Book # 14 Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

According to my movie diary, it has been more than 19 years since I've seen the film of Gone with the Wind, and apparently I really liked it. However since then I've forgotten pretty much the whole story except that Atlanta gets destroyed, there is a really sad horse riding accident and that Rhett leaves at the very end. So I entered into reading the book with a pretty clean slate.

While reading it I was a bit conflicted. First off the book is very "readable" since Mitchell's style is fairly modern and the actual plot moves along and is interesting. Plus it was different to read about the Civil War from the South's point of view and it got me started on watching Ken Burn's Civil War miniseries. Though on the other hand... Scarlett and Rhett are incredibly unlikable people. Scarlett is in pretty much every scene and if you follow someone for over a thousand pages it helps if you actually like that character. I don't even know where to start... At the beginning she is just a spoiled teenager that loves being the center of attention. From the very start it is clear that she is in love with the wrong type of man for her, Ashley, and that Rhett is a perfect match for her. Scarlett however doesn't realize this until page 1022 at which point it is too late. Let me  a make a list of what makes me dislike Scarlett so much

-She marries her first husband to spite someone else.
-She honestly doesn't feel bad when that husband dies and doesn't want to mourn him.
-She never cares for her son and is usually kind of mean to him
-Not only is she a slave owner, in one scene she beats a slave
-After her slaves are freed she complains about having to do stuff herself and wants her slaves back
-And she makes a lot of racist remarks.
-And some Anti-Semitic ones too
-She lies to her sister's fiance that her sister has broken off the engagement
-So she can marry him instead... for his money
-She tries to steal away her sister-in-law's husband
-She doesn't love her first daughter either
-When she can't get slave labor she uses convict labor
-She shoots a Union soldier in the face and steals his money
-She lies about her business competitors

I'm sure I'm forgetting some other stuff, but she isn't a nice person. And Rhett isn't any better. He profits from the Civil War, brags about killing a freed slave for being "uppity to a lady", and is probably having an affair the whole time he's married to Scarlett. Really, the two characters totally belong together.

Even after all of that, I would have liked the book if I had felt that the author wanted us to dislike them and disapprove of her actions... but that isn't the case I feel. The way that slavery and racism is so casually accepted, the dislike of being a part of the United States, and the whole thing where the KKK is accepted really left a bad taste for me (which required I rewatch Django Unchained to feel better). Mitchell just idealized the whole Southern culture too much. Maybe she was just a bit naive and didn't study her history enough before writing the book. I actually started to feel a bit self-conscious about reading the book in public. 

The book mentions Les Miserables... it reminded me that I'd rather follow Jean Valjean for a thousand pages than Scarlett O'Hara. I guess I'll give it a C+.