Gone with the Wind Totally Explained

Everything about Gone With The Wind totally explained

Gone with the Wind is a 1936 American novel by Margaret Mitchell set in the Old South during the American Civil War and Reconstruction. The novel won the 1937 Pulitzer Prize and was adapted into an Academy Award-winning 1939 film of the same name. It was also adapted during the 1970's into a stage musical titled Scarlett; there's also a 2008 new musical stage adaptation in London's West End titled Gone With The Wind. It is the only novel by Mitchell published during her lifetime, and it took her ten years to write it. The novel is one of the most popular books of all time, selling more than 30 million copies (see list of best-selling books). Over the years, the novel has also been analyzed for its symbolism and treatment of mythological archetypes. by Ernest Dowson: "I have forgot much, Cynara! gone with the wind." The novel's protagonist Scarlett O'Hara also uses the title phrase in a line of dialogue in the book: when her hometown is overtaken by the Yankees, she wonders if her home, a plantation called Tara, is still standing, or if it was "also gone with the wind which had swept through Georgia".

Plot summary

Mitchell's work relates the story of a rebellious Georgia Southern belle named Scarlett O'Hara and her experiences with friends, family, lovers, and enemies before, during, and after the Civil War. Using Scarlett's life, Mitchell examined the effect of the War on the old order of the South, and the aftermath of the war on what was left of the southern planter class. The plot of Gone with the Wind contains many details which have triggered spin-off concepts,
   While Margaret Mitchell used to say that her Gone with the Wind characters were not based on real people, modern researchers have found similarities to some of the people in Mitchell's own life as well as to individuals she knew or she heard of. Mitchell's maternal grandmother, Annie Fitzgerald Stephens, was born in 1845; she was the daughter of an Irish immigrant, who owned a large plantation on Tara Road in Clayton County, south of Atlanta, and who married an American woman named Ellen, and had several children, all daughters.
   Many researchers believe that the physical brutality and low regard for women exhibited by Rhett Butler was based on Mitchell's first husband, Red Upshaw. She divorced him after she learned he was a bootlegger amid rumors of abuse infidelity.
   After a stay at the plantation called The Woodlands, and later Barnsley Gardens, Mitchell may have gotten the inspiration for the dashing scoundrel from Sir Godfrey Barnsley of Adairsville, Georgia. Martha Bulloch Roosevelt, the mother of US president Theodore Roosevelt may have been an inspiration for Scarlett O'Hara. Roosevelt biographer David McCullough discovered that Mitchell, as a reporter for The Atlanta Journal, conducted an interview with one of Martha's closest friends and bridesmaid, Evelyn King Williams, then 87. In that interview, she described Martha's physical appearance, beauty, grace, and intelligence in detail. The similarities between Martha and the Scarlett character are striking.

George Trenholm as Historical Basis for Rhett Butler

It made international news in 1989 when Dr. E. Lee Spence, an underwater archaeologist and shipwreck expert from Charleston, South Carolina, announced his discovery that Margaret Mitchell had actually taken much of her compelling story of love, greed and war from real life and that Mitchell had actually based most of Rhett Butler on the life of George Alfred Trenholm. Like Rhett, Trenholm was a tall, handsome, shipping magnate from Charleston, South Carolina, and made millions of dollars from blockade running. Both the real life Trenholm and the fictional Rhett were accused of making off with much of the Confederate treasury and were thrown in prison after the Civil War where they were visited by a beautiful woman with a "fast" reputation. Spence's literary discovery that had its roots in his prior discoveries of some of Trenholm's wrecked blockade runners made international news.
In his book, Treasures of the Confederate Coast: The "Real Rhett Butler" and Other Revelations

, Dr. Spence reveals what the editors of Life magazine called "overwhelming evidence" that shipping and banking magnate George Trenholm was the historical basis for Mitchell's romantic sea captain. Spence's book gives a compelling case that Mitchell had falsely claimed Rhett was pure fiction.

Symbolism

Over the past years, the novel Gone with the Wind has also been analyzed for its symbolism and mythological treatment of archetypes. Scarlett has been characterized as a heroic figure struggling and attempting to twist life to suit her own wishes.
   In 2000, the copyright holders attempted to suppress publication of Alice Randall’s The Wind Done Gone, a book that retold the story from the point of view of the slaves. A federal appeals court denied the plaintiffs an injunction against publication in Suntrust v. Houghton Mifflin (2001), on the basis that the book was parody protected by the First Amendment. The parties subsequently settled out of court to allow the book to be published. After its release, the book became a New York Times bestseller.
   In 2002, the copyright holders blocked distribution of an unauthorised sequel published in the U.S, The Winds of Tara by Katherine Pinotti, alleging copyright infringement. The book was immediately removed from bookstores by publisher Xlibris. The book sold in excess of 2,000 copies within 2 weeks before being removed.
   A second sequel has been released in November of 2007. The story covers the same time period as Gone with the Wind and is told from Rhett Butler’s perspective. Written by Donald McCaig, this novel is titled Rhett Butler's People (2007).

Adaptations

Gone With The Wind has been adapted several times for stage and screen, most famously in the 1930s film starring Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh. On stage it has been adapted as a musical Scarlett (premiering in 1972), and was again adapted as a musical called Gone With The Wind premiering at the New London Theatre in April 2008 in a production directed by Trevor Nunn.

Further Information

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