Anne of the Island Notes
LMM accomplished three goals with this book: for Anne to finish college, begin her writing career, and become engaged
I felt the time “whiz away” (words from Philippa found in chapter 9) in this novel more than the first two. Let’s look at the major events of each year.
Before leaving for Redmond, Gilbert tries to talk to Anne about their relationship, and Anne chatters on to keep him from doing it.
“I never felt glad to see Gilbert go before,” she thought, half-resentfully, half-sorrowfully, as she walked along up the lane. “Our friendship will be spoiled if he goes on with this nonsense. It mustn’t be spoiled—I won’t let it. Oh, why can’t boys be just sensible!”
Year 1
“Harvest is ended and summer is gone,” quoted Anne Shirley, gazing across the shorn fields dreamily.
· Anne lives in a house with all the cushions on St. John’s by the cemetery
· She and Priscilla meet Philippa
· Anne returns home for Christmas where Jane Andrews proposes to Anne on behalf of her brother Billy and Anne refuses
· Gilbert is a frequent visitor at 38 St. John’s and escorts Anne “at nearly all the college affairs”
· Charlie Sloan proposes and Anne refuses
· Anne and her friends secure Patty’s Place
· Anne wins a scholarship
· Diana enters Anne’s story into the baking powder competition and wins
· Ruby Gillis passes away
Year 2
The summer had been a very happy one, too—a time of glad living with summer suns and skies, a time of keep delight on wholesome things; a time of renewing and deepening of old friendships; a time in which she had learned to live more nobly, to work more patiently, to play more heartily. ~Chapter 15
· Anne and her friends get settled into Patty’s Place with Aunt Jamesina and the cats
· Anne goes back for Christmas
· Aunt Josephine dies and leaves $1,000 for Anne to pay for college
· Anne turns 20
“To think that this is my twentieth birthday, and that I’ve left my teens behind me forever,” said Anne, who was curled up on the hearth-rug with Rusty in her lap, to Aunt Jamesina who was reading in her pet chair. ~Chapter 19
· Gilbert proposes and Anne refuses
“I—I can’t,” said Anne miserably. “Oh, Gilbert—you—you’ve spoiled everything.”
~
A world without any Gilbert in it! Anne repeated the words drearily. Would it not be a very lonely, forlorn place? Well, it was all Gilbert’s fault. He had spoiled their beautiful comradeship. She must just learn to live without it. ~Chapter 20
· Anne visits Bolingbroke with Phil and visits her birth home
· Anne returns to Avonlea for the summer but Gilbert does not
Summer between Year 2 and Year 3
Life was very pleasant in Avonlea that summer, although Anne, amid all her vacation joys, was haunted by a sense of “something gone which should be there.” She would not admit, even in her inmost reflections, that this was caused by Gilbert’s absence. ~Chapter 23
· The Irving’s return to Echo Lodge
Anne, talking to Miss Lavendar, says,
“I wonder why everybody seems to think I ought to marry Gilbert Blythe.”
“Because you were made and meant for each other, Anne—that is why. You needn’t toss that young head of yours. It’s a fact.”
· Phil falls in love at last with Jonas
Year 3
It was November—the month of crimson sunsets, parting birds, deep sad hymns of the sea, passionate wind-songs in the pines…Somehow, since her return to Redmond for this third year, life had not mirrored her spirit back to her with its old, perfect, sparkling clearness. ~Chapter 25
· Anne meets Royal Gardner and falls in love (or thinks she does)
· Gilbert is seen with Christine Stuart
· Phil and Jonas get engaged
Summer between Year 3 and Year 4
· Diana gets married to Fred Wright
· Gilbert and Anne have “something of their old comradeship return”
· Anne teaches thru July and August in Valley Road
· Janet Sweet and John Douglas finally get engaged after 20 years
· Sam Tolliver asks Anne to marry him and she refuses
Year 4
· Anne gets $10 for a piece of writing
· She meets Roy’s sisters and mother
· Anne says she has learned “to look upon each little hindrance as a jest and each great one as the foreshadowing of victory” ~Chapter 37
· Preparing for the graduation ceremony, Anne discards Roy’s violets for Gilberts lilies-of-the-valley and wears a little pink heart pendant from Gilbert until she hears that Gilbert and Christine Stuart will probably get engaged and then she pulls off the necklace
· Roy asks Anne to marry him and she turns him down
· Anne hears from Davy that Gilbert is dying and Anne is heartbroken
· Phil sends Gilbert a letter telling him to try again with Anne
· When he recovers, he asks her to marry him and she finally gives him the answer he was looking for
“I asked you a question over two years ago, Anne. If I ask it again today will you give me a different answer?”
Still Anne could not speak. But she lifted her eyes, shining with all the love-rapture of countless generations, and looked into his for a moment. H wanted no other answer. ~Chapter 41
Woods in Autumn by Frederic Edwin Church, 1865
Let me know your thoughts of Anne of the Island!
As always, I’m delighted you’re here!
~Stephanie
I always have a sense of holding my breath through the book, until Gilbert and Anne are finally engaged, and then what a sigh of relief! No matter how many times I've read it! 😄