Céline’s Reflections: Gone With the Wind
Title: Gone With the Wind
Author: Margaret Mitchell
Medium: Audiobook
Motivation for reading: Recommended by my brother and a former co-worker who also grew up in Georgia. And because I’m a native Atlantan. And it’s a world classic! (So you might say I’m going into this a little biased…)
Reflections & Takeaways:
It cracks me up to think to think that people around the world adore and praise and love Gone With the Wind — this huge book that took place in my hometown. Even though I was born and raised in Atlanta, I still find it really random when anything happens there. But for some reason, even though I haven’t lived in Atlanta for over ten years at this point, it does seem that all random roads and super bizarre connections in life take me back to Georgia — Including this lovely novel! I guess the girl can leave Georgia, but Georgia doesn’t leave the girl.
My grandmother’s maiden name was Mitchell, so we have been told that somehow we were distantly related. (I still need to study the family tree connection and how that works out.) I’m also dubious because my grandmother grew up primitive Baptist, and Margaret Mitchell was Catholic, which honestly surprised me. I was raised Catholic by my French mother, and my dad was raised Methodist in southern Georgia. His grandfather was a Methodist minister. So the fact that I’m related to a Catholic woman who was from Georgia baffles me a little bit. And from what I have picked up, Catholics in the American south have not always been welcome. The other interesting and random connection is that Margaret Mitchell went to my rival high school, which was also down the street from where I grew up. I passed Westminster everyday on my way to my school.
I read Gone With the Wind in October 2019, and when I went back to Atlanta for Thanksgiving, I really wanted to go visit Margaret Mitchell’s grave and house. Luckily, my brother humored me and we went on a Sunday morning to Oakland Cemetery. It was honestly a fun experience! I wasn’t too thrilled about visiting a cemetery, but it was a beautiful November morning, the leaves were changing, and we just had the time to visit and walk around the cemetery. It’s pretty historical — considering that Atlanta, as Margaret Mitchelll describes in her novel — is a relatively young city. (As my French relatives will remind me, next to the history of Europe, the United States has relatively not history.)
This book also provided me an interesting perspective of the American South during Reconstruction. The novel takes place during and after the Civil War, and the abolishment of slavery forced the South to adjust to the new social structure which deeply impacted the economy. It’s difficult to imagine how hard it was for the southerners to adapt. People and societies tend to resist change, and the American South was forced to drastically alter its entire social structure and way of life in a short amount of time with little to no guidance or precedent.
I wanted to write about Gone With the Wind because it was one of the best books I read in 2019. As it is such a rich story, I won’t even be able to scratch the surface of all my thoughts in this little blog. Still, I wanted to pay the book a little tribute and encourage anyone to read it. While I may be biased because I’m from Atlanta, there is a reason it’s a beloved and revered book around the world.
I have to admit that I attempted to read the book back in either middle or high school and failed. I also tried to watch the movie and was bored out of my mind. (Side note — The movie doesn’t do the book justice in my humble opinion but I’ve always had a bias toward books.) Looking back, I realize I wasn’t mature enough to fully appreciate the significance. All I remembered was thinking Scarlett was a spoiled, self-centered, brat that only thought about herself and who had a crush on Ashley, a married man she could never have. I didn’t have the life experiences to understand, and at the time it all seemed ridiculous to me.
I guess as I’ve aged, I’ve obtained a pair of rose tented glasses. I did learn a lesson from Scarlett that has taught me how to get over or deal with my own heartbreak. At the end of the novel, Ashley does become available, but Scarlett finally realizes that he is not the man she loves nor does he love her. She finally recognizes that she has been in love with a man that doesn’t exist. The Ashely in her mind is her creation. Similarly, I’ve dated guys that I was head over heels for that broke up with me after they had become an integrated part of my life. Each time, I was devastated — a universal feeling that many of us feel when we experience heartbreak. I questioned what love really was and didn’t know if I would meet anyone else as great as each of them was. It took time for me to move on, but after reading this book, I realized that those men and my feelings for each of them are for a man that doesn’t exist. The day that they broke up with me, the guy I loved ceased to exist. Yes, the man still physically exists, but I realized that he isn’t the same person. He’s evolved over time, and I remind myself I’m in love with a version of him that had loved me back. It’s gone. Thanks to Scarlett, I woke up realizing I didn’t want to fall into her trap and learned the importance of letting those men go the same way that Scarlett dismisses her false love for Ashley.
Finally, Scarlett is a great character, and my previous opinion that I had from middle and high school of her has evolved. She is certainly flawed, and one of those flaws is selfishness. However, I now understand her motivation and her purpose and that gives her character new meaning to me. As the book continues, her selfishness benefits the people around her, as she helps the family preserve their home. She is also a fierce entrepreneur who is skilled at navigating the traditional man’s world of business and dealings. Scarlett doesn’t hold back or allow the men to push her aside simple because she is a woman. She knows she can match and outwit many of them.
Towards the end of the book, you feel like Scarlett’s world is crumbling after everything she has fought for. And when you think you can’t feel worse for, you cheer her on as she turns the whole tone around in only a way Scarlett can. She finishes on what I think is the best line of the whole book and it fills your heart with the confidence that she will be more than okay and that she will take you with her as she booms, “Tomorrow is another day!”
Hats off to you, Miz Scarlett.
Random books/shows that I made connections with while reading this book:
The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis — A fictional book and also a popular Netflix show about ascension of a young woman in the male-dominated world of chess.
Circe by Madeline Miller — Based off of Greek mythology, the author retells the story of Circe, the nymph and witch. This is another story with a strong, complex female lead.
