Frankly Scarlett, We've Got a Situation

Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell.

McMillan Publishing, 1936.  1037 pages.
Oldies But Goodies

Unbuckle the swashes and re-lace those whalebone stays!  Our Cellar Door season opener features a lively discussion of Margaret Mitchell's 1936 romantic classic, one-thousand-thirty-seven page-turning pages of silliness and seriousness, of saints and sinners, of scandalous behavior and sashaying, of swooning and simpering, of states rights and sieges, of Scalawags and sawmills... and Scarlett. Ah, Scarlett. Katie Scarlett O'Hara Hamilton Kennedy Butler, one of our all-time feistiest fiction favorites.  Perennial belle and serial bride, her fiddle-dee-dee spirit never fails to fascinate; her untamed Irish heart captures and carries our collective heart over the Mason-Dixon Line and sweeps us across the timeline of quintessential American literature.
  

Until the final pages of this epic-novel-that-doubles-as-a-doorstop, Scarlett demonstrates an astonishing lack of self-awareness and a maddening paucity of empathy. Her character is completely at variance with antebellum standards of gracious gentility and with post-war practices of ravaged pride. Our insightful GW wonders if perhaps we recognize some of our own egocentrism and selfishness in Scarlett.  Okay, okay, okay, Scarlett is a narcissist.  But what's not to like about the girl with the tiniest waistline in three Georgia counties? And what's not to admire about a young not-quite-a-lady who chooses the green-sprigged-muslin-with-the-plunging-neckline, despite the fact that it is decidedly not a barbecue dress?
 

Scarlett cuts a poor figure of motherhood, MH notes: so poor, in fact, that two-thirds of her children simply vanish from the film adaption.  It's almost impossible to discuss the novel without acknowledging the 1939 movie.  Funny how things work out: Vivien and Clark and Olivia and Leslie look exactly like Scarlett and Rhett and Melanie and Ashley!  Rhett Butler is, of course, an iconic charming cad.  He's not a marrying man, a truth that becomes painfully apparent when Mr. and Mrs. Butler take up post-honeymoon residence in an architectural horror, an over-the-top Swiss chalet-style McMansion with a hazardous staircase on Peachtree Street.  
Now, as she tiptoed across the room toward the quiet figure, panic clutching at her heart, she knew that Melanie had been her sword and her shield, her comfort and her strength. We come to respect Melanie because of and in spite of her surfeit of humility and serenity. She is a physical weakling with nerves of steel, evidenced by unshakable dedication to The Cause, unwavering devotion to Ashley, and inexplicable determination to maintain Scarlett as her BFF.  And Ashley.  So gallant, so sensitive, so effete, so steeped in impractical honor that he's practically soggy.  Scarlett loves to hear him speak, hangs on his every word... and generally has no clue what he's talking about Götterdämmerung?  Dream of a dream that lived like a dream and breathed like a dream and did not die in the face of a dream of reality?  Puh-lease. Get back to chopping firewood.  Let's take a peek at the official trailer, offered today in full technicolor glory:

 

 

Which brings us to the meeting's inevitable Moment of Crisis.  It's the portion of the program when we attempt to apply what we have learned from our reading to the challenges of modern suburban living.  In this case, our intrepid and somewhat impetuous SC, in a Scarlett-esque turn of acquisitive mid-summer imagination, borrows both GWTW the novel and GWTW the two-disc movie set from the Library of the Chathams.  She vows to view the film only after concluding her reading of the bigger-than-a-breadbox book. 

Page after page after page, through Secession and War and Reconstruction, July becomes August and then September. The novel is sumptuous and compelling... and long. The tantalizing two-disc set sits unwatched on the nightstand all summer long. Notices arrive via post and via electronic message from the library, expressing intensifying degrees of dismay, alarm, and exasperation.  Succinct reiterations of the rental agreement are blissfully disregarded.  Do you see where this is going? I'll think of it tomorrow... I can stand it then.  Tomorrow, I'll think of some way [to return the stinkin' movie]... After all, tomorrow is another day.  By the time the Cellar Door convenes, let's just say that the current fine-enhanced value of SC's two-disc set is commensurate with grossly-inflated wartime prices for staples like flour, sugar, coffee, and bon-bons.  Confederate currency not accepted.

What to do, what to do?  What would Scarlett do?  Suddenly she thought of Rhett Butler and calm dispelled her fears... She hated him, but he was strong and smart and he wasn't afraid... Oh, why hadn't she thought of him before?  But alas, we cannot recommend Rhett for this job.  Sure, he's been around the block several times and across the ocean several more, but when has he flown to the aid of a borrower-in-distress, a well-read femme fatale who fails to return library materials on or before their due date? Besides, there isn't a blockade runner between Chatham and Charleston with the intestinal fortitude and gumption required to stand firm at the circulation desk, to fend off a scourge of accumulated fines and the threatened suspension of borrowing privileges. In the alternative, we are proposing a late-autumn charity ball/fundraiser in SC's backyard: a twilight screening of the tardy film, followed by a scandalous auction.  Call the Courier, urges CS: the high bidder will dance both a reel and a waltz with SC!

"Fo' Gawd, Miss Scarlett!  We's got ter have a doctah... Ah doan know nuthin' 'bout bringin' babies!"  We ruminate over a disturbing hypothetical: Vengeful Yankees are storming Hot 'Lanta and the Rebel army is in full retreat.  The mercury is rising; the munitions warehouses are up in flames.  We remember that it's not the heat, it's the humidity... but the air is so moist that we can mix hominy in our hair.  Miss Melly is upstairs, wracked with pain in the throes of excruciating labor.  How will BJM react when she discovers that KMJ has grossly and flippantly misrepresented her midwifery skills?  Imagine, and discuss.

The meeting adjourns.  In a hundred nightmares, she had fled through fog like this, through a haunted country without landmarks, thick with cold cloaking mist, peopled with clutching ghosts and shadows. Okay, a bit of dramatic license here. The meeting adjourns and it's a bit overcast.  Nonetheless, as we make our way home, we are haunted by the strangely satisfying image of SC bravely taking the dance floor at Jenks on a hot summer evening not-so-long-ago.  She is executing, Lawd have mercy, a flawless Jersey Shore Fist Pump.  She is wearing a moss-green velvet hooped mini-dress that bears a strong resemblance to the window treatments at Tara.  Ashley watched her go and saw her square her small thin shoulders as she went.  And that gesture went to his heart, more than any words she had spoken.  Scarlett, meet Snooki.  Snooki, meet Scarlett.  After GTL, we are totally down with GWTW. 

Thank You, KMJ!

A Timely Read: 2011 marks the 75th anniversary of publication of Gone with the Wind.  They've been celebrating all year at the Atlanta History Center's Margaret Mitchell House, so why shouldn't we join in the fun? And, of course, Gone with the Wind won the Pulitzer Prize in 1937, so a read or a re-read meshes nicely with our ongoing Pulitzer Project.  
A Thoughtful Gift: To complete the experience, may we suggest a Gone with the Wind tote bag from Barnes and Noble? Perfect for transporting reading material and radishes.