There are several museums (including Ms. Montgomery’s birthplace), a park, a restaurant and shopping complex, stores, guest cottages and inns, all named for Anne, a feisty redheaded orphan, or for locations in Montgomery’s classic young adult series, whose first volume was published in 1908.
“Lucy Maud is a huge portion of the tourism here, not only ‘Anne’ but her descriptions of P.E.I.,” said Jack DesRoches, a local tour guide who referred to Prince Edward Island by its well-known acronym. “Lots of her books describe the beauty of this place, so that drives people here.”
With the holidays just around the corner, the gift of literature is always a good idea — but coupling that with travel to visit the setting of a classic book or the home of its author could create a gift remembered for a lifetime. After all, characters such as Anne, Jo March, Tintin and Pippi Longstocking are enduring fictional friends for many readers, young and old.
“I do think that there is this really firm belief that your imagination can change the world, that you can use the power of your imagination to create a world that is more satisfying,” said Mavis Reimer, the director of the Center for Research in Young People’s Texts and Cultures at the University of Winnipeg. “Going to real places where imagination took hold like that, it does also allow you to work at that intersection of what’s the relation between your imaginary life and the real world.
Another Firebrand
Another fictional, feisty redhead is Pippi Longstocking (in Swedish, she is called Pippi Langstrump). Created 80 years ago by Astrid Lindgren, the books about Pippi’s adventures have sold more than 70 million copies and been translated into 80 languages, most recently Nigerian Pidgin.
Fans of Ms. Lindgren — and Pippi — can tour Nas, the author’s childhood home just outside the southern Swedish town of Vimmerby and visit an adjacent visitor center that stages exhibitions about the author and her influence. Within walking distance, there also is Astrid Lindgren’s World, a theme park that stages performances based on Ms. Lindgren’s books. It has playgrounds, a reproduction of Pippi’s home, Villa Villekula, and a miniaturized model of what Vimmerby would have looked like when Ms. Lindgren was growing up there in the early part of the 20th century.
Denmark’s Favorite Son
In Denmark, fans of Hans Christian Andersen — the author of such children’s classics as “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” “The Princess and the Pea” and “The Little Match Girl” — can visit Odense, the town where the writer spent the first 14 years of his life.
One of the places to check out is the H.C. Andersens Hus, a museum that includes exhibitions, short films and interactive installations that help visitors investigate the writer’s creative process. Admission includes access to both the home where Mr. Andersen was born in 1805 and the half-timbered yellow house where he lived until he was 14.
Once he moved to Copenhagen, Mr. Andersen lived mostly along the colorful Nyhavn (New Harbor), which is both a street and a canal. Over the years, he lived at number 20 — his home when his first fairy tales were published in 1835 — and then later at numbers 18 and 67.
A Roving Reporter
In Belgium, Tintin buffs can spot their beloved cartoon adventurer, a roving reporter, all across the country’s capital, Brussels — he is on murals, atop buildings and there is even a statue of him and his dog, Snowy, at the Centre culturel d’Uccle.
The Musée Hergé, in the town of Louvain-la-Neuve just outside of Brussels, celebrates the life of Georges Remi, Tintin’s creator (his pen name was Hergé). The contemporary building, designed by the French architect Christian de Portzamparc, houses more than 80 original illustration plates and 800 documents, photos and objects once owned by the writer.
A Tale of One City
For fans of “A Christmas Carol” and other classics by Charles Dickens, London should be the destination.
First, there is his home at 43 Doughty Street, now a museum in the heart of literary Bloomsbury. It was where Dickens wrote “Oliver Twist” and “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby,” books about two subjects close to his heart: poverty and the working class.
There also are several Charles Dickens walking tours, where fans can visit the last standing wall of Marshalsea, the prison where the author’s father was incarcerated, and Hatton Garden, where the “Twist” villain Fagin and his gang once operated, now the center of London’s jewelry and diamond trade.
There also is a new West End production of “Oliver!”, based on the 1960 musical. “The performance not only entertained us with its extraordinary humor and vibrant energy but also sparked meaningful family conversations about what it meant to grow up in London during the 1830s compared to today,” said Lindsey Kosinski, an American living in London, who recently saw the show with her mother and three children. “Sharing this timeless story across three generations made the evening especially memorable.”
And just for the holidays, “A Christmas Carol” is being staged at the Old Vic, opening Wednesday and running through Jan. 10.
Hiding in Plain Sight
South of London, in the Kent countryside, are the gardens of Great Maytham Hall, the inspiration for Frances Hodgson Burnett’s “The Secret Garden.”
The British American author, who also wrote “A Little Princess” and “Little Lord Fauntleroy,” leased the manor house from 1898 to 1907. One day, as she described, she found a robin fluttering near a small door covered in ivy. She unlocked the door to find a neglected garden, overgrown with brambles and tangled vines.
For fans of “The Secret Garden,” the scenario may sound familiar, as its heroine, Mary Lennox, also discovered a forgotten wonder behind a hidden door.
Over time, Ms. Hodgson Burnett restored the garden, planting hundreds of roses. Visitors on a walking tour in the proper season now can see those roses, as well as wisteria, bluebells and foxgloves.
A Timeless Heroine
That happened — at least in part, Dr. Reimer at the University of Winnipeg said — because characters like Jo March gave ambitious, intelligent girls “ways of building interior lives, interior narratives, that allowed them to live, cope and survive, and even maybe thrive, in a world that was not always very welcoming of them.”
While writing “Little Women,” Ms. Alcott lived at Orchard House, just outside of Boston.
The home, which displays many items that belonged to the Alcott family, is open to the public with daily 45-minute guided tours that can be booked in advance.
Next door is The Wayside, one of the Alcotts’ earlier homes, which they called Hillside.
It was purchased from them by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author of “A Scarlet Letter” — certainly not a children’s book, but perhaps a classic making this a bucket-list visit for readers who admire the dignity and character of his heroine, Hester Prynne.
