Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell has more than stood the test of time for nearly a century. Written in flowing, vivid prose, the heavy novel unrolls the crimson story of the Civil War from a stark and fearless perspective—the South and the Confederates, with “cotton and slaves and arrogance”. The living and breathing personalities of the characters propels the tale forward, through the lazy peace of the days before the crashing, destructive ones of war, and the slow, painful Reconstruction. Set in the state of Georgia, the speeches are drawling and amusing, the landscapes colorful and real, the struggles of those who waited at home raw and heartbreaking. The masterful voice is descriptive yet delicate as a painter’s brush.
Scarlett O’Hara is the pulsing, fiery spirit of the story, who refuses to be broken under any physical or emotional disaster. Whatever life pushes at her, her stubbornness and tenacity enable her to face with spirit. Despite growing up as the belle of the County, being raised by a mother who prioritized gentle manners and kindness over anything else, Scarlett was born with qualities that were “vital and earthy and coarse” similar to those of her father, which remained in her over the sixteen years of being trained as a dainty lady. When real life began for her with war crashing over her small world, those qualities are what bore her up in the midst of the vulgarity, violence, and destruction of the war. If she had been a serene, gentle-minded lady like her mother, or the meek, polite young girl she had been brought up to be, perhaps the war would have broken her, dragged her under. But under her seemingly delicate beauty lies an almost virile strength and crudeness, and they play their role to the full as she fights her way through the explosions and rubble. However, her headstrong character and selfish obstinacy, paired with her high spirits and popularity, succeed in flinging her far away from the ideal gentle women of society. From the beginning where sixteen-year-old Scarlett enjoys stealing the beaux of other girls and breaking their hearts, to the aftermath of the war where she runs her own business and does what she pleases, turning a deaf ear to all the scandals she causes among the sensible, dignified folk, Scarlett is commonly hated among women around her, including her sister, except for Melanie.
Melanie is the complete reverse of Scarlett—the shy, sweet, and frail girl, “as simple as earth, as good as bread, as transparent as spring water”, with eyes that have the “still gleam of a forest pool in winter when brown leaves shine up through quiet water”. For a long while, she seems as helpless and clinging as a little girl, no spirit or backbone, pure and kind and meek. Due to her blind trust in everyone and the eyes to only see the good in others, she seems a naïve and foolish child. But this slowly changes after she becomes the wife of Ashley Wilkes and the war enters her life as well as Scarlett’s. Spurts of sudden spirit and courage can be seen, standing up against a public belief, asserting her own opinion, even willing to join Scarlett in a violent defense of Tara. Despite her frail physique, she bears an agonizingly long journey through the war shortly after giving birth to a boy, she works willingly and is always selfless although she herself is far from healthy. As Scarlett reluctantly realizes with admiration, “beneath the gentle voice and the dovelike eyes of Melanie there was a thin flashing blade of unbreakable steel.”
As much as this intense novel paints spirit, gumption, and tenacity in the bright light, as much as fieriness and grittiness is portrayed as the essential qualities for survival, the seemingly quiet and underlying character of Melanie Hamilton Wilkes is gentle but luminous. While Scarlett madly grappled with life’s challenges and always tackled problems with sheer obstinacy, shooting a man and making convicts labor for her, Melanie was always there for her, purely devoted and loving. Scarlett’s thinly veiled hatred of Melanie was invisible to her, and she loved Scarlett as dearly as a sister. Melanie’s loyalty for Scarlett never wavered, not even when her close friends and advisors were outspoken against her and a scandal surrounding Scarlett and her husband threatened to tear the town apart. Melanie was willing to stand against the current of scandal and public disapproval by Scarlett’s side. Melanie was the precise type of young girl expected to buckle under the war, yet she survived through the dreary years of attack and labor. She was later to become the heart and spirit of Atlanta with her selflessness and purity of mind. In short, Melanie has quiet strength different than, yet of equal power to Scarlett’s brash one.
Margaret Mitchell gave this reply during an interview: “If the novel has a theme it is that of survival. What makes some people come through catastrophes and others, apparently just as able, strong, and brave go under? It happens in every upheaval. Some people survive; others don’t. What qualities are in those who fight their way through triumphantly that are lacking int hose that go under? I only know that survivors used to call that quality ‘gumption.’ So I wrote about people who had gumption and people who didn’t.”
Is the reckless, gritty gumption better than the nearly invisible yet powerful one of the “weak, the gentle, the tender hearted”? The desolate, broken hearts when the selfless souls have left them is a price to be paid when that question is answered in the positive. Melanie who “never had anything but heart” regardless of her physical failure, her ardent soul is the quietly shining angel of the South, a woman full of the gumption the author defined as the heart of Gone with the Wind. What kind of people buckle under a catastrophe or pull through? Gumption doesn’t lie in physical looks, popularity or an exuberant personality. Instead it lives and breathes in the serene smiles of those who are loving and loyal—so concludes the great novel of the South.
(Published in The Sequitur, November 2018, Westdale Secondary School, Hamilton, ON)
