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The National College of InformaticsTraian LalescuHunedoara2014

BOOK SERIESWritten ByDAN BROWN

Supervisor: 2014 Student:Dan Sorina Popp MihaelaChapte6Table of contents:

I. Table of contents............................................................... 2II. Argument...........................................................................3III. Precis.................................................................................3IV. Chapter 1 :Margaret Mitchells Biography.......................4V. Chapter 2 :Summary.........................................................5 Part 1........................................................................5 Part 2........................................................................6 Part 3........................................................................7 Part 4........................................................................8 Part 5........................................................................9VI. Chapter 3 :Main Characters..............................................12VII. Conclusion........................................................................13VIII. Bibliography.....................................................................13IX.

Argument

Gone with the Wind is a historical romance set in northern Georgia during the Civil War. The single most important event is the Civil War, which changes the lives of everyone in the south and drives Scarlett to some of her most reckless deeds.I have chosen to write about this book because she captivated me with the plot.When I start reading I was very absorbed by the lecture and I could not stop. The narathor present us the life in 19th century, what is happening with the society when the war starts.I admire the main character, Scarlett Ohara how she handled and saved Tara. She is an atypical protagonist, especially as a female romantic lead in fiction. When the novel opens, Scarlett is sixteen. She is vain, self-centered, and very spoiled by her doting parents. She can also be insecure; but is very intelligent, despite her fashionable Southern-belle pretense at ignorance and helplessness around men. She is somewhat unique among Southern women, who society preferred to act as dainty creatures who needed protection from their men. Scarlett is aware that she is only acting empty-headed, and resents the fashionable "necessity" of it, unlike most of her typical party-goingSouthern bellessocial set.

Precis

In the first chapter, I present the authors life, Margaret Mitchell.In the second chapter, I present the story of the book.In the third chapter, I write about the main characters.Chapter 1: Margaret Mitchells Biography

Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell was born in 1900 in Atlanta, Georgia and lived just 49 years. She attended Washington Seminary in Atlanta and Smith College in Massachusetts. She worked for the Atlanta Journal from 1922 to 1926, but took a retirement after injuring her ankle. She worked on her only novel,GonewiththeWind,for ten years, publishing it in 1936. The motion picture rights were sold for $50,000, and the film won the "Best Picture" Academy award in 1940. The novel was an overnight sensation, selling a million copies and requiring 31 printings in its first year of release.Mitchell said of her novel, "If it has a theme, it is that of survival. What makes some people able to come through catastrophes and others, apparently just as able, go under?" She says that some called it "gumption." "So I wrote about people who had gumption and the people who didn't." In writing her story, Margaret drew on the history and experiences from her own family. Both of her parents were of Irish descent, and many of her ancestors had fought in the American Revolution, Irish uprisings, and the Civil War. Her grandparents had lived in Jonesboro, and Margaret herself rode about Atlanta on a pony while listening to stories told by Confederate veterans. Part of her childhood was spent in a stately home on Peachtree Street.Mitchell had a "secret life" which is recognized today in the Margaret Mitchell Museum in Atlanta. She was a champion for African Americans in an age when segregation reigned in the south and the new KKK was an active organization. As a 19 year old, she chose to work in the city's black clinics and was accordingly expelled from the Junior League. In 1941, after being approached by Dr. Benjamin Mays, she gave a donation of $80.00 to Morehouse College, a historically black institution. When she was told of the impact of her gift, she decided to make the donation a yearly event, but asked that it be kept anonymous. Dr. Mays, president of the college, kept her secret for several years after her death. In all, she helped over 40 African Americans become medical students.In the 1940s, Mitchell became a full-time volunteer, devoting her energies to numerous projects. She died in 1949 after being hit by a speeding taxi while crossing the street near her home.

Chapter 2 :Summary

Gone with the Wind takes place in the southern United States in the state of Georgia during the American Civil War (18611865) and the Reconstruction Era (18651877) that followed the war. The novel unfolds against the backdrop of rebellion wherein seven southern states, Georgia among them, have declared their secession from the United States (the "Union") and formed the Confederate States of America (the "Confederacy"), after Abraham Lincoln was elected president with no ballots from ten Southern states where slavery was legal. A dispute over states' rights has arisen involving enslaved African people who were the source of manual labor on cotton plantations throughout the South.Part 1It is April 1861 at the "Tara" plantation, owned by Gerald O'Hara, a lucky Irish immigrant, and his wife, Ellen Robillard OHara, who is from a coastal aristocratic family of French descent. Their sixteen-year-old daughter, Scarlett, is not beautiful, but men seldom realized it once they were caught up in her charm. It was the day before the men were called to war, Fort Sumter having been fired on two days earlier.Scarlett learns that one of her many beaux, Ashley Wilkes, will soon be engaged to his cousin, Melanie Hamilton. She is heart-stricken. The next day at the Wilkeses' barbecue at "Twelve Oaks," Scarlett tells Ashley she loves him, and he admits he cares for her. However, he knows he would not be happily married to her because of their personality differences. She loses her temper at him, and he silently takes it.Rhett Butler, who has a reputation as a rogue, had been alone in the library when Ashley and Scarlett entered and felt it wiser to stay unseen during the argument. Rhett applauds Scarlett for the unladylike spirit she displayed with Ashley. Infuriated and humiliated, she tells Rhett, "You aren't fit to wipe Ashley's boots!"After rejoining the other party guests, she learns that war has been declared and the men are going to enlist. Seeking revenge for being jilted by Ashley, Scarlett accepts a marriage proposal from Melanie's brother, Charles Hamilton. They marry two weeks later. Charles dies from measles two months after the war begins. She gives birth to her first child, Wade Hampton Hamilton. She is bound by tradition to wear black and avoid conversation with young men. Scarlett is saddened by these restrictions.Part 2Aunt Pittypat, who is living with Melanie in Atlanta, invites Scarlett to stay with them. In Atlanta, Scarlett's spirits revive, and she is busy with hospital work and sewing circles for the Confederate army. Scarlett encounters Rhett Butler again at a dance for the Confederacy. Although Rhett believes the war is a lost cause, he is blockade running for the profit. The men must bid for a dance with a lady, and Rhett bids "one hundred fifty dollars-in gold" for a dance with Scarlett. Everyone at the dance is shocked that Rhett would bid for Scarlett. Melanie comes to Scarlett's defense because she is supporting the cause for which her husband, Ashley, is fighting.At Christmas (1863), Ashley is granted a furlough from the army. Melanie becomes pregnant with their first child.Part 3 The war is going badly for the Confederacy. Atlanta is besieged from three sides (September 1864). The city becomes desperate and hundreds of wounded Confederate soldiers pour in. Melanie goes into labor with only the inexperienced Scarlett to assist, as all the doctors are attending the soldiers. Scarlett, left to fend for herself, cries for the comfort and safety of her mother and Tara. The tattered Confederate States Army sets flame to Atlanta and abandons it to the Union Army. Melanie gives birth to a boy, "Beau", and now they must hurry for refuge. Scarlett tells Prissy to go find Rhett, but she is afraid to "go runnin' roun' in de dahk". Scarlett says, "Haven't you any gumption?" Prissy then finds Rhett, and Scarlett begs him to take herself, Wade, Melanie, Beau, and Prissy to Tara. Rhett laughs at the idea but steals an emaciated horse and a small wagon, and they follow the retreating army out of Atlanta.Part way to Tara, Rhett has a change of heart and abandons Scarlett to enlist in the army. She makes her way to Tara. Things have drastically changed: Scarlett's mother is dead, her father has lost his mind with grief, her sisters are sick with typhoid fever, the field slaves left after Emancipation, the Yankees have burned all the cotton, and there is no food in the house. Scarlett avows that she and her family will survive and never be hungry again.The long tiring struggle for post-war survival begins that has Scarlett working in the fields. There is the ever-present threat of the Yankees who steal and burn, and at one point, Scarlett pulls Charles's pistol out from her thigh and kills a Yankee marauder with a single shot.A long succession of Confederate soldiers returning home stop at Tara to find food and rest. Two men stay on, an invalid Cracker, Will Benteen, and Ashley Wilkes, whose spirit is broken.Part 4Life at Tara slowly begins to recover when new taxes are put on Tara. Scarlett knows only one man with enough money to help her, Rhett Butler. She looks for him in Atlanta only to find he is in jail. Leaving the jailhouse, she runs into Frank Kennedy, who is betrothed to Scarlett's sister, Suellen. Realizing Frank also has money, Scarlett hatches a plot and tells Frank that Suellen will not marry him. Frank succumbs to Scarlett's feminine charms and he marries her two weeks. Frank gives her the money to pay the taxes.While Frank has a cold and is pampered by Aunt Pittypat, Scarlett goes over the accounts at Frank's store and finds many of his friends owe him money. She takes control of his store, and her business practices leave many Atlantans resentful of her. With a loan from Rhett she buys a sawmill and runs it herself, all very unladylike conduct. To Frank's relief, Scarlett finds she is pregnant, which curtails her activities for a while. She convinces Ashley to come to Atlanta and manage the mill, all the while still in love with him. At Melanie's urging, Ashley takes the job. Melanie becomes the center of Atlanta society, and Scarlett gives birth to Ella Lorena. Georgia is under martial law, and life has taken on a new and more frightening tone. For protection, Scarlett keeps Frank's pistol tucked in the upholstery of the buggy. Her trips alone to and from the mill take her past a shanty town where criminal elements live. One evening coming home, she is accosted by two men who try to rob her, but she escapes with the help of Big Sam, the former negro foreman from Tara. Attempting to avenge his wife, Frank and the Ku Klux Klan raid the shanty town whereupon Frank is shot dead.Frank Kennedy lies in a coffin in the quiet stillness of the parlor in Aunt Pittypat's home. Scarlett is remorseful. She is swigging brandy from Aunt Pitty's swoon bottle when Rhett comes to call. She tells him tearfully, "I'm afraid I'll die and go to hell." He says, "Maybe there isn't a hell." Before she can cry any further, he asks her to marry him saying, "I always intended having you, one way or another." She says she doesn't love him and doesn't want to be married again. However, he kisses her passionately, and in the heat of the moment she agrees to marry him. One year later, Scarlett and Rhett announce their engagement, which becomes the talk of the town.Part 5 Mr. and Mrs. Butler honeymoon in New Orleans, spending lavishly. Upon returning to Atlanta, they stay in the bridal suite at the National Hotel while their new home on Peachtree Street is being built. Scarlett chooses a modern Swiss chalet style home. Rhett describes it as an "architectural horror".Shortly after they move into their new home, the sardonic jabs between them turn into full-blown quarrels. Scarlett wonders why Rhett married her. Then she tells Rhett she will have a baby, which she does not want.The Bonnie Blue Flag, is an 1861 marching song that refers to the first unofficial flag of the Confederacy.Wade is seven years old in 1869 when his half-sister, Eugenie Victoria, named after two queens, is born. She has blue eyes like Gerald O'Hara, and Melanie nicknames her, "Bonnie Blue.When Scarlett is feeling well again, she makes a trip to the mill and talks to Ashley, who is alone in the office.. She returns home and tells Rhett she does not want more children. From then on, they sleep separately, and when Bonnie is two years old, she sleeps in a little bed beside Rhett (with the light on all night because she is afraid of the dark). Rhett turns his attention towards Bonnie, dotes on her, spoils her, and worries about her reputation when she is older.Melanie is giving a surprise birthday party for Ashley. Scarlett goes to the mill to keep Ashley there until party time, a rare opportunity for her to see him alone. Ashley tells her how pretty she looks, and they reminisce about the days when they were young and talk about their lives now. Suddenly Scarlett's eyes fill with tears, and Ashley holds her head against his chest. Ashley sees his sister, India Wilkes, standing in the doorway. Before the party has even begun, a rumor of an affair between Ashley and Scarlett spreads, and Rhett and Melanie hear it. Rhett, more drunk than Scarlett has ever seen him, returns home the evening of the party long after Scarlett. He enjoins Scarlett to drink with him. Not wanting him to know she is fearful of him, she throws back a drink and gets up from her chair to go back to her bedroom. He stops her and pins her shoulders to the wall. He tells her they could have been happy together saying, "for I loved you and I know you." He then takes her in his arms and carries her up the stairs to her bedroom where passion envelops them.Next morning Rhett leaves town for three months with Bonnie and Prissy. Scarlett finds herself missing him, but she is still unsure if Rhett loves her, having said it while drunk. She learns she is pregnant with her fourth child.When Rhett returns, Scarlett waits for him at the top of the stairs. She wonders if Rhett will kiss her, but to her irritation, he does not. He says she looks pale. She says it's because she is pregnant. He sarcastically asks if the father is Ashley. She calls Rhett a cad and tells him no woman would want his baby. He says, "Cheer up, maybe you'll have a miscarriage." She lunges at him, but he dodges, and she tumbles backwards down the stairs. She is seriously ill for the first time in her life, having lost her child and broken her ribs. Rhett is remorseful, believing he has killed her. Sobbing and drunk, he buries his head in Melanie's lap and confesses he had been a jealous cad.

Scarlett, who is thin and pale, goes to Tara taking Wade and Ella with her, to regain her strength and vitality from "the green cotton fields of home." When she returns a healthy woman to Atlanta, she sells the mills to Ashley. She finds Rhett's attitude has noticeably changed. He is sober, kinder, polite, and seemingly disinterested. Though she misses the old Rhett at times, Scarlett is content to leave well enough alone.

Bonnie is four years old in 1873. Spirited and willful, she has her father wrapped around her finger and giving into her every demand. Even Scarlett is jealous of the attention she gets. Rhett rides his horse around town with Bonnie in front of him, but Mammy insists it is not fitting for a girl to ride a horse with her dress flying up. Rhett heeds her words and buys Bonnie a Shetland pony, whom she names "Mr. Butler," and teaches her to ride sidesaddle. Then Rhett pays a boy named Wash twenty-five cents to teach Mr. Butler to jump over wood bars. When Mr. Butler is able to get his fat legs over a one foot high bar, Rhett puts Bonnie on the pony, and soon Mr. Butler is leaping bars and Aunt Melly's rose bushes.Wearing her blue velvet riding habit with a red feather in her black hat, Bonnie pleads with her father to raise the bar to one and a half feet. He gives in, warning her not to come crying if she falls. Bonnie yells to her mother, "Watch me take this one!" The pony gallops towards the wood bar, but trips over it. Bonnie breaks her neck in the fall, killing her.In the dark days and months following Bonnie's death, Rhett is often drunk and disheveled, while Scarlett, though deeply grieved also, seems to hold up under the strain. With the untimely death of Melanie Wilkes a short time later, Rhett decides he only wants the calm dignity of the genial South he once knew in his youth and leaves Atlanta to find it. 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."

Chapter 3 :The Main Characters

Scarlett OHaraThe protagonist of the novel. She is the daughter of Gerald and Ellen O'Hara and is accustomed to getting her own way, whether with clothes or boys. She surrounds herself with young men, flirting mercilessly and is not above stealing the beaux of other girls. She is willful, conniving, and yet far more intelligent than well-bred girls are supposed to be.Rhett ButlerScarlett's life long antagonist who is in love with her from the moment he sees her. He is an opportunist willing to take advantage of any situation, but not without kindness or generosity under the right conditions.Melanie HamiltonWife to Ashley Wilkes and sister-in-law to Scarlett. Described by Rhett as the only truly kind person he has ever known. Unable to believe anything bad about people she loves.Ashley WilkesHusband to Melanie Hamilton and object of Scarlett's life-long fantasy. He is a true member of the old south who feels unable to cope with the new world.MammyScarlett's childhood nurse and life-long servant and companion. Mammy understands Scarlett better than Scarlett understands herself and is remarkably intuitive, but also protective and motherly.

Conclusion

In conclusion , the book is full with action, romance, history and has many conflicts.I have chosen to write about this book because it is a good book and I really enjoyed reading it .I think that Margaret Mitchell influence many people with her work and I believe that it is a very complex novel.

Citography http://thebestnotes.com/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gone_with_the_Wind http://www.romanceeternal.org/article/gone-wind https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/3358283-gone-with-the-wind?page=1

Until you've lost your reputation, you never realize what a burden it was or what freedom really is. ~ 4 ~