James Kinney gave us the lecture about the American Literature today and make us a way to organize our thinking about it.
As for me, my image of American Literature begin with the novel "Gone with the wind", the American novel by Margaret Mitchell, which was published in 1936 and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1937. It was the only book that Margaret Mitchell published in her lifetime, but it became one of the best selling American novels.
I like the title, " Gone with the wind", which appears in the novel: When Scarlett escapes the destruction of Atlanta by Northern forces, she flees back to her family's plantation, Tara. At one point, she wonders, "Was Tara still standing? Or was Tara also gone with the wind which had swept through Georgia?"
Scarlett expresses views that were common of the era. She has many spiteful and selfish opinions in the novel, and is callous toward her children, her sisters, and of course Melanie, who has every virtue Scarlett lacks.
But I like her so much, who is so faithful and encourages me. At the end of the novel, when Rhett refusing Scarlett's plea to come along and claiming that he was no longer in love with her. Scarlett cannot think of anything to do at present. Finally, with newly dawned realisation of true love, she sits at the foot of the stairs exhausted, telling herself in her characteristic style that she will think about her problems the next day. Being her strong self, she calms down and decides to go back to Tara and think of a solution as she still believes that she has the charm to get any man she sets designs upon.
Hope lights Scarlett's face: "Tara! Home. I'll go home, and I'll think of some way to get him back! After all, tomorrow is another day!" And in the final scene, Scarlett stands once more, resolute, before Tara.
"After all, tomorrow is another day!"
