My Grandmothers Copy of Gone With The Wind

I recently downloaded the book, ‘Gone With The Wind’ to my Kindle. It’s not because I haven’t read the book – far from it! Like millions of readers world-wide, I have already savoured every page of this best-selling listed book of all time in hardback, at least twice so far. I was 6 years old when my grandmother first noticed me looking intently at her copy of ‘Gone With The Wind’ in her bookcase. And it was shortly after my grandmother passed away a few months later that the very same book was placed gently into my hands to keep (as per her request).

There have been so many book reviews about ‘Gone With The Wind’, authored by Margaret Mitchell, that I was almost tempted not to write this review. It seems somewhat pointless in repeating what has already been written countless times about this masterpiece, and the only book ever published by this author in 1936, who received a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for it, in 1937. With over 30 million sales, a film, and sequel attempts by other authors in attempts to keep the ‘Gone With The Wind’ saga alive, it is a book well known, world-wide.

For those unfamiliar; set in the state of Georgia, southern United States in 1861, ‘Gone With The Wind’ is the story of the high spirited, unconforming southern belle Scarlett O’Hara and her tumultuous struggles of the heart, with (southern gentleman) Ashley Wilkes and (charming rogue) Rhett Butler. But it is not just a romance novel; it is also a novel bathed in American history, and the story of a young woman’s determination and strength of will to save her beloved plantation home called Tara in any way possible, through times of the American Civil War and the early years of Reconstruction.

I cannot recall why I was so captivated by this book when I looked at it on my grandmother’s book shelf all those years ago (it did not have a colourful outside cover). I certainly wasn’t at an age to fully comprehend the contents of it, despite the fact that as a child growing up in the Australian bush in the 1960’s, reading was a huge part of my childhood, especially as my mother and grandmother were both teachers. However, once I read the book I realised that my grandmother would have known I would relate to Scarlett’s love of the land; her home, Tara, which she fought to protect at any cost.

My favourite excerpts:-

Gerald O’Hara (Scarlett’s father): ‘’Do you mean to tell me, Katie Scarlett O’Hara, that Tara, that land doesn’t mean anything to you? Why, land is the only thing in the world worth workin’ for, worth fightin’ for, worth dyin’ for, because it’s the only thing that lasts.’’

“Somewhere, on the long road that wound through those four years, the girl with her sachet and dancing slippers, had slipped away, and there was left a woman with sharp green eyes, who counted pennies and turned her hands to many menial tasks, a woman to whom nothing was left from the wreckage, except the indestructible red earth on which she stood.” 

‘Gone With The Wind’ will appeal to readers for so many different reasons. I highly recommend it!

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