摘 要

《飘》是玛格丽特·芒内尔林·米切尔的代表作。主人公斯嘉丽是一个出生于富裕家庭并且具有强烈反叛精神的人 。她一生只想得到理想的爱情，守护塔拉，不断赚钱。然而她的理想却总是被现实压垮。她有敢于面对困难，不向命运低头的反叛精神，这使她在战乱中决定返回家园并承担起整个家庭的重担，并且毫不怯弱地抗争命运。本文旨在分析小说中斯嘉丽反叛精神的原因，反叛精神的表现形式和后果等三个方面，进而探讨斯嘉丽女性意识的觉醒，启迪当代女性在处理两性关系时，应当保持自身的经济独立和精神独立。

关键词：《飘》；反叛精神；原因；表现形式；后果

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. Demonstration 2

2.1 Factors causing Scarlett’s rebellious spirit 2

2.1.1 Scarlett’s life experience 2

2.1.2 The influence of the war   4

2.2 Scarlett’s rebellious spirit reflected in Gone with the Wind 5

2.2.1 Persistence in love 5

2.2.2 Challenge of male chauvinism  6

2.2.3 Rebellion against religious restrictions 7

2.3 Consequences of Scarlett’s rebellious spirit 9

2.3.1 Social ostracism 9

2.3.2 Marriage breakup 10

3.  Conclusion 11

Works Cited 12

Bibliography 13

An Analysis of Scarlett’s Rebellious Spirit in Gone with the Wind

1. Introduction

Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell was born in a lawyer family in Atlanta. During the Civil War, Atlanta fell into the hands of northern army. When Margaret decided to create a novel about the Civil War, Atlanta became the background of the novel naturally. After a failed marriage, Margaret married John Marsh in 1925. The following year, because of a leg injury, Margaret had to resign from the newspaper office. With her husband's encouragement and her own unusual experience, she devoted herself to creation. Ten years later, she wrote the book—Gone with the Wind.

As Margaret Mitchell’s first and only published novel, Gone with the Wind achieved a great success throughout the United States and around the world. The author took her grandmother Anne Stephen as the prototype, and created the main character—Scarlett. Anne was the victim of the American Civil War. Before the war, she was an aristocrat, and the war completely destroyed her previous life. In Gone with the Wind, what impresses us most is the spirit of a rebellious Georgia woman named Scarlett O'Hara and her travails with friends, family, and lovers. The Civil War destroyed Georgia and even the economy of the whole South, the slave regained their freedom, and the former slaveholder’s extravagant times had gone with the wind. As a female writer, Margaret Mitchell expounded the suffering of war with exquisite emotion. It made lovers separate and children left their parents. However, in addition to the fall of Atlanta, the wounded were lying on the square, and the author did not spend too many words on the war scenes. Margaret paid more attention to affection. As the first novel to describe the American Civil War from the perspective of women, Margaret emphatically described how Scarlett lived hard in the war times. Margaret also put great emphasis on female feelings about war. Scarlett underwent the American Civil War and the post-war reconstruction, and she married three times and was economically independent, and attracted many local residents’ eyes. At the same time, Scarlett was criticized by males. On the one hand, the enterprising men thought Scarlett was a vain creature and a heart of steel, and the opinionated women also thought Scarlett was a selfish, unsympathetic, and licentious woman. On the other hand, reformers thought Scarlett completely betrayed her class. The American bourgeoisie’s dauntless, aggressive, and positive spirit reached deep into her thoughts and memories. She is a heroine who is good at building a new life in the ruins of the old world. According to Gone with the Wind, the American spirit of Scarlett is well known in the world.

This thesis will explore Scarlett’s rebellious spirit as reflected in this novel in terms of the factors causing her rebellious spirit and the consequences of such rebellious spirit.

2. Demonstration

2.1 Factors causing Scarlett’s rebellious spirit

2.1.1 Scarlett’s life experience

Scarlett was born in a rich plantation family in the South. Her mother Ellen was a well-educated and behaved Southern aristocratic woman. However, her father Gerald was a man who was rude in manners and uncultivated in speech. When Gerald knew he could no longer have a son, he had no delicate palate about Scarlett. Gerald treated her as a boy. They often concealed their inappropriate behaviors from the mother. Scarlett was the eldest and prettiest daughter, and Gerald always doted on her. Scarlett’s father gives her brisk and restless vitality and dauntless quality.

Before her mother, she was a good girl. In her mind,