"As God is my witness, I'm never going to be hungry again."
- Scarlett O’Hara™ as portrayed by Vivien Leigh in the feature film "Gone With The Wind"
(1,000 points) Relive magic moments from the movie with ensembles crafted for your Scarlett™ doll. Order each separately. (Dress forms not included.) Now in stock!
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Historical Account: "Southern Belle" - Gone with the Wind, an American novel by Margaret Mitchell, was published in 1936 and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1937. It was the only book that Margaret Mitchell published in her lifetime, but it became one of the best selling American novels.
Critics and historians regard the book as having a strong ideological commitment to the cause of the Confederacy and a romanticized view of the culture of the antebellum South.
The book includes a vivid description of the fall of Atlanta in 1864 and the devastation of war (some of it absent from the 1939 film), and shows a considerable amount of historical research. |
However, Mitchell's sources were almost exclusively Southern writers and historians; according to her biography, Mitchell herself was ten years old before she learned that the South had lost the war. Mitchell's sweeping narrative of war and loss helped the book win the Pulitzer Prize on May 3, 1937.
An episode in the book deals with the early Ku Klux Klan: in the immediate aftermath of the War, Scarlett is assaulted by poor southerners living in shanties, whereupon her former Black slave Sam saves her life. In response, Scarlett's male friends attempt to make a retaliatory night-time raid on the encampment. Northern soldiers try to stop the attacks, and Rhett helps Ashley, who is shot, to get help through his prostitute friend Belle. Scarlett's husband Frank is killed. This raid is presented sympathetically as being necessary and justified, while the law-enforcement officers trying to catch the perpetrators are depicted as oppressive Northern occupiers.
Although the Klan is not mentioned in that scene, it is mentioned that Scarlett finds the Klan abominable and believes the men should all just stay at home (though this is motivated mostly by a selfish desire to both be petted for her ordeal and to give the hated Yankees no more reason to tighten martial law, which is bad for her businesses). Rhett is also mentioned to be no great lover of the Klan, though he says at one point that if it is necessary he will join in an effort to integrate well into society. The novel never explicitly states whether or not this drastic step was necessary in his view. The local chapter later breaks up under the pressure from Rhett and Ashley.
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