Sorry I've been away for so long! But between my day job, my night job, and the World Cup I've been totally swamped. Hopefully, things will quiet down now that it is officially summer, but there are no guarantees I suppose. Anyway, if you enjoy my writing and have any interest in Prince Harry you should check out my guest blog about Prince Harry and Booze and Brazil over at Prince Harry Watch.
"Georgia's very existence as a state had been wiped out and it had become, with Florida and Alabama, "Military District Three," under the command of a Federal general," MM tells us at the beginning of this chapter, following this information with the opinion that "if life had been insecure and frightening before this, it was doubly so now."
Everyone around Scarlett is fearful but extremely proud of the legislature for standing up against Reconstruction, but Scarlett's fright is balanced by determination. And so, instead of giving into her fear and cowering at home Scarlett is still going about her business, still taking charge of the mills, still doing her rounds traveling through the suburbs of Atlanta even though everybody tells her not to leave the safety of her street. Hmmph. Maybe it's time to take a step back and evaluate Scarlett's actions and MM's position on Scarlett's actions when compared to the wild, wild world of Reconstruction-era District 3.
Is Scarlett being selfish? No, I don't think so. As of right now in GWTW, Scarlett hasn't actually been a firsthand witness to anything too crazy. As a matter of fact, although Scarlett certainly doesn't believe she's being protected from the wild, wild world, things haven't been as dangerous as she thinks, have they? Sure she had to shoot that deserter Yankee that one time at Tara, but other than that she hasn't come up against anything particularly violent. Before The War Scarlett was one of the most coddled members of the most coddled class in America. She wasn't supposed to even think about Negroes or lower-class whites or Yankees, and she certainly wasn't supposed to interact with them. But times have changed, and she now finds herself having to actually deal with these groups of people and I think whatever jaded experience she has along these lines comes more from a comparison to her early life than to anything she has actually experienced. It's like....
Okay, Six Flags Great America here in Illinois just opened a brand new ride. It's the biggest, fastest, highest, blah blah blah, wooden coaster in the world, and I'm sure that 99% of all people who ride the coaster will declare themselves daredevils because they had the stones to get on the ride. But if you're a Navy Seal who skydives regularly, this ride is nothing special, right? You're used to G-forces and the falling sensation and whatever else happens when you jump out of an airplane, so riding on a roller coaster isn't even all that scary to the Seal.
But then you have an entire class of people who think skydiving is child's play. Maybe they've fallen from a plane or out of a three story window. Or perhaps they've lived through an avalanche or an explosion or something seriously danger. This third group of people is so used to danger they would probably sleep through the entire 2 minute roller coaster experience.
So what I'm saying is, Scarlett belongs to the first group of people. She doesn't think she does anymore because she's been supporting herself for so long and because she's tough and because she killed a man back at Tara, but she does all the same. I would argue that Ashley and all the men who fought through the Civil War belong to the second group of people: they know what real danger looks like and they've had some close calls out there in the big, bad world, but they survived and can make sense of everything that happened. And then you've got the third group, the people who've had their lives threatened and destroyed on a regular basis, the people who know what it's like to be a starving, half-dead, half-mad, non-person. People like Archie (ex-con who killed his brother for sleeping with his wife), the former slaves (because...well, let's be real, ya'll), and Rhett(gambler/black sheep) and good old Belle (madam!). Scarlett thinks she's so tough, and she is tough. I have no doubt that she'd probably thrive as part of this third group, but the reality is that she isn't nearly as hard as she thinks she is. Not yet, anyway.
Does MM think Scarlett is being selfish? No. I don't think so. Not yet, anyway. The beautiful thing about GWTW is that MM doesn't hit us over the head with her opinion about Scarlett's actions. Scarlett is the heroine of GWTW and I think MM has great affection for her creation, but I'm not sure that she supports every one of Our Girl's endeavors. But I don't think MM is scornful of Scarlett's behavior in this section. Yes, it's a little risky to ride through shantytown, past "the sluts" who "seemed to try themselves whenever she drove by," but money is money and business is business, and I think MM likes Scarlett's hustle.
So...here we go.
Scarlett is now forced to drive through shantytown on her own. Nobody from upper-class society would dare ride with her through that part of the county at this juncture in time. And she's of course alienated herself from Archie, so she's riding along with nothing but her gun when she runs into Big Sam. Good Old Big Sam, who plays an interesting role in GWTW. I could write thousands of words about Big Sam, words that would match or perhaps exceed the amount of things I have to say about Mammy and Prissy and even the Luckless Lu (who doesn't even factor into the story until much later). But for now I'll just point out how interesting it is that MM takes such great pains to differentiate between former slaves from the County and unknown Negroes. County/Tara slaves like Sam and Mammy are always a welcome surprise for Scarlett and the gang, aren't they? On the other hand, anytime Scarlett encounters unknown Negroes something bad is liable to happen, even if that's just a showdown with some sluts as her horses trot on by. But here's the thing:
ALL THESE NEGROES ARE FORMER SLAVES.
These folks are belonged to somebody, didn't they? I mean, it's not as if Atlanta was suddenly flooded by a bunch of illegal immigrant black people coming to town looking for a good time. These are local people who lived in local plantations. If they didn't belong to Tara, then they belonged to the Wilkes or the McIntoshes or the Tarleton's or somebody they know. And if so, then why are they so dangerous all of a sudden when Big Sam and the people Scarlett knows are still the same safe, dependable folks they've always been? But actually, this all feeds into MM's apparent favoritism for small town/country living as opposed to the madness of big cities. Scarlett has been in Atlanta since 1862, but Scarlett's heart still belongs to the county. There was a meme going around facebook this week saying "you never forget the neighborhood kids you grew up with," and I guess that's MM's view of the world. Big Sam wasn't one of Scarlett's friends, but he was the foreman on Tara and he therefore firmly belongs to the camp of friendlies.
Anyway, Scarlett's next encounter is a fun, fun, fun little face-off with good old Johnnie Gallagher. We haven't heard much from Mr. G. since Scarlett hired him. We've heard people talk about him (notably Rhett and Archie), but Scarlett hasn't really talked to him much while we've been looking over her shoulder. MM uses Scarlett's conversation with Mr. G. to show us a lot of things, but I think mostly she uses this to show us that even Scarlett believes in ethical business practices. Scarlett is most concerned with business profits of course, but she also can't believe how terrible Mr. G. is treating the convicts (which is pretty funny since everybody told her that Mr. G. was going to be a cruel master). Mr. G. is whipping the convicts, he's starving them (no side meat with the black-eyed-peas, y'all!), and he's hoarding most of the good food for himself and selling the rest of it. Scarlett is mean, but MM wants us to think that Mr. G. is absolutely terrible. Which he is.
But Scarlett is thrown into a dilemma almost immediately because Johnnie Gallagher calls her bluff and threatens to quit. And finally Scarlett O'Hara Hamilton Kennedy must choose between profit and Doing The Right Thing. And she decides...that profit is more important than the well-being of her convict gang.
"As she drove off down the path to the Decatur road her conscience battled with her desire for money. She knew she had no business exposing human lives to the hard little man's mercies. If he should cause the death of one of them she would be as guilty as he was, for she had kept him in charge after learning of his brutalities. But, on the other hand--well, on the other hand, men had no business getting to be convicts. If they broke laws and got caught, then they deserved what they got. This partly salved her conscience but as she drove down the road the dull thin faces of the convicts would keep coming back into her mind."
Oh Scarlett.
And I think that here, right here in chapter 44 of GWTW is the beginning of the great transition, the great rift, in Scarlett's life. Until now Scarlett hasn't been faced with what MM thinks was an actual ethical dilemma. After all, Scarlett's major "sins" until now have only been coveting Ashley and marrying Frank Kennedy, and these are mere affairs of the heart and tiny blips compared to life and death. But now Mr. G. is going to work these men to death, and Scarlett is the only one who can stop him from bullying them into an early grave and...she...decides...not to do anything. Because convicts deserve what they got, not because they broke the laws, but because they were dumb enough to break laws and get caught. As I said earlier, we usually have to guess at MM's politics and her opinions about her characters, but not here. Chapter 44 began on an ambiguous note, with MM not taking any particular stance on Scarlett's increasingly risky behavior, but after Scarlett decides to continue employing Johnny G. things immediately begin to fall apart. And all hell breaks loose. As a matter of fact, Scarlett doesn't even make it home that afternoon before these chickens come home to roost because she's attacked by violent transients on the road back to Atlanta and her entire world is thrown into turmoil. The dominoes are beginning to fall at this juncture in the story, and they don't stop falling until every character we love is either dead or crazy or just plain gone from the scene.
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