'Gone with the Wind' by Margaret Mitchell (Chapters 48 - 63)

MY THOUGHTS:

I've turned the final page. I reached a stage where I didn't want Gone with the Wind to ever end, but now there's nothing more to do than mop up my tears and get on with life, although part of my heart still lingers in nineteenth century Atlantla, Georgia. This fourth and final section deals with the ill-fated marriage of Scarlett and Rhett, which could've been so great. It begins with their honeymoon in New Orleans where she plans to return to Atlanta with a big splash. 

Scarlett's dream house design is hilariously hideous, and Rhett knows it but builds it anyway. She borrows lavish features she admires from architecture far and wide to create something astoundingly garish. There are cupolas, turrets, towers, balconies, lightning rods and jigsaw work, not to mention coloured panes, Gothic gazebos and iron statues. She sets her heart on owning Atlanta's flashiest mansion, to rub in the noses of anyone who has ever criticised her, whereas in reality it provides them more ammunition. Rhett knows the house is a nightmare and calls it, 'just the sort of house a profiteer would build.' 

The time period of Rhett and Scarlett's early marriage was around the start of America's Gilded Age, which lasted from approximately 1870 to 1900. It was part of an economic boom between the end of the Civil War and the start of the 20th century. Mark Twain coined the name to mean, 'glittering on the surface and corrupt underneath.' Apparently Margaret Mitchell got his vibe. She describes it as an era of waste and ostentation with the trappings of refinement thinly veneering the vice and vulgarity beneath.' It is, however, an ideal environment for her main character to flourish because, 'On the crest of this new wave of vulgarity, Scarlett rode triumphantly, dashingly pretty in fine clothes with Rhett's money solidly behind her.' Still, we read on with a sense that the trough is coming. 

This is a section of sudden realisations. First off, after all the years of idolising Ashley, Scarlett finally figures out his problem. He can only ever look back. In her eyes, adaptability is vital, since nostalgia is a mental express train to grief and heartache. But we readers already know that Ashley keeps alive the memory of the grand old days before the war, because that's when favour shone on him. For Scarlett, this revelation carries the sting that she was never truly in love with the real Ashley, but rather with her own mirage. Although our heroine never had much imagination, apparently she had just enough to dream up an heroic, purposeful version of an Ashley who never really existed. Because the real Ashley was that turtle on his back who needed to be gently turned over by others, to protect him from a too-hard world. 

My book hangover may be even more to do with the spouses, Melanie and Rhett, than with Scarlett and Ashley. What a loyal, principled and admirable character Melanie is. I think Rhett's heartfelt tribute must also be ours. 'God rest her, she was the only completely kind person I ever knew. A very great lady.' 

And wow, I guess I lost my bet with Margaret Mitchell concerning Rhett. (See Part 1.) At least I did if the deepest empathy counts as love. By the end of the book, my heart ached for him for a reason I couldn't possibly foresee. Seeing him stripped back to such vulnerable rawness is especially poignant in such a powerful person who formerly wore his devil-may-care attitude like a cloak. And the fact that Rhett surely wouldn't want to be pitied as poignant makes the effect all the greater. 

I believe the ending is what's known as a 'Pyrrhic Victory.' That is, success which comes with great loss or devastating cost. Scarlett is left with everything she ever dreamed of; a palatial mansion, lots of money, and Ashley all to herself. But at this late stage, she realises these things fall far short of making her happy after all. Consider it poetic justice, reaping what's she sown, or a rude awakening for a unscrupulous heroine who'd never learned to look to simple things for happiness and always taught herself to defer it, it packs a tremendous punch.   

Two questions play on my mind having finished.

1) Do you think Scarlett ever wins Rhett back?

Thousands of fan fiction authors say, 'Yes.' They include Alexandra Ripley, the lady who wrote 'Scarlett,' the authorised sequel commissioned by Margaret Mitchell's estate. (I haven't read it. Based on the plot summary I scanned, I doubt I ever will.) I'm not convinced Mitchell herself would've ever endorsed such a conclusion. Mitchell refused to write a sequel or give away any possible plot points of what might have happened next, but based on what she's left us with, I can't imagine a reunion happening. 

I feel the book ends in such a way that Rhett will be the one thing Scarlett can't get by setting her mind on the challenge with her bulldog tenacity. He is perceptive and insightful enough to realise that Scarlett simply doesn't do relationships well. A deep and original man like him doesn't fall out of love easily. She's broken his heart, and as he says, 'You can't expect to simply say sorry and have it all mended.' Ultimately life choices lead to consequences, and if he takes her back, it'll be a neat unraveling of what all those brilliantly written thousand pages were all about. 

Along with this, I suspect that although Scarlett has had a few blinding epiphanies, at her core she's just the same. Her essence is as consistent as Ashley's. Just as Ashley will always look back, Scarlett will always be mercenary, unimaginative, calculating and manipulative. She'll always shove uncomfortable revelations to the back burner of her mind to reflect on tomorrow. Consider her typical behaviour on the last couple of pages. She's already planning a retreat to Tara to choose her battle tactics in her quest to win Rhett back again. She hasn't taken his assertion that, 'Even the greatest love can die,' at all seriously.  

Personally, I expect he'll stick to his declaration that the horse has bolted. He'll be kind, he'll touch base and offer financial support, but he knows her too well to ever be roped in again.

However, I suspect I may be in the minority here. If you think her stubborn determination will manage to win him back again, please feel free to tell me so.

2) What happens to Scarlett's children?

The end of an epic always makes my mind tick over with possibilities for the next generation. There is ample room for improvement in the lives of Scarlett's two remaining children. The thing about kids is that they haven't lived long enough for crappy circumstances to be their own doings, as is often the case with adults. Nope, it's grown-ups who make children's lives terrible, but if the cycle isn't interrupted it'll be sucked into their mindsets and some day latched onto, taken ownership of and continued as their own. And with a parent like Scarlett, I can't imagine things changing for Wade and Ella anytime soon.

Without saying it outright, Margaret Mitchell seems to hint that Ella was a victim of fetal alcohol syndrome. We know Scarlett consumed lots of brandy on the sly during her marriage to Frank, including that pregnancy. Later she deplores Ella's scatterbrained tendency to dart from topic to unrelated topic like a bird on a twig; a prime symptom of this condition, as is the fact that Ella was a scrawny, odd looking little baby. If this is the case, Scarlett directly causes irreparable damage to Ella's brain, then blames it on the child herself. She even reflects that if one of her children had to die, she could easily dispense with Ella. Charming! 

And as for Wade, how can he possibly throw off twin complexes of fear and abandonment loaded on his shoulders from early on? The nightmare of escaping from burning Atlanta during his toddlerhood may never leave him. And then wherever he begins to extend tentative roots, he's ripped up to another situation. (I'm thinking specifically of when he's forced to leave Tara, where he's bonded with Melly and Will, once his mother marries Frank.)  And since Wade is the eldest child, he bears more social ostracism following his mother's choices than do his sisters. 

By the time we reach the end, he loses his youngest sister and beloved aunt close together, and then Rhett, his hero, takes off, abandoning him along with Scarlett. We don't get to see Wade's reaction to all this, because it's Scarlett's story and she never focuses on her son. But I fear a sensitive soul such as him will not recover easily. Fear, abandonment and bereavement are unfortunate bedfellows, because they tend to keep flowing into each other, and this boy is saddled with the trio. What will the future hold for this 11-year-old at the end of all the drama?

For now anyway,

 We have to be content with where we all knew the story was leading. We're on the third to last page, and Scarlett says, 'But my darling, whatever shall I do without you?'

Let's all finish here by rattling off Rhett's very famous reply, whether we're drawing from book or screen. 

'Frankly my dear........'

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