Anime Anne

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Friday, September 6th. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day. Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown. Coming next on The World and Everything in It: a classic tale told in an unexpected style.

EICHER: Last week, animator Hayao Miya-zaki was among the winners of the Ramon Magsaysay Awards—considered the Nobel Prizes of Asia.

Miya-zaki received the award for using art to help children understand complex issues and for creating many of the most memorable and beloved films in the world.

BROWN: His studio is best known for anime films such as Howl’s Moving Castle, Spirited Away, and The Boy and the Heron.

Today reviewer Chelsea Boes takes us back to an earlier project—the animated Anne of Green Gables series from 1979.

NARRATOR: While Anne was boarding the train that would take her to the little station, Matthew Cuthbert, wearing a white collar and his best suit, was on his way to the station to meet an orphan boy.

CHELSEA BOES: When you think of Anne of Green Gables, do you also think of Japan? You should. Lucy Maude Montgomery’s 1908 novel was introduced to Japan by Canadian missionary Loretta Leonard Shaw. One of Shaw’s students translated the tale of the whimsical redhead, and the Japanese version was published after World War II. Over the decades, Anne has become a national heroine there, and Japanese artists and writers continually reinterpret her story. In 1979, famed animator Hayao Miyazaki joined forces with Nippon Animation to create an anime version. It’s a 50-episode show and Miyazaki supplied the scene setting and screen composition for the first 14 episodes before departing the project.

The orphan Anne might be rendered in classic anime style, but she still rings true to the character Montgomery penned. She’s scrawny, uncared for, outrageously talkative and dramatic, and, for all that, charming. Though made in Japan, the production is set in Canada like the original novel. The backdrops of pre-industrial countryside feel refreshing. The precise, delicate drawings of Marilla’s spotless kitchen and Matthew’s trim farmstead feel nourishing. And that’s a good thing. Because we’re going to be here with Anne for a long, long time. The anime series runs 25-minutes per episode and covers the entirety of the novel.

ANNE: The best thing to do is if you called me by the name Cordelia.

MARILLA: What! Good heavens, child, Cordelia? Is that really and truly your given name?

ANNE: No, not exactly, but I’d like for people to call me Cordelia.

The episodes, all on YouTube, follow the novel’s chapters to a T. Anime Matthew is more talkative than he should be—much more so than the stellar Matthew from Kevin Sullivan’s 1985 classic version of Anne. But Marilla’s stern Protestantism is very much intact, clashing with Anne’s whimsy to create the wry humor that makes Anne’s story great.

MARILLA: Don’t you know about God?

ANNE: I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ his only begotten son.

MARILLA: Well, at least you know something about it, thank goodness.

The first 14 episodes introduce us to all the main ingredients that make readers love Anne. Her overactive imagination. The mouse drowning in the plum pudding. And, of course, Anne breaking her slate over Gilbert Blythe’s head when he calls her Carrots. (Speaking of the slate breaking, one word of warning: A hilarious but not kid-friendly translation blunder occurs at that point in the English dub.)

ANNE: Stop it, you louse!

CHILDREN: (gasping) What did she do?

Each episode ends on a cliffhanger, so kids will be eagerly waiting for tomorrow night’s episode.

NARRATOR: Summer was over, and once again fall had come to Prince Edward Island. Matthew and Jerry Boot had a great deal of work to do in the field. Meanwhile, Anne and Marilla were harvesting the apples . . .

In the anime and in the book, it’s dialogue—not events—that drives Anne’s story. You may see one of her most famous lines posted around social media in the coming weeks: “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”

The show is restful, wholesome, and a whole lot cheaper than a flight to Prince Edward Island, Canada—where 3,500 Japanese tourists visit each year to celebrate their red-haired heroine.

I’m Chelsea Boes.

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