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News Release99-01 Friend Donates Lucy Maud Montgomery Collection to National Library of CanadaOTTAWA, March 11, 1999 - The National Library of Canada is pleased to announce a major donation of more than 300 works by one of Canada's best-loved authors with the inauguration of the Ronald I. Cohen Lucy Maud Montgomery Collection. "Thanks to Mr. Cohen's keen collecting interest and generosity, we now have an outstanding, nationally significant addition to our Canadian literature collection," says National Librarian Marianne Scott. "This rich bibliographic resource will provide researchers with a vast array of Montgomery's works in a single location. We are most grateful to Mr. Cohen - a very special Friend of the National Library - for his contribution to the national heritage." Lucy Maud Montgomery, Prince Edward Island's most famous author, has been described by scholar Dr. Mary Rubio as "Canada's most enduring export". Her first novel, Anne of Green Gables, written in 1908, became an instant bestseller and was followed by seven sequels, the Emily autobiographical trilogy and two novels for adults. Montgomery published 22 fiction works, a serialization of her life, a book of poetry and some 450 poems and 500 short stories. She also left 10 volumes of unpublished personal diaries. Ronald Cohen, a member of the Board of the Friends of the National Library of Canada since its founding in 1991 and the current vice-president, says that in addition to his personal enthusiasm for Montgomery's works, his goal in developing the collection was to provide a bibliographically significant grouping of the author's works. "In the end it is my hope that those of us who have been collecting similar examples of Canada's literary heritage will preserve these for all time in the national institution mandated to gather together our published heritage - the National Library of Canada." The collection has added more than 300 Canadian, British, American, foreign and variant editions to the Library's Montgomery holdings, which includes many items complete with dust jackets, a number of rare items and some unpublished works. The donation enriches the National Library of Canada's collection with at least 120 editions new to the Library's collections. The Ronald I. Cohen Lucy Maud Montgomery Collection will be housed in the National Library of Canada's Rare Book Room. -30- For further information, contact Karen McGrath Media Relations |