Chicago Trib

A new civil war over 'Gone With the Wind'

By Patrick Reardon Tribune staff writer March 28, 2001

Author Margaret Mitchell's estate has filed suit in Atlanta to block publication of a novel that tells the late writer's "Gone With the Wind" story from the perspective of a former slave who is an illegitimate half-sister of Mitchell's heroine, Scarlett O'Hara.

A hearing will be held Thursday in Atlanta on the estate's argument that "The Wind Done Gone" by Alice Randall, set to be published in June by Houghton Mifflin, is technically a sequel to Mitchell's classic 1936 novel of the Old South and thus a violation of U.S. copyright law.

The case raises thorny legal questions about how far a writer can go in referring to another author's work. Even more, it threatens to open old scars for U.S. blacks.

For 65 years, African-Americans have chafed at the stereotypical representations of lazy, childlike, easily frightened black slaves in Mitchell's perennial best seller, as well as in the 1939 Oscar-winning movie based on it. Randall's book promised to go a long way toward counterbalancing those insensitive views by envisioning the O'Hara family's Tara plantation and the people who lived there from a slave's point of view.

Now the book, which has been endorsed by such major African-American literary voices as Ismael Reed and Claude Brown, may never reach the stores.

Randall, an African-American who lives in Nashville and co-wrote a No. 1 country song -- "XXXs and OOOs," recorded by Trisha Yearwood -- didn't return phone calls Tuesday.

But in a statement released by her publisher she said: "Once upon a time in America, African-Americans were forbidden by law to learn to read and write. It saddens me and breaks my heart (that) there are those who would try to set up obstacles for a black woman to tell her story, and the story of her people, with words in writing."

Michael Eric Dyson, a DePaul University professor and an expert on black culture and U.S. race relations, said Randall's book represents an important step toward rectifying the slanted portrayal of blacks in Mitchell's book. "We've had the slavery story by proxy from Margaret Mitchell, and now we want black people to speak for themselves," he said.

This different point of view won't benefit just blacks, Dyson said, but also will give white readers a fuller insight into life in the South in the era of slavery leading up to the Civil War.

"You get a sense of the complexity of black life," he said. "These people had passion and interests. They had ruminations; they had conflicts. They were human."

Although "The Wind Done Gone" is not scheduled for publication until June 6, advance reviewer copies have been distributed by Houghton Mifflin, and promotional material from the publisher portrays the book as "the story that's been missing" from the Mitchell book.

Margaret Wogan, one of several attorneys representing the Mitchell estate in the lawsuit, which was filed March 16, cited such language as proof that the book is a sequel and a "derivative work that incorporates wholesale fully developed characters from 'Gone With the Wind.'"

Wogan noted that the Mitchell trust "is in the business of authorizing sequels" in return for a cut of the profits. The first sequel, "Scarlett" by Alexandra Ripley, was published in 1991. A second one is being written and will be published by St. Martin's Press.

In the lawsuit, the Mitchell estate contends that all of the major characters in Randall's novel -- with the exception of its narrator, Cynara, said by the novel to have been sired by Scarlett's father and therefore her half-sister but who was never suggested in Mitchell's book -- are "readily identifiable as the core Mitchell characters." For example, the character known as "R.B." or "Debt Chauffeur" is clearly a parallel to Mitchell's Rhett Butler, the suit says. Similarly, it alleges, the character "Other" in Randall's book is her version of Scarlett O'Hara.

In addition, the suit claims Randall's book makes clear reference to key incidents described in "Gone With the Wind." At one point in "The Wind Done Gone," Cynara remembers how R.B. cursed Other "but called her darling or dear but he told her he didn't give a tinker's damn what happened to her. When he walked out, she sat down on the stairs and cried."

Houghton Mifflin took a hard line Tuesday, promising to vigorously battle the Mitchell estate on the issue. "It is unconscionable to deny anyone the right to comment on a book that has taken on such mythic status in American culture," Wendy Strothman, executive vice president of the company's trade and reference division, said in a statement. "'The Wind Done Gone' is an inspired act of literary invention that gives voice to those whom history and culture have silenced."

Joseph Beck, an Atlanta attorney who is representing the publisher in the suit, declined to comment Tuesday.

However, legal experts said Houghton Mifflin's best defense would be to argue that Randall's book is a legitimate form of literary comment on "Gone With the Wind."

Roberta Kwall, director of the DePaul University Center for Intellectual Property Law, noted that those who own the copyright on a book often fight attempts to satirize or parody the work. But parodies and satires are protected under an exception to the copyright law. "You're allowed to take enough of the underlying work to conjure up the original," Kwall said.

In such situations, there's a certain amount of freedom granted to the satirist to recount the earlier work, said Cynthia Ho, a Loyola University law professor. "It's hard to make fun of something unless you can draw parallels," she said.

The ultimate decision in the Mitchell-Randall case could hinge on a precedent set a decade ago by the rap group 2 Live Crew.

In 1989, the group released the album "As Clean As They Wanna Be," which included a track that satirized Roy Orbison's 1964 ballad "Oh, Pretty Woman," changing the words to "ugly woman." After lengthy legal battles, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that 2 Live Crew was within its rights to parody the earlier tune.

On the other hand, Wogan noted that attempts to publish "Lo's Diary" by Pia Pera, about the inner life of Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, were successfully blocked in court until the author and ultimate publisher, Foxrock, agreed to give Nabokov's son a share of the book's profits.

While Wogan characterized the lawsuit as an attempt by the Mitchell estate to protect its financial rights, Dyson said more than a business decision is involved. "We've heard from Scarlett O'Hara; now we want to hear from the female and male slaves who were there (at Tara)," he said. "The moral argument is that, as a measure of justice and restitution, you should at least allow a literary exploration of the same territory."

In an interview transcript released by Houghton Mifflin with reviewer copies of "The Wind Done Gone," Randall said, "Unfortunately, 'Gone With the Wind' is an inaccurate portrait of Southern history. It's a South without miscegenation, without whippings, without families sold apart, without free blacks striving for their education, without Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass. 'Gone With the Wind' depicts a South that never ever existed."

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Answers

Interesting legal case. I suspect the estate will lose.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

While I enjoyed Gone with the Wind, I will rush to purchase the "rest of the story" if it hits the market. I would think that it would increase the sales of Gone With the Wind for those who have never read it. GWW is a great read, but anyone who has any sense of southern history has to know that it is strictly the "white" version.I love history, but one cannot love just white history or US history and get a complete picture. I hope the book gets released.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I loved the book, and actually loved the Scarlett sequel. However, I do not see these books in any way as history. This is nothing but a love story set in a difficult part of our nations history.

You don't know how many times, when I was younger, that I wished Rhett looked up at the stairs at me like that. LOL

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I hadn't really heard of Gone With the Wind until I came over here. Vague mentions of it, but nothing that stuck. When I saw the movie, I thought it was a bit hokey--but you have to remember I'm NOT a sentimentalist (British understatement) in matters romantic. I just thought it was a good piece of bodice-buster fiction, written through the eyes of a southern woman in the--what was it? Forties? Social perceptions have changed a great deal (mostly!) since then. GWTW is an excellent social commentary on the views of middle-class southern white women in the forties. Nothing more.

Sidebar: I had two files in my office labeled, "Scarlett O'Hara" and "Rhett Butler" One was for things to do tomorrow, the other was for bold, decisive action today.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

The funniest episode of the Carol Burnett show that I ever saw was their spoof of GWTW (an episode quite famous in its day).

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Oh, I do remember that, Peter! The curtain rod was still in the curtain when Burnette put it on as a dress.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I trust someone will let us know when the book is available, or the movie is coming out?

That Carol Burnett skit was great. I wonder if Nick at Nite will ever air any of those shows?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001