Gone With the Wind
by Margaret Mitchell
★★★★★
**SPOILERS AHEAD**
I first read this epic novel 10 years ago and now after rereading it I appreciate it even more. It’s easy to dismiss it as a love story, but that doesn’t even cover half of the story. It begins in the days preceding the Civil War as Georgian plantation owners gather for a barbeque. We meet the O’Hara family: spitfire Scarlett and her sisters, their gentle mother Ellen and wild Irish father Gerald.
The plot unfolds as war is declared and the self-centered Scarlett realizes the man she loves, Ashley, is planning to marry someone else, Melanie. I couldn’t put the book down as we swept from marriage to death, births to destruction. It is a romance, but it is also so much more than that. It’s a history of the south and a portrait of endurance. It’s a story about surviving change. The entire Southern society comes crashing down around its people, some survive, some flourish, some die, some live in denial. It affects everyone, but each person reacts differently.
One character that stood out to me this time was Scarlett’s mother Ellen. I’d forgotten that she is only 32 at the beginning of the book. She’s has had six children, but she’s so young! After her heart was broken, she married Scarlett’s father Gerald, even though he was 28 years her senior. Ellen is the only person who Scarlett truly respects and wants to please. Even after her death, Ellen’s impact on her daughter resonates throughout the novel.
“Mother had always been just as she was, a pillar of strength, a fount of wisdom, the one person who knew the answers to everything.”
Gerald is another great character. He’s 60 at the beginning of the book, but he’s full of life. When his wife dies his spirit completely breaks. He does want what’s best for his children and he knows that Ashley would never be a good match for Scarlett. He warns her of this, that their temperaments are too different to ever be compatible, but she ignores him.
Scarlett's Men:
The men in Scarlett’s life shape her in many ways. Her first husband is the weak and naïve brother of Melanie. Scarlett marries him to spite Ashley, but their brief marriage is cut short when Charles dies after only two months. His only legacy was the son, Wade, he gave her.
Scarlett married for the second time out of necessity. She needs money to save her beloved plantation, Tara and so she marries Frank, her sister’s beau. She always refers to him as a fussy old maid, but he was stronger than he first appeared. Despite being tricked into marriage, he honors her as his wife. She bullies him and scandalizes him by purchasing and running lumber mills. It’s an unhappy pairing that is cut short by Frank’s untimely death, but not before Scarlett bears him a daughter, Ella.
Ashley is the man that she can never have, but the one she never ceases to love. She may have loved him purely at one time, but at some point it becomes more of a dream. She wants him because she can’t have him. Everyone who knows either of them understands that they would be horrible for each other, but she idolizes him in her mind and it doesn’t matter who he truly is. I was so frustrated by Ashley. In his honorable way he strings Scarlett along for years. He is weak in so many ways. Although Scarlett does some despicable things, you have to admire her tenacity and unwillingness to let circumstances defeat her.
“He accepted the universe and his place in it for what they were and, shrugging, turned to his music and books and his better world.”
I’ve saved the best for last. Rhett Butler, the scoundrel, the soldier, he is so many things throughout the book, but in every situation he is honest to a fault except for when it comes to his own heart. He and Scarlett are two peas in a pod. She continually finds herself admiring Rhett because of his practicality and she can’t help but feel physically attracted to him, but she also despises him because he’s the only man who truly knows her, sees her for what she is and still loves her.
“I wonder if anyone but me realizes what goes on in that head back of your deceptively sweet face.”
I love that the readers and Scarlett never completely know Rhett. He teases and goads, but he very rarely shows his true face. Only when he talks about his cruel prideful father and his poor mother or when he’s angry do we see his vulnerable self.
“He was dark of face, swarthy as a pirate, and his eyes were as bold and black as any pirate’s appraising a galleon to be scuttled or a maiden to be ravished. There was a cool recklessness in his face and a cynical humor in his mouth as he smiled at her, and Scarlett caught her breath.”
One of the things I love and admire so much about this book is the complex characters. They surprise you with their depth and their ability to change and grow. Rhett is practical to a fault, but he is also incredibly heroic, deciding to join the war when it’s almost too late to do anything. Melanie is by far my favorite character in the book. When you first meet her you think she’s a simpering fool, much of that is because we see her through Scarlett’s eyes. As we get to know her we are surprised, alongside Scarlett, to find an incredible strength of will. She is one of the kindest and strongest characters in all of literature.
“Now why didn’t I have the gumption to say that?” thought Scarlett, jealousy mixing with admiration. “How did that little rabbit ever get up spunk enough to stand up to old lady Merriweather?”
It takes a long time for Scarlett to get past her initial impression of Melly, but in addition to her unfailing loyalty and kindness, she has a strength that Scarlett admires.
“Struggling against hatred for Ashley’s wife, there surged a feeling of admiration and comradeship. She saw in a flash of clarity untouched by any petty emotion that beneath the gentle voice and the dovelike eyes of Melanie there was a thin flashing blade of unbreakable steel.”
In addition to the main characters there is a wonderful selection of supporting characters that didn’t make it into the famous film. Beatrice Tarleton owns a neighboring plantation. She has four rambunctious sons and raises horses. She loses all of her sons and horses in the war and it breaks her heart. Grandma Fontaine, another neighbor, tells Scarlett about watching her family being slaughtered by Indians and somehow surviving the experience. She is a picture of what Scarlett could become when she is old, a formidable woman. Will Benteen is a Confederate soldier nursed to health at Tara. He stays on, helping run the farm and despite his poor upbringing he becomes a helping hand to Scarlett as she tries to rebuild their lives. He knows and understands much about the family’s dynamics, but he remains silent on most issues.
One of the most interesting things about Gone with the Wind is the question of whether not Scarlett is a villain. In the classic sense she is an obvious villain. She doesn't care who she hurts while trying to reach her goal. She ruins lives with abandon, she lusts after another woman’s husband, she is a neglectful mother and a shallow creature. Yet she also protects those around her. Without her Tara would have been lost to the Yankees, Melly would have died in childbirth as Atlanta burned. She can become petty and cruel. But if every decision she made was out of selfishness she never would've stayed in Atlanta while Melly was pregnant. Even if she did that out of a misplaced the loyalty to Ashley It was still the right thing to do.
Scarlett is a fascinating character because of her contradictions. In the same way Melanie is just as fascinating. She is both weak and incredibly strong. The women are two sides of the same coin and their similarities are just as interesting as the things that separate them.
Scarlett’s great tragedy is that she never truly understands the people in her life until it’s too late. She loves a version of Ashley that doesn’t exist. She doesn’t see how much Rhett loves her and she never understands what an incredible friend she has in Melly.
“Never before had it occurred to her that she needed Melanie. But now, the truth surged in, down to her deepest recesses of her soul.
“Now she had a fumbling knowledge that, had she ever understood Ashley, she would never have loved him; had she ever understood Rhett, she would never have lost him.”
BOTTOM LINE: This beautiful novel has so many layers and is just a damn good book. It’s about the crumbling of a way of life. It’s about war and starvation. It’s about the deep bounds of friendship and the impact your parents have on your life long after they’re gone. It’s about love and the illusion of love and longing for things you can’t have. It covers so many issues and yet at its heart it’s also a love story. I know I’ll reread this book again in the future and I’m sure that the next time I’ll peel even more layers away.
“Now you are beginning to think for yourself instead of letting other think for you. That’s the beginning of wisdom.”
“They were right! Everybody was right! You aren’t a gentleman!”
“‘My dear girl,’ he said, ‘how inadequate.”
“Scarlett reigned supreme at Tara now and, like others suddenly elevated to authority, all the bullying instincts in her nature rose to the surface.
“All wars are sacred to those who have to fight them. If the people who started wars didn’t make them sacred, who would be foolish enough to fight?”
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