[Read Along] Gone With The Wind

Gone With The Wind

Author: Margarett Mitchell

Copyright © 1936 by The Macmillan Company

Cover illustration ©1939 Turner Entertainment Co.

All rights reserved.

The translation edition:

Lalu Bersama Angin

Translator: Susanty Lesmana

Cover remake by David

Indonesian edition, first published by PT Gramedia Pustaka Utama, Jakarta, November 2002

My own: Second printed in June 2009

1.124 pages; 23 cm

ISBN-10: 979-22-0032-0

ISBN-13: 978-979-22-0032-4

In order to celebrating Margaret Mitchell's birthday, I joined Gone With The Wind Read Along with some other blogger. Hmm.. to tell you the truth, it was hard to do for me. Sexy book with those pages in a limited time. But it challenging though. Thank you, Fanda and Bzee for hosting this read along.  

Ha! I finally made this review. This is really a scary book! Not to mention it told horror story. Well, I don’t think I will read horror story, anyway. This scary book means that the amount of the pages! It has more than 1200 pages! And I have to read them within 2 months only! Wow! And... the letters on every page are small. Thank you very much.

Umm.. okay, here’s a brief story about Gone With The Wind. It told about Scarlett O’Hara, a girl from Tara, who was different from the usual girl in her country. She’s stubborn and pretty wanna be. But she’s attractive. She liked to gain men’s attention by her enchantment. She liked to date one man to another man.

No one noticed that Scarlett O’Hara really in love with Ashley Wilkinson because she’s dating any men. Scarlett herself realized that she’s in love with Ashley when the Wilkinson’s family held a party to announce the engagement of Ashley and Melanie Hamilton, his cousin. She didn’t want Ashley to marry his cousin. Scarlett was trying to find a way to make Ashley in love with her.

While thinking of a run away project with Ashley, Scarlett was having some chat with Charles Hamilton. Brother of Melanie, the next fiancee of Ashley. Charles was really in love with Scarlett and he kept on holding Scarlett’s hand while Scarlett took a peek at Ashley. He thought that Scarlett was in love with him too.

And when everyone was taking a nap between the party, Scarlett was trying to find Ashley to tell him what she feels about him. She’s trying to seduce Ashley. But Ashley kept still. When Scarlett found that Ashley kept still on his taught to marry Melanie Hamilton, she was so angry and throwed a vase (I guess, sorry I forgot) to Ashley. And when she shouted Ashley till Ashley gone, she didn’t realize that there was a man who slept near them. Rhett Butler.

Rhett Buttler is a friend of John Wilkinson, Ashley’s Pa. He’s a business man. When all of the men in South talked about war on the party, Rhett was trying to convince those men, that they were not ready to fight. Rhett was giving an idea about not to make a war with the Yankees. Because he’s already known that the Yankees were well prepared. And the South would be beaten by the Yankees. But they would not listen to Rhett.

And before the Civil War goes, suddenly Scarlett O’ Hara became Mrs. Charles Hamilton. Yes. She was married to Charles Hamilton in two weeks, a day before the wedding of Ashley and Melanie. And Charles also died in the war, just before he took a part at the war. He died because he got sick. Not because he got killed by the enemies. And Scarlett also had a baby from Charles, named Wade.

Then Scarlett moved in to Charles Hamilton’s hometown in Atlanta. She lived there with Aunty Pittypat and Melanie (was Hamilton, now) Wilkinson. She brought Wade there. While she’s staying at Atlanta, she worked at hospital to help the warriors who got injured. Two years after, Ashley got some breaks, so he went home to see his wife. And after the break, Ashley got back to the war, Melanie got pregnant. Months later, Scarlett helped Melanie delivered the baby.

Oh. I almost forgot. Rhett Butler also appeared in here. He met Scarlett who wore mourning dress. Rhett who knew that Scarlett loved to dress fashionable laugh at her and tried to change Scarlett’s mind about  wearing the mourning dress. Rhett also asked Scarlet to dance with him in a fundrising.

When Atlanta has fallen, Miss Pittypat was moved to Macon. Scarlett was thinking about coming home to Tara. She brought Melanie, her baby, and Wade too. For a half way to Tara from Atlanta, Rhett was with them. He rode the horse cart. But then, he left them alone, because he decided to take a part in the war.

Scarlet’s life has changed when she’s been back to Tara. She’s no longer a spoiled girl. She has to deal with her family’s hunger problem. And her mother’s death. And her Pa’s last condition. Her Pa was no more  a strong man after his wife’s death. Scarlett has been transformed into a tough woman. All the things she would do to keep Tara belongs to her family.

Okay, enough for the synopsis. I will not give you any spoiler. You can read it as well. I would like to share you my opinion about this book.

#1 Translation. Because I’m reading this book the translation edition – in Bahasa, I will tell you about the translation. Thanks to the translator, because she translated it well and I enjoyed every word in it. I had no problem with her translation. This is a classic book, so I must give her worship for re-telling the story into a good words in Bahasa. I love it. Really. I had read the English version and I needed more time to understand the story, since English is not my native language :D

#2 Characters. I only remember some of those characters, mainly Scarlett O’Hara (of course), Rhett Butler, Charles Hamilton, Mammy, Melanie Hamilton, Ashley Wilkinson, Miss Pittypat, Uncle Peter, Elen O’Hara, Gerald O’Hara (ups, I almost wrote Gerald Butler, LOL) and Frank Kennedy. There are so many characters in this book to remember, and I only remember some of them! But I love the way the author wrote it. She kept on reminding us the rest of other characters and the relationship between them, so it didn’t make me to open previous pages to find out who they are.

#3 Scarlett O’Hara. Honestly, I don’t know how to feel about her. I don’t really like her at first, because she’s so... what? I do not have words to describe her. She’s so stupid, spoiled, and over confidence for me.  When she was fighting and working hard to keep her family stay out of the hunger and she married Frank Kennedy, her sister’s, Suellen O’Hara fiancee to get some money to pay Tara’s tax fee, I still couldn't fall in love with her. She could not impress me anyway. She's an opportunist! Well, she’s not the character that made me in love at the first sight. She tried to convince me that she is worth to be loved. And I still don't in love with her.

#4 Rhett Butler. I never like the style of this man. I know he’s smart, rich, handsome, but I don’t like his non-commitment style. Well, I know, he’s the only guy who knew how to make Scarlett noticing herself. But, still. I don’t like this man!

#5 The idea about the women in that era. I don’t know that in the era before The Civil War, men thought that women were stupid. Could not do anything but shopping for herself. Could not do anything without her sleeve’s help. I also do not know in that era, in United States, woman who made love with man before getting married were labeled naughty. Not good woman. I think lots of girls now in United States and other countries have lost their virginity before they got married. I think the Civil War has changed the idea too.

#6 The story itself. For me, Margaret Mitchell is too wordy on writing this story. But that's okay because I don't need to open the previous pages to remind me all the story behind :D

#7 The cover. Well, I have no problem with the cover. I don't really like it, anyway :D

Nah, I made a little research about The Civil War that underlie this story. You can check the source here.

The Civil War was a fight to preserve the Union which was the United States of America. From the conception of the Constitution, there were two differing opinions on the role of the federal government. Federalist believed that the federal government and the executive needed to maintain their power in order to ensure the survival of the union. On the other hand, anti-federalists held that each state should have the right to determine the laws within its own borders and should not be forced to follow the mandates of the federal government unless absolutely necessary.

The Civil War. Source from here

As time passed the rights of the states would often collide with various actions the federal government was taking. Arguments arose over taxation, tariffs, internal improvements, the military, and of course slavery.

Northern Versus Southern Interests

Increasingly, the Northern states squared off against the Southern states. One of the main reasons for this was that the economic interests of north and south were opposed to each other. The South was largely comprised of small and large plantations that grew crops such as cotton which were labor intensive. The North, on the other hand, was more of a manufacturing center, using raw materials to create finished goods. Slavery had been abolished in the north but continued in the south due to the need for inexpensive labor and the ingrained culture of the plantation era. As new states were added to the United States, compromises had to be reached concerning whether they would be admitted as slave or as free states. The fear of both groups was for the other to gain an unequal amount of power. If more slave states existed, for example, then they would garner more power in the nation.

Abraham Lincoln's Election Leads to Secession

By 1860 the conflict between northern and southern interests had grown so strong that when Abraham Lincoln was elected president South Carolina became the first state to break off from the Union and form its own country. Ten more states would follow with secession: Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and North Carolina. On February 9, 1861, the Confederate States of America was formed with Jefferson Davis as its president.

Abraham Lincoln. Source from here

The Civil War Begins
Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as president in March, 1861. On April 12, Confederate forces led by General P.T. Beauregard opened fire on Fort Sumter which was a federally held fort in South Carolina. This began the American Civil War.
The Civil War lasted from 1861 until 1865. During this time, over 600,000 soldiers representing both sides were killed either by battle deaths or disease. Many, many more were wounded with estimates of more than 1/10th of all soldiers being wounded. Both the north and the south experienced major victories and defeats. However, by September 1864 with the taking of Atlanta the North had gained the upper hand and the war would officially end on April 9, 1865. 

The Civil War. Source from here

Well... war only left people in suffer. No food, no home. Leaving the trauma inside. But also, war can make people change. Like, The Civil War has transformed Scarlett O’Hara from a spoiled girl into a tough and smart woman.

Here are some facts about the writer, Margaret Mitchell: 

Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell (November 8, 1900 – August 16, 1949) was an American author and journalist. One novel by Mitchell was published during her lifetime, the American Civil War-era novel, Gone with the Wind. For it she won the National Book Award for Most Distinguished Novel of 1936^[1] and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937. In more recent years, a collection of Mitchell's girlhood writings and a novella she wrote as a teenager, Lost Laysen, have been published. A collection of articles written by Mitchell for The Atlanta Journal was republished in book form. These additional works have enabled scholars and the public to more fully comprehend the richness and depth of Margaret Mitchell's writing.

Margaret Mitchell. Source from here

I’m giving my 4 stars for Gone With The Wind. I'm learning a lot about The Civil War here. Happy born day, Margaret Mitchell.