Reading
Gone with the Wind , I was struck by Scarlett's response to Rhett in Chapter 19, when he proposes that she become his mistress:
"Dear," he said quietly, "I am complimenting your intelligence by asking you to be my mistress without having first seduced you." Of course, moments earlier in the scene, he'd preempted her question. In a passage that made my eyes widen and twisted my mouth into a smirk (the sad facial composition that results when I goofily try to repress an expression betraying keen interest), Rhett tenderly kisses Scarlett's palm (always a sexy move, gentlemen), prompting in Scarlett a "treacherous warm tide of feeling that made her want to run her hands through his hair, to feel his lips upon her mouth." Yes!
But by the time Rhett defines (confines) his desire with the label "mistress," Scarlett has forgotten this treacherous tide of feeling -- which, along with the passel of brats (and maybe some money), is what she'd have gotten out of an affair with Rhett. This forgetfulness is a symptom of Scarlett's fear of sex, and the attendant pleasure, humiliation, and loss of control -- to say nothing of the irrationality, incomprehensibility and general difficulty maintaining one's dignity -- that accompanies it.
This fear (not shared and underestimated by) Rhett is what dooms their romance. "Only when like marries like can there be any happiness," warns Gerald, Scarlett's father, in Chapter 2, and Rhett agrees: "I love you, Scarlett, because we are so much alike, renegades, both of us, dear, and selfish rascals," he says in Chapter 23. Unfortunately, their sex drives aren't compatible, a problem that seems just as divisive of a marriage in the 19th century as it is in our own day.
The "passel of brats" betrays Scarlett's prudish fear -- along with the concomitant failure of imagination and lack of experience -- with the economy of a punch. Reading that line felled me with pity, compassion and a gentle (but nonetheless mocking) incredulity of Scarlett, this silly, willful, immature girl whose vocabulary includes "passel," but not "orgasm."
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This page contains a single entry by Maya published on February 1, 2009 1:57 AM .
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