Like so many sequels, a bit of a disappointment (Scarlett: The Sequel to Margaret Mitchell's "Gone with the Wind" - Alexandra Ripley)

Member Name: worst_trip

Product:	Scarlett: The Sequel to Margaret Mitchell's "Gone with the Wind" - Alexandra Ripley
Date:	27/09/09 (39 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Easy to read, with a non-taxing plot

Disadvantages: It's not exactly a great work of literature, this

In its way, 'Scarlett' - Alexandra Ripley's 1991 sequel to Margaret Mitchell's classic book 'Gone With the Wind' is quite well researched - in that Ms Ripley has obviously gone through the original with a fine-tooth comb in order to find subsidiary characters who might or might not have been mentioned in the first book and who could play a part in this one. Elderley grandfathers, maiden aunts, the in-laws - and more distant relations than you can shake a stick at - hordes and hordes of O'Hara cousins! An unfeasibly ancient Irish grandmother! They all show up to do their turn in 'Scarlett' at some point.

The inclusion of all these supporting players is particularly odd in plot-terms because apart from Scarlett O'Hara-Wilkes-Kennedy-Butler herself, all the 'originals' from GWTW are either dead at the start of the new story (e.g. Melanie Wilkes), departed (Rhett Butler) or are deliberately dispatched with from the story very early on (Mammy; Ashley Wilkes; the various Scarlett sisters and sprogs), thus leaving our heroine free to enjoy a standard series of adventures of the bodice-ripping, period-drama-in-the-Old-South type. As a basic period pot-boiler, the story would stand up quite well for itself; the wandering plot makes quite a good sort of sense, the writing style is - a bit toe-curling in places but generally all right, and it certainly holds the reader's attention well - even throughout the hundreds and hundreds of pages of purplish prose ('Scarlett' being a real door-stopper of a blockbuster book). But as a sequel to 'Gone With the Wind' it disappoints on almost every level. The characters who have survived Ms Ripley's early editorial cull - basically Scarlett and Rhett - are changed almost out of all recognition, and the 'moral compass' of the book - especially as this relates to the interactions between the black and white characters - is also completely different. Of course, given that a big part of the original GWTW dealt with slavery in the Southern states of the USA I can understand why, politically, the people behind this book (and it was commissioned by the original author, Margaret Mitchell's estate) had to have this aspect altered; it was written in the modern day, after all: but instead of dealing with this emotive, admittedly very difficult issue directly the solution in 'Scarlett' is to simply overlook that any potential problem might exist. In the new book this is achieved by doing away with all black / African American characters entirely. This has clearly been done to make things "easier" for the reader - issues of racism in the Deep South? Tra-la-la, let's ignore all that and get back to some descriptions how pretty Scarlett O'Hara looks in her lovely lacy frocks! - and because of it 'Scarlett' the book comes across as a spineless and watered-down effort , a dreadful all-round cop-out.

I can't not mention the issue with the IRA that also rears its ugly head in 'Scarlett'. One of the many, many plot strands in the book involves our heroine going home to Ireland for reasons it would take too long to explain and getting unwittingly involved with some Irish freedom fighters - no, sorry, I mean IRA terrorists. On this subject, the author does have a shot at presenting both sides of a complex issue (a relatively nice and 'safe' one from an American readership's point of view, I would guess). Admittedly, while the IRA get their 'come-uppance' at the end of the story and in 'Scarlett,' are not portrayed entirely sympathetically, they're not portrayed entirely unsympathetically either, and for a British person who can remember all the - fuss and nonsense - that Irish republicanism led to in the 1970s and 1980s, this is a bit difficult to take. I don't think it sits well or is quite appropriate considering the rest of the content of this otherwise pretty silly and completely frivolous book.

So, 'Scarlett', like very many sequels to well-loved works of fiction is a let-down to the reader. As a stand-alone story it would work all right but it suffers by comparison with what has gone before. I doubt this is entirely Alexandra Ripley's fault, however: I don't know if anyone other than Margaret Mitchell herself could've come up a sequel to 'Gone With the Wind' that'd have passed muster, and as she never saw fit to write such a sequel, one has to wonder what her estate executors were thinking, trying to get someone else to continue the story on her behalf.

You can currently pick up copies of 'Scarlett' for low, low, prices at second-hand shops, car-boots sales and on Ebay, etc. It doesn't appear all that often in the shops these days, but still shouldn't cost you more than a couple of quid. Incidentally, I wouldn't go for one of the larger hard-back versions unless you want to keep it long-term - it'll take up far too much valuable spce.

Summary: One possible 'what if' scenario for Scarlettn'Rhett...not to be taken too seriously however