Reading Anne of Green Gables was an exhilarating experience, so I had high expectations when
I started the second book of the series: Anne of Avonlea. This one, however,
made me cringe. Several parts of the book tempted me to quit the read, but I
pushed myself to finish it in order to write this post.
When I read Anne of Green Gables, I thought Anne
was ahead of her times. She navigated her challenges with grace and
intelligence, encouraging others to become more open-minded. In Anne of Avonlea,
Anne’s behavior does not befit the character the author created in the
first novel.
Anne and Marilla felt compelled to adopt
six-year-old twins because the children had lost their parents and needed
somebody to raise them. I thought this was an intriguing part that would reveal
how Anne would touch the twins' lives in unique ways. I was wrong.
The twins were Dora and Davy. Dora was a kind, well-behaved girl, whereas Davy was mischievous and violent; his actions showed clearly that he lacked empathy and consideration for the feelings and emotions of others. Yet Anne and Marilla considered Davy their “favorite” and they loved Davy more than they loved Dora. To make matters worse, the author portrays this situation as something normal and acceptable.
Let’s take a moment to
reflect on this aspect of the novel. Even though Anne of Avonlea was written
about a hundred years ago, this feature of the characters and plot appears to
mirror current affairs and situations in our modern societies. For example, research
has shown that women in the workplace are held to different standards than men.
We
don’t even need to travel far to see how women’s lives are treated poorly by
the legal system.
Coming back to the story, it is important to
point out that Anne and Marilla are not the right caretakers for Dora. She
deserves better.
Anne started working as a teacher in the small
town of Avonlea, where everybody appreciated how she cared about her students.
She did her best to excel at her teaching position. One day, however, her mood
was not in the right state of mind and her behavior went off the rails. One of
her students—a girl—had a fall. As a result of this accident, Anne told her off
in a way that clearly evinces the social biases against girls.
“If you cannot move without falling over something, you’d better remain in your seat. It is positively disgraceful for a girl of your age to be so awkward.” Anne never apologized to the girl nor showed any signs of regret about this statement.
You may remember from Anne of Green Gables
that Anne had been adopted by siblings Matthew and Marilla. Now we are told
that Anne voted for the same political party that Matthew had voted for before
he died because she wanted to follow his example. Anne had no interest or motivation
in examining the ideas, principles and goals of the political party she was
blindly willing to vote for. It was made clear that the only reason to support
this political party was that Mathew had voted for it before he died.
In this
novel Anne does not appear to be the intelligent person she was in the first
book. It is true that she had an insightful conversation with her colleague in
which she spoke against whipping children, but, other than that, there is not
much to impress the reader about Anne in Anne of Avonlea. I still like some of
the peculiar characters Lucy Montgomery introduces, and the end of the story is
a pleasant read, romance instilled into it without obnoxious sentimentality.
I
assign two stars out of five to Anne of Avonlea. It may still be considered a useful
resource to spark discussions about current social issues that
continue to assail the world today, and to analyze the subtle and not so subtle
ways in which gender discrimination continues to pervade different societies. An
introspective outlook can open up the opportunity to examine social judgments
and prejudices and to see how these judgments shape the fate of societies and
the world.
Also, a recent study shows that one third of young men in Germany consider that violence against women is acceptable:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/11/europe/germany-violence-against-women-study-intl/index.html
One in three female NHS surgeons in England have been sexually assaulted by a colleague within the last five years:
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-66775015
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/12/two-women-describe-sexual-assaults-in-surgery
I am sharing here an opinion article by Kara Alaimo:
