Gone with the Wind (volume 2) by Margaret Mitchell

The Review (continued)

The first 500 page volume was reviewed in April 2013 and took us up to the loss of Atlanta and the defeat of the Confederacy.

In volume 2 the war is over and sufficient of the main characters have survived to continue the story. Tara is still standing; or rather it’s on its knees. With the hated Yankees in control, the negroes freed and carpetbaggers from the North flooding in to plunder the defenceless Southern states, Scarlett needs cash to pay taxes or lose the plantation. She turns gold-digger (not in the Californian sense) and returns to Atlanta to entrap one of the few respectable southern gents with any cash.

This saves Tara and gets Scarlett a toe-hold in the now booming Atlanta economy. Her approach to the carpetbaggers is if you can’t beat them, join them. Rhett Butler has the same view and they continue their tempestuous relationship, making dollars, infiltrating the new-moneyed Yankee folk, but losing the respect of the downtrodden, proud remnants of Confederate society. Only faithful friend Melanie Wilkes and her husband Ashley will give them the time of day.

These desperate days for the Southerners give birth to the abomination of the Klu Klux Klan, which attempts to mete out a rough justice on negroes perceived to have slighted (or worse) any white lady’s honour. Following one of their skirmishes Scarlett finds herself widowed for the second time; free once more, but to wed Rhett Butler or to prise Ashley Wilkes from his passionless marriage?

The painful reconstruction of the South eventually gives way to recovery as Georgia gains a measure of self-governance. But the complex four-cornered relationship between Scarlett, Rhett, Melanie and Ashley shows strain and stress under the pressure of events, producing uncertainty right to the end.

The power of the book is in Scarlett’s uncompromising character; frequently dishonourable, always selfish, but undeniably resilient in the face of adversity. Any problem too big to solve today can be shrugged off until tomorrow – famously “another day”. What lifts the book out of the chick-lit pot-boiler category is the broad historical sweep and the riveting scenes between Scarlett and Rhett that crackle with sexual tension and expostulate Rhett’s “don’t give a damn” philosophy.

Six month’s reading (both volumes) and no regrets; tomorrow is another book!

Down and Out in Paris and London – George Orwell

Written in the 1930s this slim volume relates the young Orwell’s personal experience of extreme poverty in the two cities.

In Paris, out of money, he eventually secures a position as a ‘plongeur’, the lowest rated menial in a hotel or restaurant. This provides a pitiful income in exchange for long hours in the stifling heat of the kitchens with the valuable compensation of access to food. His fellow workers provide a treasury of tales of false hopes and ruined dreams. His income pays his rent and no more.

He returns to London on the promise of a job but when it is delayed he is forced to spend a month penniless in the capital. He joins the ranks of the itinerant tramps, kept moving by the vagrancy laws from ‘spike’ to ‘spike’ (a casual ward of the workhouse). From the old hands he learns survival techniques, which spikes are best, and the alternatives to institutional dormitories such as the accurately named two-penny hangover.

Orwell’s writing is clear, concise and is all the more affecting for being un-emotional. In the main he just reports the facts, reserving judgement to a couple of chapters where he sums up his personal opinions and offers simple if unconventional ideas to improve matters.

Is it of relevance today, or is it just of historic interest? It may be possible to judge if much has changed after reading the reputed modern equivalent - A Street Cat Named Bob. As a historic document its personal testimony delivered with a light touch makes it both informative and very readable.

Florence and Giles – John Harding

In late 19^th century upstate New York eleven year old Florence and her younger half-brother Giles are orphans immured in the gothic pile that is Blithe House, looked after by a housekeeper and staff employed by their absentee guardian uncle. He does not believe in educating girls but Florence has secretly accessed the vast library and independently developed her reading and language skills.

In fact they are over-developed; leading to a penchant for synthesising new forms of words whenever she feels the standard lexicon is un-sufficiently expressive. It is her first-person account of events that we get throughout; her synopsis could read thus:

Her brother is boarding-schooled for a while and she friendships a boy from the neighbouring estate. But things pearshape when Giles quits school and a new governess is appointed (we learn a previous governess fatally-accidented on the lake). Florence suspects Miss Taylor is up to no good and witbattles her in a struggle that starts with polite sniping but soon gets life-and-deather.

The precociousness and resourcefulness of Florence, as well as her passion for books, is reminiscent of Roald Dahl’s Matilda; but Florence is older, lacks powers of telekinesis, and is working pretty much alone against an adversary more threatening than the comic Miss Trunchbull. Although you have to root for her, and fear for her welfare, her capacity for ruthlessness is more than a little concerning by the end.

It is hard to decide if Florence and Giles is aimed at the youth or adult market – it seems to occupy ground between the aforesaid Matilda and Henry James’ Turn of the Screw. (Which features similarly named siblings Flora and Miles in a not dissimilar environment).

Not that it matters; I enjoyed the read which was well worth the £1.99 download. The oddities of vocabulary, which could have been irritating, actually fitted in well with and added charm to the narrative.

A Dark Matter by Peter Straub

Read as part S of the “Along the Library Shelf” reading journey

Chosen because

An attractive cover, as ever, drew my eye: a lonely barn in a field of corn below a high white sky dotted with menacing black birds. The blurb was promising with comments from Stephen King and The Guardian, and the first couple of pages left me wanting to know more. The horror genre is not my usual choice, but that is what the A to Z journey is all about – variation from the norm.

The Review

Lee Harwell is a writer in late middle age in need of literary inspiration. A chance encounter brings back to mind a long-buried episode of his youth and soon an irrepressible desire forms to dig it up and examine it.

It was buried for a good reason. His high school friends (one now his wife) took part in a psychic experience, led by the guru-like Spencer Mallon, which ended in death, disappearance and damage to the survivors, who then clammed up and spread far and wide. Harwell himself had chosen not to get involved but now needs to know what actually happened and sets about rounding up the gang and persuading them to talk.

Two strands emerge and intertwine. In the normal world the old friends re-engage and spend time joining the dots from their shared adolescence to their current separate lives. In doing so they each recall and describe the traumatic experience of the para-normal world called forth by Spencer Mallon. Was the spirit world they revealed real or imagined?

The writing is good and maintains interest, although concentration is required as the story flits between now and then, character and character, and first and third person narration (often in the same paragraph). The depictions of horror are vivid and powerful but to me were too unworldly to produce fear or dread.

Read another?

I’ve nothing against the (award winning) author but, as this book has not drawn me into the horror genre, probably not.