Montgomery of the Island

I am currently sitting in the Toronto airport waiting (more hours than I'd like to admit - darn layovers) for my flight home. I am returning from Prince Edward Island, where I attended the bi-annual Montgomery conference at the University of Prince Edward Island.

The University (my photo)

Ever since I realized that travel was a thing (thank you, Rick Steves' Europe) PEI jumped to the top of my travel bucket list.

Anyone doubting the importance of public television, stop right there.
I travel because of this man and PBS. Image found here.

This was due mainly to L.M. Montgomery's books. In case she sounds familiar, but you can't place her, she is the author of Anne of Green Gables, the quintessential Canadian girls' text, or perhaps Canadian text, period. I won't make that claim here.



What I will say is that Montgomery's love for her Island emanates from her writing. Of her 20 novels, only one wasn't set on the Island. Anne arrives on PEI an outsider, permitting her to introduce the reader to the beautiful landscape surrounding her: the red roads, the blossoming trees, the shimmering lakes. We are introduced to Emily of New Moon as she communes outside with the Wind Woman (the Wind Woman was definitely a presence on the Island yesterday). Jane of Lantern Hill first comes to the Island to find a home - due to her father and arguably, the land on the Island.

With beauty like this, can you blame Montgomery? (my photo)

Place for Montgomery, so it would seem from her journals, is crucial. Her books (almost) all include the additional character of Prince Edward Island.

So, what happens when you travel to a place you know intimately from reading? I won't say that it was like coming to a place I know - that's too cheesy, and I'm not very good at picturing things in my head. But after working on Montgomery throughout graduate school and using Anne during my first year of teaching, it was magical returning [genuine Freudian slip] going.

That an author can write so vividly of a place that tourists from all over the world want to visit - that is magic.

Through the Looking Glass: Feminism!

Last week, in the midst of getting ready for the upcoming ChLA conference, I treated myself to the new Alice film, Alice through the Looking Glass. I've always had a indifferent relationship with Carroll's Alice and the many iterations of the film, but I had a friend who was eager to see it and I had read a Vogue piece about the fashion in the film (Alice in pants - gasp!). Plus, this theatre doubled as a restaurant, which sounds like something in a fantasy. So, I went. 

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(Please note: I've tried to be very good at not giving spoilers, but there may be information ahead that you'd rather wait to see the movie to find out.)

There are many reviews of the film discussing whether or not it is good as a story, true to Carroll, a waste of money for Disney. (For the record, I thought it was okay as a story, a poor imitation of Carroll, and not Disney's best investment, but certainly not their worst.) What surprised me the most was the feminist character of Alice.

Frequently in these stories the empowered female is what Lissa Paul calls a woman in drag (cite). The female takes on masculine traits, just as she dons masculine attire, using logic, strength, and general machismo to realize her ambitions. But Alice is still feminine. 

She sets off on her adventure through time out of concern for the Mad Hatter, because he is her friend. But she is still able to drive a time machine that sort of doubles as a ship and looks all sorts of cool. And she makes this journey on her own. So, yes, the feminine drives her decision, but she isn't bound to subordination or deference to a male character.

The resolution to her real-world story is rooted in the feminine, too. Without spoiling anything, Alice looks to her mother for resolution. All of this time she has been striving to follow in the footsteps of her father, as she is captain of his ship the Wonder. She has largely ignored her mother, who wishes Alice to follow convention. In order to have a successful resolution, though, Alice decides to take care of her mother by giving her mother a voice. 

In her seminal text, Waking Sleeping Beauty (1997), Roberta Trites observes:

Another method feminist characters use to transcend gender roles is to embrace and celebrate certain characteristics traditionally linked to femininity…. feminist protagonists recognize and rely on traits that gave their literary foremothers strength: compassion, interconnectedness, and communication. (5)

Alice succeeds in doing each of these things: she acts out of compassion; she cares about her connectedness with her mother; and she communicates with her mother and the Wonderland characters. There is a spirit of unity amongst female characters by the time the story is over.

It's not that Alice must give up her pants (you'll have to see the film to truly appreciate it!), she embraces her feminine and therein lies the power. For that reason, I cannot recommend this film enough. From the studio that has brought many partially-empowered females (see my previous post), I was so pleased to have found this version of Alice.

Works Cited

Alice through the Looking Glass. Directed by James Bobin, performances by Mia Wasikowska, Johnny 
Depp, and Helena Bonham Carter, Disney, 2016.

Trites, Roberta Seelinger. Waking Sleeping Beauty Feminist Voices in Children's Novels. U of Iowa P, 1997.

The Feminine in Star Wars

As I have mentioned in a previous blog post, I have been tutoring elementary school students. This means that I have entered the world of popular children's literature: Star Wars Rebels, Star Wars the original series, Star Wars: an overview of the entire galaxy, and the occasional superhero.

This introduction to the popular reading material that, let's be honest, is geared towards male readers has brought several questions to my mind. Most of these books feature male protagonists, in the vein of the movies that they are based on. They are filled with action, feature very little character development and almost no dialogue.

Imagine my surprise when I was introduced to Sabine, the female, POC Star Wars rebel.

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I don't mean to hold Sabine up as the token female or woman of color, meant to carry the message of empowered womanhood to readers, but I do want to acknowledge what she represents within this very masculine franchise.

In Sabine's Art Attack, she infiltrates a stormtroopers' base. She apparently does not want to cause harm; instead, surprise, she wants to make art. She graffitis one of their ships with a purple bird, the rebel symbol. When the troopers try to stop her, she adds an "eye" to the bird, a bomb. When it goes off, a purple (sparkly?) smoke fills the air. The stormtroopers are momentarily stopped, but no one is seriously injured.

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So... let's break this down. This female character, decked out in armor, sporting short purple hair, shows up on a covert mission. So far, so good. But then, she only fights back when she is attacked. Her intended action does nothing more than disturb the situation. Maybe the Imperial Army lost a ship, at best, but mostly her actions mean that the cleaning crew will have extra work that night.

Where is the balance though? Do we want children, regardless of gender, reading about fighting and violence? The only fighting I've read about in the Star Wars books is a report of what happened in the films. For example, Obi-Wan Kenobi fights and "defeats" Darth Maul. Maybe with books with an intended child audience the violence is intentionally curbed. Sabine comes from the TV show Star Wars Rebels, a show that airs on Disney XD.

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But her indirect way of fighting back. Her covert mission to leave a mark that won't harm is so distinctly feminine. "I will sidestep confronting you." "I will make things inconvenient for you without making you acknowledge my presence." This is particularly uncomfortable because she is a woman of color.

Am I making too much of this children's book that will probably never be read by anyone else at the academy? Some would say, yes. But these students aren't reading Charlotte's Web or Matilda. This is their reading of choice. (Believe me, I've tried to give them other options.) Shouldn't we care what they are consuming? And how women, and women of color, are being portrayed?

The more female characters there are, the more they can afford to be one-dimensional. But when there is a "token" female, then making her a stereotypical woman teaches readers that that is the woman's role in these action films. Leia gets rescued in the Episode IV, and Sabine makes art. Thank goodness for Rey.

The Research Paper: A Follow-Up Post

Today in class my Research and Writing students (Composition II in other universities) brought in their next-to-final drafts to discuss. All semester alongside the normal research component (see a previous post), we have been discussing YA literature. We've read through Roberta Seelinger Trites's Disturbing the Universe (2001) and Suzanne Collins's popular The Hunger Games (2008), all while they have been planning to analyze and write a research paper on a YA novel of their choice. At times they have been frustrated, overwhelmed, and even confused (yay for literary criticism!). At times I have questioned whether or not I have given them enough tools to succeed.

Katniss may know the troubles of fighting the Capital,
but she can only imagine the difficulties of formatting citations.
Image found here.

These research papers are theirs completely. They chose the books; they gathered the research; they developed the argument. Much like a graduate supervisor, I have been here to cultivate their ideas. (I now have so much more empathy for my supervisor!) Today as they peer reviewed and asked me final questions about their papers, I could see the look of pride on their faces. They were holding ten- to twelve-page papers in their hands. Papers that they had researched and written. Some of them were genuinely excited by their findings and even eager to praise others' work.

It's yet to be seen how the papers have turned out (I remain unfailingly optimistic), but just seeing their pride in their accomplishments was a reward in itself. They have taken ownership of their writing. They have journeyed into the land of academia and come out with knowledge. It was a very satisfying way to end the week. Happy Friday!

Emily's New Cover

Today I was in the children's section of the library. While searching for general titles to share with students, a brightly colored book jumped out at me (metaphorically, not literally, thank goodness).

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It was one of L.M. Montgomery's Emily books. This series begins innocently enough about a young orphan girl who wants more than anything to be an author. Much like Montgomery's other orphans, Emily, while sharing her precocious vocabulary, manages to win over even the most curmudgeonly of neighbors. But then the series takes a darker turn.

By the final book in the series, the above-pictured Emily's Quest, Emily feels deserted by her friends, who are off living their lives, is struggling with her identity as an author, ends up crippled for a brief period, and then engaged to a predatory father figure.

Did you get that from this cover?

I am all for repackaging classics. One of my favorite things to do at the bookstore is peruse the various copies of Pride and Prejudice. Part of me was thrilled just to see this lesser-known Montgomery novel at my local library.

But there is something about the "prettifying" of this dark novel. Montgomery's final book in this trilogy asks tough questions of those wanting to achieve their dreams.

After Emily's illness and belief that her first novel was worthless, this passage occurs:

"My days of laughter are done," Emily said to herself. And her days of creation as well. She could never write again. The "flash" never came. No rainbow spanned the gloom of that terrible winter. People came to see her continuously. She wished they would stay away. Especially Uncle Wallace and Aunt Ruth, who were sure she would never walk again and said so every time they came. Yet they were not so bad as the callers who were cheerfully certain she would be all right in time and did not believe a word of it themselves. (Montgomery 57)

Not exactly the happy-go-lucky thoughts of a pink-covered book. This may not seem too bad in the grand scheme of the novel, but there are chapters upon chapters of Emily being depressed. There are points where a happy ending doesn't seem possible. In fact, scholars posit that the romantic happy ending Montgomery offers her heroine is false - one that can never truly be happy (Epperly 190; Rubio 30).

Don't get me wrong. I think that this novel is important in the wider conversation around girlhood, even young adulthood. These darker emotions should be explored. Montgomery herself says that she relates the most to Emily (Epperly 145), and so to an extent these feelings are based on real life.

But why package them in pink and dreams? Do we need to tell ourselves that everything is going to be okay - at least on the outside? Or in knowing the plot, do we see this cover as what we hope will happen for Emily? That she will keep looking out over the horizon, searching for the fulfillment of her dreams?

Works Cited

Epperly, Elizabeth Rollins. The Fragrance of Sweet-Grass: L.M. Montgomery's Heroines and 

the Pursuit of Romance. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1992. 

Montgomery, L.M. Emily's Quest. New York: Bantam Books, 1983.

Rubio, Mary. "Subverting the Trite: L. M. Montgomery's `Room of Her Own."' Canadian Children's Literature 65 (1992): 6-39.

Defining Research

For a lack of relevant pictures, here is a place I imagine would be excellent to research in. Image found here.

As an adjunct I teach four composition classes at two different universities. So, I think about research and writing a lot. As you can imagine, I also talk about research and writing a lot with my students.

Recently, during a conference with one of my students I was asked point-blank to what research was. I felt at a loss for words. What was research? Other than the thing that I was supposed to be doing when I was really grading papers (or watching TV or washing my hair or... you get the idea).

Before I could answer, she added this observation: she thought that research was simply gathering others' ideas and writing them down. I told her that in some ways she was right. After all, the first part of a large project is figuring out what everyone else has said.

But it's more than that - it's taking everyone else's ideas and laying them down as a foundation and building from there. This is why I encourage my students to use the first-person when they write. I know that's not the traditional way of writing essays (and in fact, I'm only "permitted" to do so at one university). I want them to own their ideas though. To separate their ideas from the critics' ideas. To see how their "building" is being constructed.

This student then mentioned that her preconceived notion of research included interviewing people (to what end, I don't think she knew). We are not interviewing people, though. Not even a little. In the realm of children's literature, as previously mentioned, I am strictly a book person. Occasionally, I consider the "ideal reader," maybe the author, but that's as close as it comes.

Books are data, I explained to her. They are the "what" that we are researching. They hold this snapshot of ideas, of a culture, of what it means to be human. For this class specifically, it's what a young adult is in book form - how the books convey what "we" trust young adults with, what we think they are capable of, what we think they want and need.

The student was convinced in the end. She was most likely convinced at the beginning, as her research project this semester is to write a ten-page paper exploring themes in a YA text of her choice, so I'm sure she'd already put two-and-two together. But for me, it was refreshing to reexamine what research is.

Research is not always easy, and more often than not, it can be daunting. However, talking about research with this student reminded me of why I do what I do. I cannot escape the fact that literary studies strikes a chord deep within me. As cheesy as it sounds, I feel fortunate to be able to share that with these students.

A Strong Disney Princess?

The cardinal rule of being an academic seems to be ignore whatever is considered "low-brow." (This creates quite an interesting dilemma when you study children's literature, especially if it is, god forbid, popular children's literature, but that's a story for another blog.) Here's my confession: not I only do I enjoy studying the low-brow, I enjoy reading/viewing some of that low-brow stuff. Particularly Disney. Especially Disney.

Recently, I found myself watching the "Disneyland 60" celebration on ABC. What was supposed to be a celebration of the original Disney park, turned into a celebration of all things Disney (which surprised me, as Disney almost never misses out on the opportunity for a commercial, but that, again, is another blog post).

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Part way through the evening, there was a montage celebrating the strength of female heroines in Disney movies. Female celebrities began listing the many positive characteristics of Disney heroines while images of characters like Ariel, Snow White, Mulan, and Pocahontas flashed across the screen.

But here's the question: Are these characters really worthy of such praise?

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Yes, Ariel defies her father and takes every measure possible to pursue her dreams. But students who took my fairy tale class last semester can tell you that she did so at the expense of her voice (quite literally). She places herself within the docile feminine role, allowing everyone around her to act while she remains passive. Even going to Ursula, and from there actually becoming a human, isn't truly her decision - Ursula's minions fetch her. Of course she is going to go along with it - it's part of her passive nature! At least Hans Christian Andersen's little mermaid makes the decision to visit the sea witch. Though admittedly, Andersen's mermaid doesn't have a name, so the one cancels the other out.

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Then you have Snow White whose abilities can be chalked up to being beautiful. Oh, and cleaning. And teaching animal friends to clean. And "whistling while she works," because keeping house for strangers is so satisfying. Then there's Sleeping Beauty whose lines in the movie total 18. The only Disney protagonist who speaks less than her is the elephant Dumbo, and his movie is half as long. Mulan defies her gender, but is she doing so because she wants to or because she is taking up the feminine mantel of taking care of her family?

This isn't a fair overview. I realize that Merida does defy her parents' desire for her to marry, even convincing them that the decision should belong to her. And Belle's love of reading and desire for adventure can be inspiring for a young girl.

But if we just offer a sweeping statement of how "empowered" these heroines are and don't actually take a moment to question if that is true, then we are doing more damage to young girls. We are telling them that ending up with a man is the happily ever after. (Thank you, Merida and Pocahontas, for being the exceptions to this rule.) In fact, your dreams and adventures probably will lead to your marriage.

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Belle's "adventure in the great wide somewhere" amounts to being trapped in a castle with a beast, developing Stockholm Syndrome, while having access to one of the most amazing libraries known to cinema screens. Jasmine gets to exercise her own opinion by choosing to marry Aladdin (who for all extensive purposes will now become sultan).

Feminist children's literature scholars like Roberta Seelinger Trites and Lissa Paul encourage scholars to question the position of the female characters that are presented to us. How do we encourage young girls to do the same? I think it is by providing multi-dimensional heroines, questioning the status quo, and encouraging girls to dream. Of course marriage can be on the table. But don't let it be the only thing on the table. And for goodness' sake - don't include Snow White in your montage of empowered women!

The Problem of the Real Child['s Parent]

Children's literature traditionally divides into two camps: the child camp and the book camp. I generally fall into the book camp. I am more concerned with what the book says and what that means for the literature and the world (when I'm feeling ambitious), less concerned with how the child benefits from and/or is affected by these books. However, my undergraduate degree is in Elementary Education, and I have recently begun tutoring "on the side." This has brought the real child into focus. All of the bias against children's books that I have conveniently forgotten exists has come to the forefront, not because these children refuse to read picturebooks or beginner chapter books, but because the parents refuse on behalf of the child!

This is not an uncommon position in the adult world. When a child says that "picturebooks are for babies," often they are parroting a parent or teacher. This declaration is not news, I recognize. But I suppose the question I have as a researcher and an advocate of children's literature is how do we reconcile what we know with the opinions around us? 

Picturebooks teach visual literacy in addition to "traditional" literacy. They encourage children to make connections, to "fill in the gaps" as so many researchers (Styles and Watson, 1996; Beauvais, 2015) have pointed out. They are valuable as a teaching tool, and frankly, they are enjoyable. Adults have recently come to the conclusion that they can benefit from coloring books, which was once labeled "babyish," but god-forbid a ten-year-old read Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are. Why?

I tried gently explaining to the parent that there are benefits to reading a picturebook, but the parent was unmoved. Her understanding of how to improve a child's reading was to give worksheets to prepare for an upcoming standardized test. Needless to say, I did not get the job, and we're probably both better off for it. But what about the child? What is his experience of reading? Would he like reading if picturebooks were a normal part of his diet?

I am not sure how to reconcile the ivory tower with the life of the real child (or parent). Really, this blog post has turned into a rant of how frustrating it is to know something that could help and feel silenced. I am not a parent. I do not have to worry about a child passing a standardized test. But I do love reading and am an advocate of others getting the opportunity to feel the same way. Reading picturebooks, or frankly, whatever interests you, is a key way to achieving that goal. 

Here is what I've learned: the book camp is way less complicated.