The Wind Is Never Gone: Sequels, Parodies and Rewritings of Gone with the Wind

217 Pages·2011·1.15 MB·English

The Wind Is Never Gone
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The Wind
Is Never Gone
Sequels, Parodies and
Rewritings of Gone with the Wind
M. CARMEN GÓMEZ-GALISTEO
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina, and London
LIBRARYOFCONGRESSCATALOGUING-IN-PUBLICATIONDATA
Gómez-Galisteo, M. Carmen, ¡982–
The wind is never gone : sequels, parodies and rewritings
of Gone with the wind/ M. Carmen Gómez-Galisteo.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-7864-5927-8
softcover : 50# alkaline paper
¡. Mitchell, Margaret, 1900–1949. Gone with the wind.
2. Mitchell, Margaret, 1900–1949.—Parodies, imitations, etc.—
History and criticism. 3. Mitchell, Margaret, 1900–1949.—
Adaptations. 4. Mitchell, Margaret, 1900–1949.—Influence.
5. African Americans in literature. 6. Slavery in literature.
7. Plantation life in literature. I. Title.
PS3525.I972G68275 2011
813'.52—dc23 2011017368
BRITISHLIBRARYCATALOGUINGDATAAREAVAILABLE
© 2011M. Carmen Gómez-Galisteo. All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying
or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publisher.
Front cover image: Clark Gable as Rhett Butler and Vivien
Leigh as Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind, 1939
(MGM/Photofest)
Manufactured in the United States of America
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Box 6¡¡, Je›erson, North Carolina 28640
www.mcfarlandpub.com
To my parents and sister, with love
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Table of Contents
Preface 1
Introduction: I Have Been Unfaithful to Thee, Scarlett! 3
1. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell 15
2. To Be Continued: Scarlett by Alexandra Ripley and
the Failed Sequels Commissioned to Emma Tennant
and Pat Conroy 36
3. Copyright Not Gone with the Wind 55
4. The Gone with the Wind Parodies: The Wind Done
Gone by Alice Randall and “Frankly, Scarlett, I Do
Give a Damn” by Beverly West and Nancy Peske 79
5. Rhett Butler’s Side of the Story: Rhett Butler’s People
by Donald McCaig 107
6. Gone with the Wind Fan Fiction 124
7. The Gone with the Wind Canon 155
Conclusion: Is It Gone with the Wind? 173
Bibliography 183
Index 203
vii
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Preface
With the spirit of her people who would not know defeat, even when it stared
them in the face, she raised her chin. She could get Rhett back. She knew she
could. There had never been a man she couldn’t get, once she set her mind
upon him.
“I’ll think of it all tomorrow, at Tara. I can stand it then. Tomorrow, I’ll
think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another day.”1
Three quarters of a century after its original publication in 1936, Gone
with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell has never fallen out of print. It has become
an icon of American culture and it has met with similar success abroad, enjoying
immense popularity in Japan, Russia and post–World War II Europe. Millions
of readers worldwide have alternately been frustrated and encouraged by the
novel’s open ending—will Scarlett get Rhett back? Even if he did not give a
damn, countless readers certainly did. Because of the ambiguous ending as well
as Mitchell’s refusal to give an answer as to what happened next, this question
has been a heated topic of discussion for decades and was the starting point for
two authorized sequels commissioned by Mitchell’s heirs. However, these are
not the only fictional works that have attempted to resolve the end of Gone with
the Wind.The nineties saw the publication of a controversial parody and, more
recently, a multitude of fan fiction stories has appeared on the internet.
There is a large number of books devoted to Gone with the Wind from
very different perspectives—the writing of the novel, the filming of the movie,
Mitchell’s biography, Mitchell’s relationship with her second husband, the his-
torical accuracy of the novel, the language of the novel from a discourse analysis
approach, the psychology and characteristics of Gone with the Wind fans, the
merchandising. Even though there are several articles on The Wind Done Gone,
most of which have focused on the court case that threatened it, there is no
serious academic work analyzing the continuations of Gone with the Wind. This
book examines not only the two authorized sequels, Scarlett by Alexandra Ripley
and Rhett Butler’s People by Donald McCaig, as well as the unauthorized parody
The Wind Done Gone by Alice Randall, but also the numerous Gone with the
1