“They’re our kind of people,”
Julie said.
It’s the sort of phrase that could be cruel. It could be
unkind, exclusive, evasive. But the way she used it, it was none of those
things.
She was referring to what Anne Shirley, as a child, called
“Kindred Spirits.” Later, when she grew up, she adopted the term her friend
Miss Cornelia used, “The race that knows Joseph.” I have no idea where L.M.
Montgomery came up with that phrase. I presume she is referencing one of the
biblical Josephs, but I honestly don’t know. I only know that she somehow found
the perfect description for “our kind of people.”
The race that knows Joseph are actually a fairly broad and
diverse lot. They like all kinds of different things. There does tend to be a
bookishness about them, but they’re not limited by those books. There are
scientists, athletes, English professors, historians, sea captains, and doctor’s
wives…all who belong to the race that knows Joseph.
It’s a bit of an intangible descriptor. There are, after
all, two biblical Josephs. I think an argument could be made for either one to
be him who is referenced. The Old Testament Joseph, Jacob’s son – he of the Amazing
Technicolor Dream Coat – was a dreamer and an old soul. He was a gifted manager
and strategic planner. Through his life he learned to see the big picture and
to glimpse things from God’s perspective. I’d wager this is the Joseph that
Montgomery’s Miss Cornelia is referring to, but I often wonder if maybe, just
maybe, it’s the other one.
The other Joseph, the New Testament Joseph, of the house and
line of David, is a quieter character than the Dream Coat Joseph. We only get a
few chapters’ worth of glimpses into this Joseph – who also had a father named
Jacob – but they are telling glimpses. He is a man who speaks with angels. A man
who rises up and takes his pregnant fiancée into his home, marrying her despite
the whispers of the people around them. He is a man who raises a Child he knows
is not his own, a Child whose depth and wisdom are confounding to the
carpenter. He works hard, and – it seems – he dies early, before seeing how the
Boy he raised turned the world upside down.
I think both Josephs would be “our kind of people.” I think
they both would find that chord of resonance with the other. But Technicolor
Joseph would be up front leading the group, laying out the plan of events, and
Carpenter Joseph would be working hard behind the scenes.
Whichever Joseph it is that we know, “our kind of people”
all know him.
“You’re young and I’m old, but our souls are about the same age, I
reckon. We both belong to the race that knows Joseph, as Cornelia Bryant would
say,” said Captain Jim.
“‘The race that knows Joseph?’”
puzzled Anne.
“Yes. Cornelia divides all the
folks in the world into two kinds– the race that knows Joseph and the race that
don’t. If a person sorter sees eye to eye with you, and has pretty much the
same ideas about things, and the same taste in jokes–why, then he belongs to
the race that knows Joseph.”
“Oh, I understand,” exclaimed
Anne, light breaking in upon her. “It’s what I used to call–and still call in
quotation marks ‘kindred spirits.’”
“Jest so–jest so,” agreed Captain Jim. “We’re it, whatever it is. When you come in to-night, Mistress Blythe, I says to
myself, says I, ‘Yes, she’s of the race that knows Joseph.’ And mighty glad I
was, for if it wasn’t so we couldn’t have had any real satisfaction in each
other’s company. The race that knows Joseph is the salt of the airth, I
reckon.”*
*Montgomery, L.M. Anne’s House of Dreams. New York: Bantam Books, 1992. p. 38. (©McClelland and Steward
Limited, 1922.)
