Gammel, Irene, ed. Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002.
Book title: Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture
Editor: Gammel, Irene
Type: Collection of essays
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Date: 2002
ISBN: 0-8020-3558-2 (cloth), 0-8020-8433-8 (paper)
URL: http://www.utppublishing.com/pubstore/merchant.ihtml?pid=7774&step=4
Synopsis
Since the publication of Anne of Green Gables in 1908, L.M. Montgomery and the world of Anne have burgeoned into a global cultural phenomenon, popular not only in Canada, but in countries as diverse as Japan, the United States, and Iran. Making Avonlea, the first study to focus on Montgomery and her characters as popular culture icons, brings together twenty-three scholars from around the world to examine Montgomery’s work, its place in our imagination, and its myriad spin-offs including musicals, films, television series, T-shirts, dolls, and a tourist industry.
Invoking theories of popular culture, film, literature, drama, and tourism, the essayists probe the emotional attachment and loyalty of many generations of mostly female readers to Montgomery’s books while also scrutinizing the fierce controversies that surround these books and their author’s legacy in Canada. Twenty-five illustrations of theatre and film stills, artwork, and popular cultural artifacts, as well as short pieces featuring personal reflections on Montgomery’s novels, are interwoven with scholarly essays to provide a complete picture of the Montgomery cultural phenomenon. Mythopoetics, erotic romance, and visual imagination are subjects of discussion, as is the commercial success of a variety of television series and movies, musicals, and plays based on the Anne books. Scholars are also concerned with the challenges and disputes that surround the translation of Montgomery’s work from print to screen and with the growth of tourist sites and websites that have moved Avonlea into new cultural landscapes. Making Avonlea allows the reader to travel to these sites and to consider Canada’s most enduring literary figure and celebrity author in light of their status as international icons almost one hundred years after their arrival on the scene.
Contents
Acknowledgments (xi–xii)
Abbreviations (xiii)
Making Avonlea: An Introduction / Irene Gammel (3–13) [Full entry]
Part 1. Mapping Avonlea: Cultural Value and Iconography
Anne of Green Gables Goes to University: L.M. Montgomery and Academic Culture / Carole Gerson (17–31) [Full entry]
Anatomy of a “National Icon”: Anne of Green Gables and the “Bosom Friends” Affair / Cecily Devereux (32–42) [Full entry]
Confessions of a Kindred Spirit with an Academic Bent / Brenda R. Weber (43–57) [Full entry]
Taking Control: Hair Red, Black, Gold, and Nut-Brown / Juliet McMaster (58–71) [Full entry]
“This has been a day in hell”: Montgomery, Popular Literature, Life Writing / Margaret Steffler (72–83) [Full entry]
The Visual Imagination of L.M. Montgomery / Elizabeth R. Epperly (84–98) [Full entry]
Writing in Pictures: International Images of Emily / Andrea McKenzie (99–113) [Full entry]
Safe Pleasures for Girls: L.M. Montgomery’s Erotic Landscapes / Irene Gammel (114–27) [Full entry]
Part II. Viewing Avonlea: Film, Television, Drama, and Musical
“It’s all mine”: The Modern Woman as Writer in Sullivan’s Anne of Green Gables Films / Eleanor Hersey (131–44) [Full entry]
Who’s Got the Power? Montgomery, Sullivan, and the Unsuspecting Viewer / K.L. Poe (145–59) [Full entry]
“She look’d down to Camelot”: Anne Shirley, Sullivan, and the Lady of Shalott / Ann F. Howey (160–73) [Full entry]
Road to Avonlea: A Co-production of the Disney Corporation / Benjamin Lefebvre (174–85) [Full entry]
Melodrama for the Nation: Emily of New Moon / Christopher Gittings (186–200) [Full entry]
Paul Ledoux’s Anne: A Journey from Page to Stage / George Belliveau (201–15) [Full entry]
Snapshot: Listening to the Music in Anne of Green Gables: The Musical / Carrie MacLellan (216–22) [Full entry]
Part III. Touring Avonlea: Landscape, Tourism, and Spin-off Products
Toward a Theory of the Popular Landscape in Anne of Green Gables / Janice Fiamengo (225–37) [Full entry]
Mass Marketing, Popular Culture, and the Canadian Celebrity Author / E. Holly Pike (238–51) [Full entry]
Through the Eyes of Memory: L.M. Montgomery’s Cavendish / James De Jonge (252–67) [Full entry]
Consumable Avonlea: The Commodification of the Green Gables Mythology / Jeanette Lynes (268–79) [Full entry]
Snapshot: Making Anne and Emily Dolls / Tara MacPhail (280–5) [Full entry]
Snapshot: My Life as Anne in Japan / Tara Nogler (286–94) [Full entry]
Taishu Bunka and Anne Clubs in Japan / Danièle Allard (295–309) [Full entry]
Avonlea in Cyberspace, Or an Invitation to a Hyperreal Tea Party / Alice van der Klei (310–6) [Full entry]
Epilogue: A Letter from Germany / Beate Nock (317–20)
Works Cited (321–42)
Contributors (343–7)
Reviews
Dean, Misao. “(Re)inscriptions of Nineteenth-Century Popular Culture.” Review of “Come, Bright Improvement”: The Literary Societies of Nineteenth Century Ontario, by Heather Murray; Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel; Paddling Her Own Canoe: The Times and Texts of E. Pauline Johnson, by Carole Gerson and Veronica Strong-Boag. Topia 10 (2003): 91–5. [Full entry]
Gillis, Stacy. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. British Journal of Canadian Studies 16, no. 2 (2003): 425–6. [Full entry]
Kotsopoulos, Patsy. “Pushing the Boundaries of Avonlea.” Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. Canadian Children’s Literature / Littérature canadienne pour la jeunesse 109–110 (Spring–Summer 2003): 128–30. [Full entry]
MacDonald-Murray, Elisabeth Anne. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. In Canadian Book Review Annual 2002, edited by Joyce M. Wilson, 248. Toronto: CBRA, 2003.
Macfarlane, Karen E. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. Atlantis 28, no. 1 (2003): 125–6. [Full entry]
Morgan, Cecilia. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. The Canadian Historical Review 85, no. 3 (September 2004): 634–5. [Full entry]
Ostry, Elaine. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. University of Toronto Quarterly 73, no. 1 (2003–2004): 264–66. [Full entry]
Robinson, Laura M. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. English Studies in Canada 30, no. 4 (December 2004): 235–9. [Full entry]
Rosenberg, Teya. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 28, no. 2 (Summer 2003): 124–5. [Full entry]
Sellwood, Jane. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. Australian Canadian Studies 22, no. 2 (2004): 337–43. [Full entry]
Whitfield, Caroline. Review of Making Avonlea: L.M. Montgomery and Popular Culture, edited by Irene Gammel. Dalhousie Review 84, no. 1 (Spring 2004): 179–80. [Full entry]