What was Gone With the Wind about?

Answer 1

Survival! After coming out of the Civil War, it was hard on many families to survive. Scarlett O'Hara did what she felt was necessary to help her family survive. They also mixed in a little romance here and there.http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-158152766.html

Answer 2

Well the movie and the book are a bit different.. the movie leaves out certain characters, etc. but since this is in the 'Romantic Movies' category, I'll give you a summary of the movie.

16 year old Katie Scarlett O'Hara (she goes by Scarlett) is a true southern belle. She has the most beaux in the county and can make any man fall in love with her. But she is in love with Ashley Wilkes. When she finds out he is going to marry his cousin, Melanie Hamilton, she gets very upset. Her Father says it doesn't matter who you marry, but Tara (the O'Hara plantation in Georgia) means everything. Land is the only thing that lasts.

So the next day, there is a BBQ at 12 oaks, the wilkes home. Scarlett has a plan to make Ashley jealous and win his love, but it fails. She gets into a room alone with Ashley, tells him that she loves him, but he keeps repeating that he is going to marry Melanie. So she slaps him, and Ashley leaves the room. Once he leaves, Scarlett is still angry, so she throws a vase across the room. Then, from behind the sofa, a man with a horrible reputation who is no gentleman. (Keep in mind this is the Civil War Era). He realizes that Scarlett is no lady and admires her for it. She angrily storms out of the room. Later that day, all the men get very excited, for the war (Civil War; 1861-1865) has started and everyone goes off to enlist. Still mad, Scarlett marries Charles Hamilton, Melanie's brother, hoping that it will hurt Ashley. A month or two after their marrige, Charles dies at camp, but Scarlett is not sad because of her husband's death, she is upset that she is going into widowhood.

Scarlett goes to visit Melanie and her Aunt Pittypat in Atlanta, where she again meets Rhett Butler. He bids 150 dollars in gold ($3,654 as of 2011) to dance with Scarlett at a ball, and to everyone's suprise and dissaproval, she accepts, only because she wants to dance. (Widows should not be at social gatherings). Later, he brings her a very expensive bonnet from Paris. As the war goes on, Scarlett and Rhett become good friends, and Rhett sneers her out of widowhood. Ashley visits for the Christmas of 1863, and when he is leaving, nobody is around, so Scarlett tells him to kiss her goodbye (they do kiss) and professes her love for him again. He leaves.

During the seige of Atlanta, Melanie goes into labor, so Scarlett and Prissy, a servant, deliver the baby. Melanie is extremely weak. The Yankees are about to invade Atlanta, so Scarlett sends for Rhett to get them out of ATL and back to Tara. He gets them out successfully, but leaves her halfway to go join the Confederate Army. Before leaving, he tells Scarlett he loves her and kisses her passionately. She slaps him. When Scarlett gets home, she discovers that her mother died the previous night of typhoid, and her father has gone insane. She vows to herself "as God as my witness I'll never be hungry again." Scarlett then takes the role as the head of the family, as there is nobody else to do it. Scarlett shoots and kills a Yankee deserter, and she and Melanie look through his pockets and find money that barely lasts them through the rest of the war. After the war ends, Ashley comes to Tara, to Melanie. Scarlett is notified that the Yankees want 300$ in taxes on Tara, and she only has 10$. So she goes to Atlanta, wearing a new dress (made of curtains) to try to flirt with Rhett to get the money. It turns out that Rhett is in jail, and when she visits him, he figures out her scheme and says he can't give her the money. On her way out, Scarlett runs into her sister Suellen's beau, Frank Kennedy, and it turns out he has money. So Scarlett tells him Suellen is going to marry someone else, and Scarlett gets the money and becomes Mrs. Kennedy. She convinces Ashley to come work at her lumber mills in Atlanta. Everyone disapproves of her running a mill because she is a woman. Rhett eventually gets out of jail. One night, on her way to the mill, Scarlett gets attacked and is almost killed, but an old servant from Tara comes and saves her. That night, all of the neighborhood men go to "clean up that area where she got attacked." Rhett stops by Melanie's house, where all the ladies were, and tells them that the Yankees know what they're doing, and attempts to save them. The Yankees are fooled, but Ashley was injured and Frank dies.

On the day of Frank's funeral, Rhett proposes to Scarlett, and when she refuses, he kisses her passionately. She tells him she said yes because of his money and she is 'fond of him.' Rhett says 'I'm not in love with you any more than you are with me.' They get married, and have one baby girl, Bonnie Blue Butler. Scarlett doesn't want any more children, so she kicks him out of her room. Rhett is furious. He devotes all of his time and affection towards Bonnie, and he mends his reputation so she will be received. During the afternoon before Ashley's birthday party, Scarlett and Ashley are caught embracing (hugging) at the mills, but it was just a friendly hug. Nobody but Melanie believes that. Rhett makes Scarlett go to the party. After she gets home, Rhett isn't there. Late in the night, Scarlett goes downstairs to get a nightcap (drink)and it turns out Rhett is there and very drunk. They have an arguement, then Rhett goes "You turn me out on the town, while you chase Ashley Wilkes, while you dream of Ashley Wilkes. This is one night you're not turning me out." Then they do 'it.' Scarlett wakes up the next morning feeling happy, but Rhett cooly apologizes for his behavior, then leaves for England with Bonnie for 3 months.

When they get back, Scarlett is delighted, but Rhett doesn't give her any emotion. While standing at the top of the stairs, Scarlett tells Rhett she's pregnant. Rhett asks who the father is, and Scarlett says "Its yours, you know its yours. I wish.. I wish it was anybodys child but yours." Rhett says "Cheer up, maybe you'll have an accident." Scarlett leans to hit him but misses and falls down the stairs. She has a miscarraige and is near death. When Melanie goes to Rhett to tell him that Scarlett is better and will pull through, he admits all of his misdeeds with Scarlett to Melanie. As Scarlett is recovering, Rhett tells her he loves her and wants to start over, but Bonnie dies from jumping with a horse. Rhett goes insane and refuses to bury her until Melanie talks to him. After she does, she collapses, because she is going to have another child, but the doctor told her if she did, she wouldn't make it. Scarlett goes to Melanie, who's last words were "Be kind to Captain Butler. He loves you so." Scarlett then realizes that she doesn't love Ashley, she loves Rhett, and that Melanie was her only true friend. (Melly dies if you don't get it)

She runs home to tell Rhett that she loves him, but Rhett says that he doesn't love her anymore. His love for her wore out. He says he's leaving Scarlett and going to Charleston. She begs Rhett to stay or take her with him and says how much she loves him, she was just a fool to not realize it. When she tells him (again) that she loves him, Rhett simply says "that's your misfortune." as he is walking out the door, Scarlett asks "where shall I go, what shall I do without you?" He says his famous last words of the movie: "Frankly my dear, I don't give a d*mn." Scarlett is of course, heartbroken, but realizes that she can get him back, and that she still has Tara. She quotes what she says to herself throughout the whole movie, "After all, tomorrow is another day!" The end.

Read the book or watch the movie. You WILL NOT be disappointed.

Answer 3

It began with an informal declaration of war at the Wilkes plantation, Twelve Oaks, shortly after which the official declaration was made. Scarlett didn't care, her personal life was not in order. She was in love with Ashley Wilkes, but he was engaged to his cousin Melanie.

Thus the war began, with the South being short of munitions, provisions, warm clothes, and shoes. The South had superior leaders and fighters but had not the financial backing. They expected England to come in on their side, but England did not.

Even with the lopsided advantages, it took the north four years to beat the South. Then came Reconstruction, a black page in southern history, where whites were not allowed to vote, the Yankee Carpetbaggers threw their weight around and insulted southerners, and all upstanding southerners had lost their homes and possessions.

Scarlett managed to make a go of it, buying and setting up a mill, an action which horrified her society peers in Atlanta.

She and her star-crossed lover, Rhett Butler (played by Clark Cable) never quite made it, although they were married. The end sentence to the movie has Scarlett saying to herself, "Tomorrow I'll return to Tara. There I will find a way to get him back. After all, 'tomorrow is another day.'"

Answer 4

The book (and movie) is about the American Civil War, and the character of a southern belle named Scarlet O'Hara. The theme of the book is survival. It takes us from the passive personality of a Southern belle to that same woman, traumatized by the war and changed overnight to a strong, take-charge type of woman who supports herself and her family and staff.

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There was a land of cavaliers and cotton fields called the Old South. Here in this pretty world, gallantry took its last bow. Here was the last ever to be seen of knights and their ladies fair, of master and of slave. Look for it only in books, for it is no more than a dream remembered, a civilization gone with the wind.

This paragraph says it all about the end of a way of life, the collapse of the Old South, which fell to its knees, never to rise again as they once were- but could never be again. Instead, the intrepid Southerners vacated their plantations and migrated to cities where they started their own businsses based on reconstruction needs for sawmills and many other organizations new to Atlanta and the deep South. It was not easy, but neither was losing their way of life, and again, they rose to the top and won their battles, against whomever dared to challenge them.

Gone with the Wind is a book of over one thousand pages written by Margaret Mitchell, a debutante from Atlanta. This was her only book, and it sold many, many copies. The book narrates historical events of the War between the States, as well as follows the story of star-crossed lovers, Scarlett O'Hara (Vivien Leigh) and Rhett Butler (Clark Gable).

The movie premier was held at Loew's Grand theater in Atlanta in December of 1939, and many Hollywood celebrities were in attendance. The movie won the Oscar for best picture, and Vivien Leigh won hers for best actress. Hattie McDaniel, who played the O'Hara mammy, won for best supporting actress. Clark Gable lost out to Robert Donat for his performance in Goodbye, Mr. Chips.

Gone with the Wind depicts the old deep South, from Atlanta's point of view, and follows Scarlett from age 16 to age 28. A gripping scene is the burning of Atlanta, where stand-ins for Scarlett and Rhett are seen with the burning of Atlanta in their near background.

Scarlett finally manages to crush Rhett's love for her, and at the end of the movie, she is alone at their mansion in Atlanta. As Rhett is leaving, she asks him, "If you leave, where shall I go, what shall I do?" to which his reply is, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a dam(n)."

Scarlett, alone and lonely, in deciding what to do, hears in her subconscious the long-ago voice of her Irish father, telling her that land is the only thing that matters-- because it's the only thing that lasts. She also hears the voice of

Rhett Butler telling her that she gets her strength from the red clay of

Tara.

Then, she thinks, "Tara. I'll go home to Tara. There I'll think of some way to get him back. I can't think about it now. I'll think about it tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day."

Answer 5

The theme in Gone With the Wind is struggle. Scarlett strugles through the whole entire book.

Answer 6

love and southern romance :)

Answer 7

twin genres of war and romance.