''Rhett Butler's People'' by
Donald McCaig
Donald McCaig (May 1, 1940 in Butte, Montana – November 11, 2018) was an American novelist, poet, essayist and sheepdog trainer.
Early life and education
McCaig was born in Butte, Montana and served in the United States Marine Corps for two ye ...
is an authorized sequel to the 1936 novel ''
Gone with the Wind Gone with the Wind most often refers to:
* Gone with the Wind (novel), ''Gone with the Wind'' (novel), a 1936 novel by Margaret Mitchell
* Gone with the Wind (film), ''Gone with the Wind'' (film), the 1939 adaptation of the novel
Gone with the Wind ...
''. It was published in November 2007.
Fully authorized by the
Margaret Mitchell
Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell (November 8, 1900 – August 16, 1949) was an American novelist and journalist. Mitchell wrote only one novel that was published during her lifetime, the American Civil War-era novel ''Gone With the Wind (novel), Gone ...
estate, ''Rhett Butler’s People'' is a novel that parallels ''Gone with the Wind'' from
Rhett Butler
Rhett Butler (born 1828) is a fictional character in the 1936 novel ''Gone with the Wind (novel), Gone with the Wind'' by Margaret Mitchell and in the 1939 film adaptation Gone with the Wind (film), of the same name. It is one of Clark Gable's ...
's perspective.
The book was unveiled on November 3, 2007,
after several years of setbacks and two previous authors.
Both
Emma Tennant
Emma Christina Tennant FRSL (20 October 1937 – 21 January 2017) was an English novelist and editor of Scottish extraction, known for a post-modern approach to her fiction, often imbued with fantasy or magic. Several of her novels give a femi ...
and
Pat Conroy
Donald Patrick Conroy (October 26, 1945 – March 4, 2016) was an American author who wrote several acclaimed novels and memoirs; his books ''The Water Is Wide (book), The Water is Wide'', ''The Lords of Discipline'', ''The Prince of Tides (no ...
had previously been commissioned by the estate to produce the book.
McCaig chose to disregard the 1991 novel ''
Scarlett'' by
Alexandra Ripley
Alexandra Ripley ( Braid; January 8, 1934 – January 10, 2004) was an American writer best known as the author of '' Scarlett'' (1991), written as a sequel to ''Gone with the Wind''. Her first novel was ''Who's the Lady in the President's Bed? ...
. He does not acknowledge its existence in the
canon
Canon or Canons may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Canon (fiction), the material accepted as officially written by an author or an ascribed author
* Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture
** Western canon, th ...
of ''Gone with the Wind'', nor does his novel incorporate any of its characters. McCaig's impression was that the Margaret Mitchell estate was "thoroughly embarrassed" by Ripley's novel.
[
]
Plot
''Rhett Butler's People'' attempts to present a semi-journalistic view of the life and times of Rhett Butler, while remaining faithful to the original Mitchell work. The Rhett- Scarlett love-story is downplayed. The novel begins with a duel
A duel is an arranged engagement in combat between two people with matched weapons.
During the 17th and 18th centuries (and earlier), duels were mostly single combats fought with swords (the rapier and later the small sword), but beginning in ...
that is mentioned in ''Gone with the Wind''; this is the reason that Rhett is not received in Charleston society. He participates in a duel against Belle Watling's brother, who is certain that Rhett is the father of his sister's unborn child.
Eventually the novel flashes back to when Rhett was twelve years old. He never had a good relationship with his father, Langston Butler, and often refused to go to Charleston with his father. His father often punished Rhett due to his lack of cooperative skills as his eldest son. Instead, Rhett spends time in the slaves quarters where he enjoys his time with Will (a slave). One day, Will gets firmly punished due to disobedience towards a white overseer. Rhett, unable to see his friend getting whipped continuously and having no power to stop it, takes the boat to escape the chaos, and vows to grow up and never be helpless again.
The novel continues through the time covered by ''Gone with the Wind'' and retells the story. The story is not told solely from Rhett's perspective. It proceeds to relate other moments from the time during the original novel and then adds a new ending. The book only goes a short way past the timeline of ''Gone with the Wind'' (unlike the sequel ''Scarlett'', which travels several years further).
Reception
Melissa Whitworth of ''The Daily Telegraph
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...
'' described McCaig's Butler as "touchy-feely".The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', Stephen Carter noted that the character of Rhett Butler was made into a more human, flawed person than either Mitchell or Ripley portrayed him to be. However, he stated that the novel transformed Rhett from the man of mystery that drew readers to him into "a version of the angst-ridden, on-the-make, love-struck antihero of modern fiction: Rhett Butler as channeled by Rabbit Angstrom f ''Rabbit, Run''">Rabbit,_Run.html" ;"title="f ''Rabbit, Run">f ''Rabbit, Run''or T. S. Garp [of ''The World According to Garp'']." He then wondered if such a Rhett was one wanted by readers.
References
External links
Official Site for ''Rhett Butler's People''
{{Authority control
Sequel novels
2007 American novels
Works based on Gone with the Wind
Novels set in Atlanta
Novels set during the American Civil War