Anne of Ingleside recap

Anne Blythe is settled at Ingleside, the doctor's house at Glen St. Mary, with Gilbert's country practice, the redoubtable housekeeper Susan Baker, and a family of children: Jem, Walter, the twins Nan and Di, Shirley, and, born in this book, the youngest, Rilla. The story is a sequence of domestic episodes rather than a single plot. Gilbert's Aunt Mary Maria arrives for a short visit and stays for months, spreading gloom and criticism until she takes offence and leaves of her own accord, to the household's relief. Each child has a chapter of their own troubles: Jem loses his dog, Walter is frightened into walking home alone in the night by a story that his mother is dying, Nan convinces herself she was exchanged in infancy and goes to find her supposed real mother, and Di is twice taken in by a friend who lies to her. Anne, turning forty, begins to fear that Gilbert has grown indifferent to her, a fear that a dinner party attended by an old acquaintance of his makes almost unbearable, until his own words on the way home show it to be groundless.

Previously: Anne Shirley grew up as an orphan taken in at Green Gables in Avonlea, taught school, took her degree at Redmond College, and married Gilbert Blythe after a long engagement. They began married life in a small house on Four Winds Harbour, where Anne's first baby died within a day of birth, where she made friends of the old lighthouse keeper Captain Jim, the outspoken Miss Cornelia Bryant, and Leslie Moore, and where her son Jem was born. Captain Jim died, Leslie was freed from a marriage that had never legally existed and married the writer Owen Ford, Miss Cornelia married Marshall Elliott, and the Blythes moved up to a larger house at Glen St. Mary called Ingleside, taking with them their housekeeper Susan Baker. Several years have passed since then; Gilbert's practice has grown, and the Ingleside nursery has filled. This book is a series of scenes from the family's life in those years.

Anne is in Avonlea for a few days, staying at Green Gables and talking over old times with Diana, now Mrs. Fred Wright. The two walk their childhood haunts, remember the friends of their schooldays and what has become of them, and Anne goes home to Glen St. Mary. Ingleside is full: Gilbert out at all hours on his practice, Susan Baker ruling the kitchen and the family's reputation, and the children, Jem, Walter, the twins Nan and Di, and small Shirley, filling the house and grounds. Anne's sixth child, a daughter, is born and named Bertha Marilla after Anne's own mother and Marilla Cuthbert, and is called Rilla from the start. Susan is triumphant. Neighbours call, chiefly Mrs. Marshall Elliott, once Miss Cornelia Bryant of Four Winds, who brings the Glen's news and her verdict on it, and the household settles into the ordinary business of a doctor's family in a small country place.

Gilbert's elderly aunt, Mary Maria Blythe, comes to Ingleside for what is announced as a short visit and settles in with no sign of leaving. She is mournful and endlessly critical: the children are ill brought up, the meals are wrong, Anne's management is careless, and every remark carries the suggestion that she is being badly used. Susan Baker, whose kitchen is invaded, endures her with visible effort, and Gilbert, who cannot be brought to see the trouble, treats his aunt as a harmless old lady. The children learn to keep out of her way. Meanwhile the ordinary griefs of childhood arrive at Ingleside: Jem's dog sickens and dies, and Jem grieves for him with the whole of his heart. Anne's household runs on under the strain, and the visit stretches from weeks into months.

Walter, the dreaming, sensitive Blythe boy, is sent away to stay with relatives at Lowbridge. He is miserable there, and an older girl, half in mischief and half in cruelty, tells him that his mother is dying and that he will never see her again. Believing it, he sets out at night and walks the long road home alone, terrified the whole way, and arrives at Ingleside to find his mother perfectly well and the house calm. The incident marks him; he has more imagination than he can always control, and the world outside Ingleside frightens him. Other episodes fill the season, small quarrels, schemes, and reconciliations among the children, while Aunt Mary Maria remains and the family's patience wears thinner with every week she stays.

Aunt Mary Maria's presence has become intolerable. She interferes in the nursery, offends the neighbours, and turns every kindness into a grievance, and Anne, who will not be rude to a guest under her own roof, is worn down by it. Susan is close to open rebellion. Matters end not in a quarrel but in an accident of manners: a party is planned in the old lady's honour, something at it strikes her as a slight, and she announces with dignity that she has stayed where she was not wanted and will trouble them no longer. She departs, and Ingleside becomes itself again overnight. The relief in the household is enormous and largely unspoken. Anne turns back to her children, her garden, and the affairs of the Glen.

The children's own troubles occupy the following seasons. Nan, who takes her fancies seriously, works herself into the conviction that she was exchanged for another baby at birth, and goes secretly to the poor household where she believes her real mother lives; the visit cures her of the idea entirely and sends her home grateful for what she has. Di attaches herself twice over to unsuitable friends: one a fluent liar from a disorderly farm whose invented family history collapses when Di spends a night under her roof, the other a girl who wins her sympathy with a tale of ill-usage and enjoys the fuss. Both friendships end in disillusionment and no lasting harm. Jem's ambitions grow, Walter goes on writing his verses, and Shirley and Rilla are still small. Anne watches them all with a mother's mixture of amusement and anxiety.

Anne, now forty, is troubled by a fear she cannot shake off: Gilbert is preoccupied, absent-minded, and short with her, forgets what matters to her, and seems to have stopped noticing that she exists. She persuades herself that his love has worn out and that she has grown old and dull. The fear reaches its worst when they go to a dinner in town where Christine Stuart, whom Gilbert knew at Redmond and whom Anne once believed he might marry, is among the guests. Anne spends the evening watching them together and is thoroughly wretched. On the drive home Gilbert speaks of Christine with complete indifference, says how much she has aged and how glad he is to be going home, and the whole of Anne's misery falls away; his distraction had been nothing but overwork and a case he could not save. The book closes on a warm summer night at Ingleside with the household asleep, the children safe, and Anne entirely happy.

Anne's fear that Gilbert has stopped loving her comes to a head when they attend a dinner in town where Christine Stuart, an old acquaintance of his college days, is among the guests. Anne dresses carefully and spends the evening watching the two of them, wretched with an unhappiness she has never felt before. On the drive home Gilbert speaks of Christine with amused indifference, remarking on how much she has changed and how glad he is to be going home, and the whole structure of Anne's jealousy collapses. His distraction, it turns out, was nothing but overwork and worry over a difficult case. The two are entirely at ease with each other again. Aunt Mary Maria has long since taken herself off, and Ingleside is its own household once more. Each of the children's troubles has been survived and mostly outgrown: Jem is full of plans, Walter is writing, the twins have finished with their unsuitable friendships, and Rilla is out of babyhood. The book ends on a quiet summer night at Ingleside with the whole family asleep under one roof and Anne content, the family established for the books that follow.