In Magic Island: The Fictions of L.M. Montgomery, Elizabeth Waterston writes that, after the success of Anne, Montgomery’s ambition was to write something entirely new.  Unlike her previous novels, Anne of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlea and Kilmeny of the Orchard, she would not make the focus on one single character.  “This book would not limit itself in that way,” Waterston writes.  “It would play games with the idea of storying and would dramatize a notable example of girlhood.”

Though the story is set in Prince Edward Island, tales from faraway lands, such as ancient Greece, Scandinavia and even pioneer Canada, would be related to her readers through the gifted storyteller, Sara.  “Montgomery was ready to celebrate the gift of narrative that she recognized in herself, and to show the kind of impact that a female story-teller could have on an admiring group of listeners, both male and female.”

Readers of the novels and viewers of the series Road to Avonlea, will agree that though both Sara Stanley and Anne Shirley are highly imaginative, they are also different.  “Sarah Stanley is presented, not as a child like the funny eleven-year-old Anne who first amused readers with her incredible fantasies, and not as a young woman like Anne in the sequel about a teacher who has drifted beyond dramatic story-telling; certainly not as a full-grown adult like romantic Kilmeny.  Sara at fourteen is exactly the age Montgomery was when she wrote in her journal ‘Life is beginning to get interesting for me’ and added, soon, ‘I like writing compositions’."

Waterston asserts that after all of Montgomery’s struggles as a writer, “which had probably drawn some mockery and jealousy as well as some admiration from her home community”, she could now relish in her success. “She gloried in imputing her own story-telling power to her new heroine, and retracing the early development of that power.”

The author points out that 14-year-old Sara (named after Montgomery’s birthplace, Stanley Bridge) is “an idealized self-portrait of the author as a young girl.”  Both girls lived on farms with their extended families, but neither had their parents present.  Neither are beautiful, but both are able to capture the interest of all around them with their stories.

For more information about the creation of Montgomery’s many novels and short stories, take a look at Magic Island: The Fictions of L.M. Montgomery.