(A reworked post from 2013.)
BOOK REVIEW: GONE WITH THE WIND
By Margaret Mitchell
It is the winter of 1861. Scarlett O’Hara, a pretty Southern
belle, lives on Tara, a large plantation in Georgia. She concerns herself
only with her numerous suitors and her desire to marry Ashley Wilkes. One
day she hears that Ashley is engaged to Melanie Hamilton, his frail, plain
cousin from Atlanta. At the Super Bowl party at the Wilkes plantation the
next day, Scarlett confesses her feelings to Ashley. He tells her that he
does love her but that he is marrying Melanie because she is sweet, caring and
very rich, and that he would appreciate if she waited until the commercial to speak
again. She slaps his face and he leaves the room. Suddenly, she
realizes that Rhett Butler, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Clark Gable,
has been watching the whole scene, and he compliments Scarlett on being
unladylike.
On the night the Yankees capture Atlanta and set it afire, Melanie
gives birth to her son. Rhett
helps them escape the Yankees, escorting them through the burning streets of
the city, but he abandons them outside Atlanta so he can join the Confederate
Army because girls are turned on by a uniform. Scarlett thanks heaven for her
GPS and drives the car all night and day through a dangerous forest full of
deserters and soldiers, at last reaching Tara. She arrives to find that her
mother is dead, her father has lost his mind and the Yankee army has looted the
plantation, leaving no food or cotton. Other
than that, everything is fine. Scavenging
for subsistence, a furious Scarlett vows never to go hungry again and drives to
the local Sizzler, where she singlehandedly clears the salad bar.
As if this weren’t enough aggravation, the war ends and taxes are
raised. She marries her
sister’s beau and he agrees to pay her taxes. She
has another baby and her husband dies before the April 15 tax due date. Rhett has emerged from the war a
fabulously wealthy man, dripping with earnings from his blockade-running
operation, food speculation and some dabbling in the black market, but he is in
prison for tax evasion and cannot help Scarlett. She marries someone else, has
yet another kid and pays her taxes. She
considers becoming a professional widow, but Rhett gets out of prison, proposes and they marry.
After a long, luxurious honeymoon in New Orleans, Scarlett and
Rhett return to Atlanta, where Scarlett builds a garish mansion and socializes
with wealthy Yankees. Scarlett
becomes pregnant again and has child number 4, Bonnie Blue Butler. Rhett dotes on the girl and
begins a campaign to win back the good graces of the prominent Atlanta citizens
in order to keep Bonnie from being an outcast like Scarlett.
Bonnie is sent off with
the other children to boarding school and Rhett nearly loses his mind. His
marriage with Scarlett sours. She concludes that she truly loves
Rhett. He, however, says that he has lost his love for her and he
leaves. Grief-stricken and alone, Scarlett makes up her mind to go
back to Tara to recover her strength in the comforting arms of her childhood
nurse, Mammy, and to think of a way to win Rhett back. She makes a
beautiful dress out of some material that she has hanging around and tries to
seduce him. (Click here.) It doesn’t work. He makes some
comment or other (I forget what it was; something like "I could care less")
and leaves.
She
finds a good lawyer and divorces Rhett, taking him for everything he has. She
moves to Hollywood, changes her name to Elizabeth Taylor, begins a successful
career in the movies and continues to add to her collection of husbands.
An even briefer review of the book:
Most of
you have only seen the movie & not read the book. I preferred
the book. I don’t like sex in the movies. I tried it
once, the seat folded up, I spilled my drink, & that ice, well, it really
ruined my mood----fishducky
