over missing her.) But in later journals, you can see her whipping herself into a frenzy over what seem to be trifles. A minor fender-bender turns into a giant tragic event where she wrings her hands over how she has been cursed. Her two sons, as they grow up, start to assert independence, and she worries herself sick over each and every move they make, making mountains out of molehills. She obviously had some kind of nervous condition – an anxiety\/depression thing – I recognize it well – which kept her from being able to “roll with the punches”. She rolled with NO punch. A tree falls in her backyard and she has to take to her bed. I have often wondered what was at the heart of this for her. Was it that she had some deep feeling that the life she was living, as satisfying as it was at times, was not the proper life for her? She was hemmed in, trapped by obligations that were meaningless to her, and at times you want to shout at her, “Cancel the goddamned church picnic, Lucy Maud, you are in no condition to be a hostess right now.” Yes, duty is a good thing, and commitment to something greater than yourself is a good thing, but Lucy Maud was actually victimized by her own schedule – she chose victimization, perhaps, but as the reality started to sink in (and as she got zero help from her useless husband), she started being unable to bear it with grace and calm. She had no help. She was the superwoman. She found it abhorrent to ask for help. These qualities all add up to a perfect storm where, by the end, she seemed virtually incapable of happiness or peace.<\/p>\n

And yet despite all that: she kept writing. Some of her best books were written in those later years. (Some of her worst ones, too – but STILL: she kept writing.) A very very courageous woman. Her books have given me so much pleasure, and it was fascinating and awful to read how difficult a time she had of it. <\/p>\n

I thought I’d excerpt one of her war-time entries, even though there is a lot of great personal stuff in this diary too (especially in her descriptions of her relationship with Frede, her cousin who died in 1918). The following entry was used heavily by Lucy Maud in Rilla<\/i>, at times word for word, so I thought it would be interesting to post it here (for those of you familiar with Rilla<\/i>).<\/p>\n

Like I said, I think her journals are great for their illumination into her writing life, her process, her thoughts. But this journal in particular could also be looked at (and I’m not sure why it’s not) as an indelible expression of wartime life in Canada, an important historical document. Well, I suppose she’s still seen as “just” a children’s book writer – and, even worse, someone who wrote books for GIRLS. Not even BOYS (who are clearly more valid as a gender, and books for THEM are seen as world-classics and taught in 8th grade English classes). Would a BOY read Anne of Green Gables<\/i>? Well, look, I read Tom Sawyer<\/i> and Huck Finn<\/i> when I was 12 and adored both of them to no end. Why is the reverse seen as so impossible? Are boys so incapable of being interested in a book with a girl heroine? Isn’t that just an assumption? Why is it not impossible<\/em> for me to enter into a book from a boy’s point of view? If I could read Huck Finn<\/i> and love it, then a boy could read Anne of Green Gables<\/i> and love it. End-stop. It’s useless to argue. You’re wrong. <\/p>\n

So. What does a woman who wrote children’s books for girls have to say about politics and war? <\/p>\n

It’s also interesting to look at a world where you get news only once a day. The anguish of waiting for the paper to come out, of having to go pick up the mail, once a day, of wondering what had happened in the preceding 24 hours.<\/p>\n

Here is the entry in question.<\/p>\n

Excerpt from The Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery: Vol. 2, 1910-1921<\/a>\"\"<\/i><\/big><\/p>\n

Sunday, Mar. 31, 1918
\nThe Manse, Leaksdale, Ont.<\/i><\/p>\n

I wonder if there has ever been a week in the history of the world before into which so much of searing agony has been crammed. I feel sure that there was not. And in this week there was one day when all humanity was nailed to the cross. On that day the whole planet must have been agroan with universal convulsion. That day was last Sunday, March 24, 1918.<\/p>\n

The morning was fine and cold. I went to church anxious but calm. As I sat in church I wondered what I would feel like next Sunday. It would be Easter – but would it herald death or life. After the service I came home and, Lily being away, was busily preparing dinner when I heard Ewan say “Do you want to hear the latest news from the front?”<\/p>\n

He had been reading a note handed to him after service by one of his elders.Something in his question or the tone of it filled me with dread. I snatched the letter. It was from Jas. Mustard who had come out from Toronto the night before. It said, simply and boldly, that the latest despatches had stated that the British line was broken and that the German shells were raining on Paris.<\/p>\n

“It can’t<\/i> be true! It can’t<\/i> be true,” I gasped again and again. I went all to pieces – I was nothing but a heap of quivering misery. If the Germans were shelling Paris they must have crashed through everywhere and be at its very gates! Paris was lost – France was lost – the war was lost!<\/p>\n

Somehow or other I finished getting dinner for the rest but I never ate or thought of eating. Ewan, who is of a very phlegmatic temperament and never goes to pieces as I do, was calm though depressed and tried to encourage me, but it was a hard task even for his india-rubber optimism. As for me I writhed physically in my intolerable suffering. Oh, what an afternoon I passed! Ewan was away. I was alone, save for the children who were not old enough to realize the catastrophe that had befallen the world. I took a dose of lavendar and that restored to me a small measure of self-control but that whole afternoon I walked the parlor floor, wrung my hands and prayed – “Oh God – Oh God – Oh God” – nothing else – no other words – I could utter nothing but that age-old plea – that age-old moan of supreme anguish.<\/p>\n

If only the news had not come until Monday, I thought piteously. It would not have been so hard to endure – one could have gone somewhere – done something. So I thought then. But now I am thankful that I learned when I did and bore my share in the world’s great pain. Everywhere that day humanity was in its supreme agony – everywhere the hearts of men were failing them for fear. I would feel shame if I had spent that day in painless ignorance or reading calmly. It was better to share the pain of my fellow beings.<\/p>\n

Ewan came home from Zephyr at five and brought with him a Saturday night Star<\/i>. I found that the news was not quite<\/i> so awful as it had seemed in Mr. Mustard’s letter. The line had<\/i> been broken in one<\/i> place, before St. Quentin, but the British forces seem to be retreating in fairly good order. There was as yet no rout and the guns that were shelling Paris were seventy miles away from it – monsters hitherto unknown, spectacular enough, but rather negligible from a military point of view. But the truth was sufficiently awful. Mr. Harwood telephoned up the latest despatches that evening and they were far from reassuring. Furious fighting was still continuing. The German losses were said to be enormous – probably were. But that old sop of comfort has been served up to us too often when reverses came to be of any power now. What boots it how many they lose if they smash through?<\/p>\n

That night I took a veronal tablet and so slept loggishly. Worked feverishly all the morning at some routine tasks requiring no thought. The mail came. The headline of The Globe<\/i> was, “Battered but not Broken”. The British had retreated to the Somme losing the territory captured in its last summer’s campaign at the cost of half a million lives. The despatches were terrible. The Kaiser boasted himself of victory and the Germans had taken 30,000 prisoners.<\/p>\n

I felt miserably depressed. Ewan and I went to Uxbridge and then to tea at Herbert Pearson’s. Nice place – nice people – but they seemed as shadows to me in my maze of pain. Lizzie told me of an incredible story of a despatch that had just come through saying that the British had captured 100,000 Germans. I knew this could not possibly be true. I feared that it had been twisted in transmission and that they had lost<\/i> a hundred thousand. This added to my distraction. But that night I slept from exhaustion. And the evening and morning was the fifth day.<\/p>\n

Tuesday morning I paced the floor waiting for the mail. Again the news was bad. The German advance continued and though the British line was not again broken it was pressed back and back. Back much further it could not go without irretrievable disaster. They were very close to Amiens – and the loss of Amiens would mean that a wedge had been driven between the French and British armies.<\/p>\n

I could do nothing that afternoon and evening. I don’t remember much about it. One day of anguish was becoming much the same as another. Again I took a veronal that night and obtained a little merciful oblivion. All the forenoon I worked at routine tasks.<\/p>\n

Hitherto, when I have had reason to dread the news I never would go to the store for the mail myself. I have always felt that I could not endure reading bad news, with those men who infest country stores sitting around on boxes and counters and looking at me with curious eyes. If the news was bad I must read it at home. But on this day this hitherto strong feeling was drowned out by another yet stronger. I could not<\/i> wait here while Ewan went down for the mail – I had borne so many of those agonies of suspense that I could not bear just that particular kind again. The “drop of water” must fall on a new place – a new kind of torture would be more bearable so I went down with Ewan to the office. It was a dull, bitter, hard<\/i> day. All the snow was gone but the gray, lifeless ground was frozen hard. A biting wind was blowing. The whole landscape was ugly and repellent. It weighed on my soul – it seemed typical of the world in which the German hell-hounds were to be our masters. I went into the store, feeling, “Oh, if it were only over – if I had just seen the news and knew the worse.” Mrs. Cook was just leaning over the counter, reading a Globe<\/i>. The headline hung down over the counter, big and black. It was upside down to me but I read it at a glance, without even the slight effort we usually make to read letters upside down. It was,<\/p>\n

“British and French check the Germans.”<\/p>\n

The relief was almost awful. I felt like a prisoner on the rack when they stopped turning it. But I was not off the rack. The torture might begin anytime. The situation was still critical – the danger still horribly great and imminent. But at least the onrush of Germans had been halted – there was still a chance. I was able to work that afternoon and sleep at night. The next day’s news was again reassuring but still the danger had not passed. Friday’s news was bad again. Montdidier and Rosiere were taken – two important points. If the Huns advanced much beyond Montdidier Amiens must fall – and if Amiens fell the Channel ports or Paris – or both – must be given up. I was worried and upset all day. Yesterday I again went for the mail and the headline was, “Even Berline admits the offensive checked.” I exclaimed aloud “Oh, Thank God,” not caring if all the loafers in Scott heard me.<\/p>\n

And so it stands. Today was Easter and I went to church. I did not, as I had hoped last Sunday, feel rejoicing in the thought that the German offensive had failed. Alas, it had had too great a measure of success. But at least I went feeling thankful that so far it had failed of decisive success. Armageddon is not over – it has but begin. But though I doubted God last Sunday I do not doubt Him today. The evil cannot win. My dream will come true!<\/p>\n

There has come out of this catastrophe one good – one supremely good thing. At last there is a generalissimo of the Allied forces and that man is Foch, the great French leader. It has taken this disaster to break the stubborn British repugnance to this. I believe that if Foch had been generalissimo long ago the war would have been over. May it not be too late!<\/p>\n

On such evenings of the past week as I could read I re-read a history of Ancient Egypt by Rawlinson and found, as in all previous readings, that even the dryest details were as interesting to me as a letter from home. Always I read with the feeling of reading of a life I<\/i> had once lived. I wonder if Egypt weaves this same sorcery over others who read of her. There is a certain couplet in Ben Hur<\/i> which always makes me incredibly homesick<\/i>.<\/p>\n

“No more does the Nile in the moonlight calm \/ Moan past the Memphian shore.”<\/p>\n

Gods! There comes the ache! I see<\/i> that moonlit shore, with the palm trees on the banks. I yearn for it – I could weep with very longing to see it again<\/i>. I must<\/i> have seen it once.<\/p>\n

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