was the character anne shirley based on anyone in real life?
There was no specific person, but Montgomery used her own childhood experiences in Prince Edward Island for the Anne series. Some find similarities in that she often felt lonely as a young girl, and an experience she had as a young girl with her relatives, the Macneills (they sent for an orphaned boy of ten-twelve years of age but received a three-year-old girl instead). A few other of Montgomery’s characters were orphans as well.
