Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Gone with the Wind, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Civil War and Reconstruction
Looking Forward vs. Looking Back
Classism and Racism
Practicality, Tenacity, and Selfishness
Women and Power
Summary
Analysis
Scarlett is in Marietta when Rhett sends an urgent telegram that Melanie is ill. Leaving Wade and Ella with Prissy, Scarlett gets the first train to Atlanta. It moves painfully slowly through old Civil War sites that once upset Scarlett; now, she pays them no mind. Rhett meets Scarlett at the depot, his face blank. He says Melanie isn’t dead, but she is dying: she had a miscarriage. She hadn’t told anyone, but Rhett knew because she’s been so happy lately. They arrive at Melanie’s house. Suddenly lonely, Scarlett grabs Rhett’s arm, but he leaves her to go in alone.
After Melanie had her first child, Dr. Meade warned her not to have another or it would kill her. Melanie is the last person that holds everyone together. She sees the best in both Rhett and Scarlett and ignores their less positive qualities. Now that she is dying, Scarlett is starting to realize how much Melanie matters to her, even as it’s too late to change anything for the better.
Themes
Ashley, India, and Aunt Pitty are gathered inside. Ashley looks like a sleepwalker. Scarlett is afraid but refuses to believe Melanie is dying. Ashley says Melanie told no one she was pregnant because she’d been so afraid something would go wrong. Dr. Meade comes out of Melanie’s room and looks at Scarlett with grief and contempt. Pitty and India both beg to see Melanie, but Dr. Meade says Melanie wants Scarlett. As he leads her to the room, he orders her not to tell Melanie about her and Ashley.
Dr. Meade doesn’t want Melanie’s contented belief in everyone she loves is good to be shattered at the last instant by Scarlett’s confession. Melanie wants to see Scarlett before she sees anyone else, suggesting that she trusts Scarlett with her last wishes more than she does her own husband.
Themes
Dr. Meade ushers Scarlett in and shuts the door behind her. The room is neat and spare, so unlike Scarlett’s own lavish bedroom. Melanie lies in bed, her eyes sunken and closed. Until this moment, Scarlett had refused to believe she was dying, but now she knows it is true. She realizes she relies on Melanie and doesn’t know how she’ll go on without her. She grasps Melanie’s cold hand. Melanie’s eyes flutter open and she whispers weakly, asking Scarlett to promise to take care of Beau like her own son. Once, Melanie had asked her the same thing while Atlanta was burning, and Scarlett had meanly hoped she would die. Scarlett thinks she’s killed Melanie, but she promises to care for Beau.
Just as it is too late, Scarlett realizes how much she depends on Melanie. She’s been obsessed with Ashley and believed that his imaginary love supported her through hard times for so long, that she never saw that Melanie was the one who really stood by her. From the beginning, Melanie trusted Scarlett to care for her children. Throughout the story, Melanie hasn’t changed whereas Scarlett has undergone a long transformation to come to the realization that she loves Melanie.
Themes
Melanie gathers strength and starts to say something about Ashley and Scarlett. Scarlett is terrified; she thinks Melanie knew about her and Ashley all along, and she’s still been a loyal friend. She prays Melanie will live so she can make it up to her. Melanie whispers Ashley’s name again, tugging weakly at Scarlett’s face to make her look up. Scarlett looks up, but Melanie’s eyes are loving; she doesn’t know. Melanie asks Scarlett to care for Ashley because he’s impractical. Scarlett promises, and Melanie says she’s so brave and has always been so good to her. Scarlett wants to scream that Melanie is wrong, but she stands, biting back her confession. It will be her penance to know that Melanie loved her even though she doesn’t deserve it.
Scarlett realizes that the most painful consequence of her selfishness is the memory that Melanie loved her far more than she deserved. Now that Melanie is dying, she has no opportunity to go back and right the wrongs she dealt her. Scarlett only comes to this realization though because Melanie is dying—it takes loss for Scarlett to realize how she’s been wrong, and then it is too late for her to change her behavior. Melanie also seems more aware and more practical than Scarlett has given her credit for, since she acknowledges Ashley’s shortcomings.
Themes
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The door opens and Dr. Meade calls Scarlett out. She holds Melanie’s hand to her cheek and says goodnight. Melanie asks for one more promise: that Scarlett be kind to Rhett, because he loves Scarlett. Scarlett promises, kisses Melanie’s hand, and leaves the room. India and Miss Pitty go in. Ashley is nowhere to be seen. Scarlett leans against the wall, her vision blurry. She never knew how much she loved and needed Melanie. She thinks back to when she killed the Yankee and Melanie stood on the landing with Charles’s sword. At the time, Scarlett had laughed at her frailty, but now she knows Melanie would’ve killed that Yankee if it meant dying herself. Melanie has always stood beside Scarlett, ready to go to battle for her. Melanie is the only girl friend she ever had, and she was so much like Ellen that Scarlett feels she is losing her mother again.
Scarlett feels she is losing Ellen all over again—or, that she’s losing someone she regularly deceived and who was an example Scarlett could never live up to. Bonnie’s death was a replay of Gerald’s death, and now Melanie’s is a replay of Ellen’s. These repeated tragedies drive home the fact that Scarlett never mourned her mother or her father but always moved on to the next thing, too afraid of being made useless by nostalgia and grief, like Ashley. Ellen’s death did not make Scarlett finally emulate the “great lady” but made her leave her old self behind completely.
Themes
Scarlett wonders where Ashley is. She’s losing Melanie, but she still has Ashley. She finds him in his room, holding one of Melanie’s gloves. She says his name in a trembling voice but realizes he’s just as lost as she is. She says that Ashley can’t be frightened because he’s so strong, but he says all his strength is gone now that Melanie is gone. Suddenly, Scarlett realizes something, and she says that Ashley loves Melanie. Ashley says Melanie was the only one of his dreams that was ever real. Scarlett says he should’ve told her years ago instead of stringing her along. She says that men are supposed to know those things, not women.
In the wake of losing Melanie, Scarlett’s mind searches for the next thing to cling to, and arrives at Ashley. When she finds him, however, he is not what she always fantasized him to be. She’s always imagined him as the perfect man: stronger than her, and smarter about love. She finds that he has no strength without Melanie, and she realizes that he loved Melanie but never realized it and never came out and told Scarlett this. With this, Scarlett’s shining image of Ashley shatters.
Themes
Ashley winces. His drooping shoulders show he’s already criticizing himself. Scarlett thinks of how she promised Melanie she’d care for him, and now she’s hurting his feelings. Scarlett can stand this, but Ashley can’t stand anything. She opens her arms, and he comes to her, crying, saying he can’t live without Melanie. She feels privately that she also can’t live without Melanie, but she squares her shoulders and soothes him. The door opens and Dr. Meade calls Ashley urgently. Scarlett pushes Ashley towards the door, telling him to be brave.
At the beginning of the story, Ashley made Scarlett promise to take care of Melanie, whom Scarlett despised. Now, Melanie has made Scarlett promise to take care of Ashley—who suddenly seems unattractive and weak. Scarlett has never loved who she’s supposed to, and she’s always wanted what she can’t have. But she again steps into a more masculine-coded, strong role as she pushes Ashley toward Melanie.
Themes
Scarlett sits on the bed, more tired than she’s ever been. She thinks about how Ashley doesn’t love her and how she doesn’t care. She should be heartbroken, but she isn’t because she doesn’t love him. She tries to tell herself love can’t change, but it has. He was a childish fancy. Melanie is dead, and Ashley could ask her to divorce Rhett to marry him. But now that Scarlett has Ashley, she doesn’t want him. If it wasn’t for her promise to Melanie, she wouldn’t care if she never saw Ashley again.
Scarlett believed so strongly that love couldn’t change that she doggedly loved Ashley even when she had no reason to. Now, she realizes that love changes all the time; she hated Melanie but grew to love her, and she fell out of love with Ashley. She realizes that she tried to make her love of Ashley as unshakeable as everyone’s love of the Cause and the Old South, but that Ashley was only a childhood fancy, something she’ll never be able to access again—just as the Old Guard’s love of Old South is never going to bring it back.
Themes
