Anne Shirley

Episode 4

Book readers have noted that Anne Shirley is skipping quickly through its source material. Although we've been dealing with consecutive chapters for a couple of weeks now – episode four covers chapters sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen – it looks like episode five will jump ahead to chapter twenty-three. I mention this because of two very specific things that this adaptation risks leaving out, both of which we ought to have gotten more about by now.

The first is that Mr. Phillips isn't a good teacher, even by the standards of the time. That's perhaps not difficult to figure out; we saw him blaming Anne for things that weren't her fault, and there was that one brief moment when another girl mentioned that he'd been writing love notes to Prissy Andrews, the oldest girl in class. But what's important on this front is that when Marilla asks Mrs. Lynde about Anne's declaration that she won't go to school again, Rachel Lynde flat-out tells Marilla that making Anne sit next to a boy is wholly inappropriate. It doesn't matter that it was Gilbert; making Anne sit with him is more than an insult, it's a slight on her reputation. That Mr. Phillips would even consider such a thing, much less carry it out, speaks volumes. (And you'll notice that this week she's back sitting with another girl, albeit not Diana.)

The other skipped-over piece is Josie Pye, the local mean girl. We've seen her smirking in the background, and I believe there's been mention of the Pye girls being unpleasant, but just how awful Josie is hasn't been made clear. Trust me when I say that will be important next week.

Despite this, Anne Shirley is still hitting all the most important bits. This week covers the dreadful Cordial Incident, wherein Anne mistakenly serves Diana currant wine instead of raspberry cordial. If you're not familiar with it, as a beverage, “cordial” refers to a sweet drink made of syrup and water; it's sort of the ancestor of drinks like Capri Sun. It's nonalcoholic, too, which is why Marilla said the girls might have it as a special treat. Unfortunately for all involved, Marilla accidentally directed Anne to the currant wine (which was fairly common to make at the time), and since Anne's never had cordial or wine, she doesn't recognize the mistake until it's too late. Of course, as Marilla points out, with either drink, Diana oughtn't have had three tumblers full – unlike the image in the episode, a tumbler is a very large glass, more mug than wine glass.

More importantly, the whole debacle is a reminder of how Anne, as an orphan of unknown origins, will always be viewed as an outsider by some people, at least until she can prove herself. If you remember, Marilla remarked that she thought Anne had better worry about Mrs. Barry's opinion rather than Diana's. This incident proves that she was right. Mrs. Barry has made up her mind against Anne, and nothing will change it–not even her good (or at least neutral) opinion of Marilla.

That's why it's significant that the cordial disaster is followed by Anne saving Diana's younger sister, Minnie May. Mrs. Barry's not at school and can't see for herself how smart Anne is, nor how popular. (Or even how much Gilbert is pining over her – poor boy even stooped to asking her for help, a blow to his vaunted pride.) But when Anne knows what to do for a croupy child and even the doctor says that she saved Minnie May's life, that's something Mrs. Barry can get behind. It might just be her pride finding an out, which, interestingly enough, would make her somewhat less mature than Gilbert, but the more important thing is that she does get past it. If she had continued to shun someone who saved her daughter's life, she really would be a termagant.

Most importantly, Anne and Diana are back together again. I could see it being very tempting to read their friendship as romantic, especially with all of their protestations of love, but this is something that's all about the historical context. While there was lesbian fiction when L. M. Montgomery was writing (see: anything by Sarah Orne Jewett), it was heavily coded. Flat-out saying “I love you” wouldn't have equated to romantic love for most readers of the early 20th Century in this context, especially when it comes with what would have sounded like a Hallmark card – Diana's note that read “If you love me as I love you/Nothing in the world can part we two.” This sort of motto was popular in autograph albums of the period. Like Anne's mimicking popular fiction in her manner of speech, it's the sort of flowery language popular in sentimental fiction. What we're meant to take from it is that Anne and Diana feel very grown-up speaking this way, and that their melodrama is part of their imaginations.

I did at last have a chance to check out the dub, and my feelings are mixed. First of all, if you were wondering, they do have Canadian accents – a little overdone at times, but unmistakably there. (My ear just may be used to the Nova Scotia and New Brunswick sound I hear most often.) My favorite voice by far is Linda Leonard as Marilla – she's close enough to the Colleen Dewhurst of my memories to make her comfortingly familiar. She's also doing a great job putting her spin on the character. I'm less sold on Monica Flatley's Anne; she sounds too high-pitched to my ears, although she may bring it down a bit as Anne settles in. Both Matthews and Rachels are good, and I didn't find a strong preference between them.

Speaking of memories of this story, next week we're going to get to a scene that I made an ill-advised attempt to act out, sure that I could pull it off. I suspect some of you can guess what that was, and that I wasn't the only one to try.

Rating:

Anne Shirley is currently streaming on Crunchyroll on Saturdays.