Diana submitted "Averil's Atonement" on behalf of Anne

Diana Barry’s unauthorized submission of Anne Shirley’s “Averil’s Atonement” turns a well-meant surprise into a conflict over authorship and literary principle. Diana secures Anne a twenty-five-dollar prize by inserting the contest sponsor’s baking powder into the story without her knowledge; Anne is grateful for Diana’s affection, yet feels that the alteration has compromised work she cared about. The episode joins a material reward to a private sense of humiliation, and leaves Anne’s deeper objection unresolved.

Background and Conflicting Expectations

Before Anne learns what has happened, Mr. Harrison asks whether she has been writing more stories. He has heard from Mrs. Hiram Sloane that a large envelope addressed to the Rollings Reliable Baking Powder Company of Montreal was placed in the post office box, apparently as an entry for its prize competition. Because the writing on it did not look like Anne’s, he only wonders whether she might be involved. Anne denies it: she has seen the offer but considers writing an advertisement for baking powder disgraceful, comparing it unfavorably with Judson Parker’s patent-medicine fence.

Her refusal establishes what is at stake before the contest result arrives. Anne does not regard the story as interchangeable with a piece of paid copy: she believes that “Averil’s Atonement” came from her best creative effort, and sees the commercial insertion as a violation of that effort. The irony is that she has already dismissed the very activity in which Diana has secretly involved her. The prize will not simply bring good news; it will force Anne to confront a public use of her work that she had explicitly rejected.

Diana’s Submission and the Alteration

That evening, Diana appears at Green Gables with a letter she has brought from the post office. She urges Anne to open it, expecting that its contents will delight her. The letter, addressed to Anne at Green Gables in Avonlea, announces that “Averil’s Atonement” has won the Rollings Reliable competition and that a twenty-five-dollar check is enclosed. The company also plans to publish the story in several prominent Canadian newspapers and print it as a pamphlet for distribution to its patrons. What initially looks like recognition of Anne’s writing is therefore also a plan for broad circulation as advertising.

Anne cannot understand the result because her original story contained no mention of baking powder. Diana then reveals that she sent in the copy Anne had given her, without asking permission. She had first considered asking Anne to enter, but feared that Anne would refuse because she had lost confidence in the story. Diana reasoned that if the entry failed, Anne would never know: unsuccessful stories were not returned. If it won, Diana expected the surprise to make her happy. The plan rests on care for Anne’s feelings, but also on Diana deciding for her what risks and uses of her writing she should accept.

Diana explains exactly how she changed the text. Drawing on her experience in the old Story Club, she added that Averil used Rollings Reliable when making a cake and credited the baking powder for its success. She also inserted the brand name into the final romantic passage: where Perceval embraces Averil and speaks of their future home, Diana made the couple promise to use no other baking powder. Her additions place the commercial name both in a domestic scene and at the story’s emotional conclusion. Anne’s gasp registers the collision between the original ending she had written and the branded ending now submitted under her name.

The Prize and Anne’s Response

Diana emphasizes that Anne has won twenty-five dollars, noting that she had heard the Canadian Woman paid only five dollars for a story. To Diana, the award makes the scheme a success and provides a welcome return. Anne, however, does not respond as if the money settles the matter. She recognizes the unselfish intention behind Diana’s action and tells her that she appreciates its motive; her effort to smile cannot conceal her confusion or distress at discovering that another person altered the story.

Once Diana leaves, Anne puts the check in her bureau drawer as though it were tainted and weeps over the shame and injured sensibility she associates with the result. The response is not simply disappointment at an unwanted edit. Anne imagines how it would feel for a mother to see her child covered with an advertisement, using that comparison to explain how closely she identifies with the story. She recalls Professor Hamilton’s instruction in the literature class at Queen’s University: writers should not work from low or unworthy motives, but should hold to high ideals. She fears that people at Redmond will hear that she wrote a story to advertise Rollings Reliable and tease her for it.

Gilbert Blythe arrives at dusk, having heard the news at Orchard Slope, and initially expects to congratulate Anne. Seeing her face, he asks what is wrong; she appeals to him to understand why the result feels awful. His first response is practical rather than aesthetic. He suggests that students at Redmond will assume Anne, like many others without much money, accepted the opportunity to earn an honest penny and help herself through the year. Board and tuition fees still have to be paid, even for someone who would rather write literary masterpieces.

Aftermath and Significance

Gilbert’s reasoning eases one particular fear: Anne is less concerned that she will be mocked at Redmond. It does not remove the deeper hurt to her ideals. The distinction matters to the episode’s ending: the social explanation makes the prize defensible as a way of earning money, but it does not restore the story to the form Anne wrote or make her feel that its use was her choice.

The episode consequently sets friendship and artistic independence beside one another without making either disappear. Diana acts from affection and hopes to spare Anne the pain of failure; her secret submission and revisions nevertheless deny Anne the decision about whether to enter the contest and how her story may be used. The check, the promised newspaper and pamphlet circulation, and the altered final declaration make the consequences concrete. Anne can value Diana’s motive and still feel that the result has disgraced work she loved. Gilbert helps her distinguish that private wound from the practical judgment other students may make, but the account ends with the wound intact.