乱世佳人

Coming-of-Age story:
Margaret Mitchell arranged Gone with the Wind chronologically, basing it on the life and experiences of the main character, Scarlett O'Hara, as she grew from adolescence into adulthood. During the time span of the novel, from 1861 to 1873, Scarlett ages from sixteen to twenty-eight years. The literary technique applied in telling the story is Bildungsroman, which is a type of novel concerned with the moral and psychological growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood (coming-of-age story). The growth and education of Scarlett O'Hara is influenced by the events of her time. Mitchell used a smooth linear narrative structure. The novel is known for its exceptional "readability". The plot is rich with vivid characters.
• Characteristics of the person
• Realistic significances
Margaret Mitchell
was the author of Gone with the wind, one of the most popular books of all time.
GENRE:
Gone with the Wind is often placed in the literary sub-genre of the historical romance novel. However, it has been argued the novel does not contain all of the elements of the romance genre, making it simply a historical novel. The novel has also been described as an early classic of the erotic historical genre because it is thought to contain some degree of pornography
Overview
• Author and the written backgrounds
• Brief introduction of the novel
• Structure and plot discussion • Social status and significance in the literature history
The southern belle is an archetype for a young
woman of the American old South upper class. The southern belle's attractiveness is not physical beauty, but rather lies in her charm. She is subject to the correct code of female behavior. The novel's heroine, Scarlett O'Hara, charming though not beautiful, is a southern belle. During the Civil War, Southern women played a major role as volunteer nurses working in makeshift hospitals. Many were middle- and upper class women who had never worked for wages or seen the inside of a hospital. One such nurse was Ada W. Bacot, a young widow who had lost two children. Bacot came from a wealthy South Carolina plantation family that owned 87 slaves.
She was born on November 8, 1900, in Atlanta. Mitchell began making up stories before she could write, dictating them to her mother. On August 11, 1949, Mitchell and her husband decided to go to a movie, Just as they started to cross Peachtree Street , She was rushed to Grady Hospital but never regained consciousness. Mitchell died on August 16, 1949, and was buried in Oakland Cemetery in Atlanta. Mitchell was inducted into Georgia Women of Achievement in 1994 and into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame in 2000.
The story describes the collapse of the Old South in the Civil War and its rebuilding during the Reconstruction era. It centers on beautiful, willful Scarlett O’Hara of Tara Plantation in Georgia. When she discovers that her love, Ashley Wilkes, is to marry Melanie Hamilton, she impetuously marries Charles Hamilton, who dies in the war two weeks later. She spends most of the war years in Atlanta but flees back to Tara before Sherman’s army. She bravely faces danger and makes the vow that controls the rest of her life, “as God is my witness, I’m never going to be hungry again.” She remarries for money and scandalizes Atlanta society by becoming a ruthless businesswoman. After the death of her second husband, Scarlett marries the dashing, cynical Rhett Butler. However, her continued devotion to Ashley Wilkes destroys Rhett and Scarlett’s chance for happiness. When she realizes Ashley’s inadequacies, it is too late. Her avowal of love for Rhett is met by the response that the film version made famous, “My dear, I don’t give a damn.” Meanwhile, Scarlett dreams of love that has eluded her for so long. However, she still has Tara and knows she can win Rhett back, because "tomorrow is another day."
Slavery in Gone with the Wind is a backdrop to a story that is
essentially about other things. Southern plantation fiction (also known as Anti-Tom literature) from the early 19th century culminating in Gone With the Wind is written from the perspective and values of the slaveholder and tends to present slaves as docile and happy. The characters in the novel are organized into two basic groups along class lines: the white planter class, such as Scarlett and Ashley, and the black house servant class. The slaves depicted in Gone with the Wind are primarily loyal house servants, such as Mammy, Pork, Prissy, and Uncle Peter. House servants are the highest "caste" in Mitchell's caste system of the slaves. They stay on with their masters after the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 and subsequent Thirteenth Amendment of 1865 sets them free. Of the servants that stayed on at Talf, "There were qualities of loyalty and tirelessness and love in them that no strain could break, no money could buy."