Forword
L.M. Montgomery’s 1926 novel The Blue Castle is a romance in the broadest sense of that term. Its heroine, Valancy Stirling, is described by one of her relatives as a “changeling,” perhaps switched by the fairies at birth; the hero lives a mysterious life in the forest; hidden identities are revealed; true love is sought in unlikely places; the unexpected and unlikely does happen.
Aspects of romance—unusual and exciting events, the pursuit of love, mystery—have featured in popular novels throughout the history of the genre. The editor of this volume, Tracy Eire, who reads this novel as an example of young adult literature, believes that Valancy’s position as a changeling is one of the elements that would appeal to YA readers. Because she is a changeling Valancy is an outsider—a misfit—who finds many of the social rules of her family pointless and their aims in life meaningless. When Valancy decides to express her real opinions, her family is shocked and readers are entertained by her frank assessments of the ideas about people and society that her family has lived by for years.
Montgomery’s gift as a writer of comedy is clear in the depictions of Valancy’s relatives and their reactions. As Valancy learns to define and express her own values and find her own path through the restrictions placed on her as a woman of a certain time, place, and social class, she may inspire as well as amuse readers of any age who are aware of social or family norms that do not align with their own desires and beliefs.
For readers of L.M. Montgomery’s more famous novels, such as Anne of Green Gables and its sequels, The Blue Castle may seem out of character. However, it has much in common with Montgomery’s other works and is likely to appeal to the same readers. The natural world plays an important role in Valancy’s development of health and happiness, as it does in Anne Shirley’s case. Finding out where she belongs is a central concern for Valancy, as it is for the orphan Anne and for other Montgomery heroines, such as Emily Byrd Starr. A girl or woman who learns to express herself is the central character. Detailed and evocative descriptions of nature feature throughout Montgomery’s novels, creating both a detailed vision of the place inhabited by the characters and a sense of wonder at the beauty around them. The Blue Castle is the only one of Montgomery’s novels not set at least partly in Prince Edward Island, but the landscape is just as significant a part of the story as is the landscape Montgomery’s birth province in the other novels.
The fact that Montgomery is a Canadian writer, describing Canadian settings, cannot be forgotten. Montgomery’s novels, particularly the Anne books, have created a picture of Canada, particularly of Prince Edward Island, that has appealed to international audiences for over a hundred years. To readers in other parts of the world, even those as close to Canada as the United States, the settings of Montgomery’s novels may sometimes seem remote and exotic. In the novels set in Prince Edward Island, Montgomery describes the fields, the woods, and the ocean that were familiar to her from her childhood, creating an appealing picture of a rural world and people whose lives are tied to farming and fishing. In The Blue Castle, the rivers, lakes, and forests of the Muskoka region of Ontario, a noted tourism destination since the nineteenth century, are treated with the same level of detail and appreciation that Montgomery brought to her childhood landscape. In this novel, few of the characters are tied to the natural world, and the difference between town life and life in the woods is very important to Valancy both before and after her rebellion.
In reprinting The Blue Castle, Tracy is placing before the general reader a novel that is a romance, a comedy, and a coming-of-age story. While it is set in a world that differs in its details from the world of contemporary readers, the challenges and experiences that the central characters face remain familiar. Valancy wants to find happiness on her own terms, being true to herself rather than relying on what others tell her is important, and her quest is both entertaining and significant.
E. HOLLY PIKE, PH.D.
E. Holly Pike taught literary history, women writers, and children’s literature at Grenfell Campus, Memorial University of Newfoundland. She has published on the works of L.M. Montgomery in edited collections and journals and has presented papers on Montgomery at numerous conferences. She is co-editor with Laura M. Robinson of L.M. Montgomery and Gender (MQUP, 2021) and with Rita Bode, Lesley D. Clement, and Margaret Steffler of Children and Childhoods in L.M. Montgomery: Continuing Conversations (MQUP, 2022). Now retired, she serves on the editorial board of the Journal of L.M. Montgomery Studies and continues her research.