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Chapter 20
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Gone with the Wind, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Civil War and Reconstruction
Looking Forward vs. Looking Back
Classism and Racism
Practicality, Tenacity, and Selfishness
Women and Power
Summary
Analysis
Scarlett sends Prissy to get Mrs. Meade and then sits down for breakfast. Her heart beats so fast that she can’t eat. Her sugarless coffee tasted even worse than usual. Wade is scared, but Scarlett tells him to play outside. Then she sits on the stairs to compose her emotions. Why does Melanie have to have her baby today? The town is so quiet—there are no ambulances, soldiers, or neighbors. Where is Prissy with Mrs. Meade? Finally, Prissy comes home alone: Mrs. Meade is bringing Phil home, so she can’t come. Scarlett hates how enslaved persons are always happy to bring bad news. Prissy shares that she tried to bring Mrs. Merriweather, but she’s busy at the hospital. Scarlett sends Prissy to get Mrs. Elsing, and to do so quickly.
The day that Melanie’s water breaks coincides with the day Atlanta falls. Slowly but steadily, things get worse and worse for Scarlett: she realizes that Atlanta is deserted and that she’s alone. She takes her frustration out on Wade and Prissy—two young innocents. And Scarlett’s selfishness shines through when she blames everyone else for how badly things are going. It’s not Prissy or Melanie’s fault that nobody can help Melanie through childbirth.
Themes
Scarlett goes into Melanie’s room and says cheerfully that Wade’s birth was over in no time. Melanie hopes hers will be that fast. Scarlett sponges Melanie’s forehead and watches Prissy return, swaying her skirt and taking her time. Swearing to whip Prissy one day, Scarlett goes down to meet her. Prissy says Mrs. Elsing is at the hospital. Scarlett says she’ll give Prissy a note to bring to Dr. Meade at the hospital and tells her to get news of the fighting in Jonesboro. Thinking of Tara and Dilcey, Prissy starts to cry. Scarlett sends her to the hospital with a note written in the margins of Gerald’s last letter.
Although Scarlett is distraught and angry with Melanie for being a burden on her, she tries to conceal it. She acts cheerful around Melanie in order to distract her from pain and stress almost as if she does care about Melanie. However, she doesn’t sympathize with Prissy’s fear, even though Prissy is afraid for Tara and her family members at Tara, just like Scarlett is. Scarlett doesn’t consider Prissy’s fears as valid as her own or as Melanie’s.
Themes
Scarlett sits with Melanie and talks about meaningless things. Melanie’s face is screwed up in pain, but she lies and says it isn’t bad. Scarlett doesn’t sympathize because she’s worried about Ellen and the Yankees. Scarlett would be happy if Melanie died. Ashamed of this thought, she prays that Melanie survives. She tries to keep talking, but Melanie says not to worry. The hours pass and Prissy doesn’t return. What will happen if the baby comes before the doctor arrives? Scarlett suddenly realizes the cannons have stopped.
Scarlett wishes Melanie would die so she’d be free of her responsibility to her. Things start to change, though, when Scarlett feels ashamed and prays. This situation, in which Melanie might be dying before Scarlett’s eyes, forces Scarlett to confront her selfishness. Praying is something that Scarlett associates with Ellen, so as Scarlett prays for Melanie, she also feels closer to her mother.
Themes
Scarlett sees Prissy returning and goes downstairs to meet her. Prissy says the Confederates are losing in Jonesboro, and she’s scared for Dilcey and Pork. Scarlett asks where Dr. Meade is. Prissy says he’s at the train depot tending the wounded soldiers coming in. The doctors yelled at her because they were so busy. Scarlett decides to go to the depot herself to get Dr. Meade and tells Prissy to stay with Melanie. If Prissy says anything about the fighting to Melanie, Scarlett will “sell her south.” She grabs a bonnet, and without pausing to look at her reflection, runs out.
Scarlett, in a moment of kind thoughtfulness, wants to make sure that Melanie doesn’t become even more stressed by learning about the fighting at Jonesboro. She threatens to “sell Prissy south” if she tells Melanie, meaning that she’ll sell Prissy to another enslaver and separate Prissy from her from her family. It’s unclear if this is a serious threat or not, but either way, Scarlett uses it to hurt Prissy and frighten her into compliance.
Themes
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By the time Scarlett gets downtown, she is panting in the heat. Downtown swarms with people. Carriages filled with wounded soldiers drive by, children cry on stoops, and men on horses gallop by. An enslaved man asks Scarlett why she hasn’t left Atlanta yet. She stops an officer who says General Hood lost the fight. The Confederates are evacuating Atlanta, leaving it to the Yankees. The officer rides off. Scarlett wonders where to go to escape the Yankees, but she can’t go anywhere when Melanie is about to have her baby.
Two calamities are happening at once: Melanie is having her baby and Scarlett needs to find Dr. Meade; meanwhile, the South has lost Atlanta and the Yankees are coming. War and personal life are colliding, sending Scarlett headfirst into total catastrophe—something she’s never experienced in her luxurious life.
Themes
Scarlett runs down a street full of ambulances, her feet beating the rhythm “the Yankees are coming!” Then she sees women and children rushing down the street carrying crates of food. Mrs. Elsing drives by, her carriage piled high with food. Scarlett hasn’t seen so much food in months. She decides that people must be grabbing as much food as they can from the commissary warehouses before the Yankees came. She keeps running.
Now that the Yankees have Atlanta, the Confederates are thinking about food. As soon as the Yankees get to Atlanta, they will take everything. So, everything is suddenly lawless. Even Mrs. Elsing, one of the “genteel dowagers” of Atlanta, is out for herself, grabbing as much food as she can.
Themes
Scarlett gets to the depot. She stops, horrified by the sight of thousands of wounded soldiers lying across the train tracks. Flies swarm over the bodies, which are so closely packed that there’s no place to step. Scarlett has seen wounded men in the hospital, but that was nothing compared to this. She braces herself and steps around the bodies, looking for Dr. Meade. Finally, Scarlett finds him. He’s happy to see her since they need help. But when Scarlett says she needs his help to deliver Melanie’s baby, Dr. Meade angrily says he can’t leave the soldiers for “a damned baby.” He tells her to find women to help. Scarlett reminds herself that Prissy knows about childbirth. But she’s afraid—this is the first time Scarlett has had to do anything on her own. She wishes Ellen were here.
Up until this point, the sight of wounded soldiers in the hospital hasn’t moved Scarlett, except to make her feel disgust. Now, the war seems horrifyingly real, and Scarlett can’t ignore the consequences of it. In comparison to Dr. Meade’s task tending to thousands of dying soldiers, Scarlett’s predicament seems insignificant. Dr. Meade also seems to consider the birth of a baby an annoyingly feminine concern in the midst of a very male concern: war, and its tragedies. Scarlett, as a woman, is on her own.
Themes
Scarlett arrives back at the house. She tells Wade, who’s crying, to go make mud pies in the yard. Once inside, Scarlett tells Prissy that the two of them will help birth Melanie’s baby. Prissy stammers, and says she knows nothing about childbirth. Scarlett shakes her and calls her a “black liar.” For the first time in her life, Scarlett strikes Prissy as hard as she can across the face. Melanie cries for Scarlett. Scarlett tries to remember everything Ellen and Mammy did when she was having Wade. Remembering a few things, she sends Prissy for supplies. Then she goes to tell Melanie that the doctor isn’t coming.
Scarlett is further deserted because even Prissy—her enslaved girl—doesn’t know anything about childbirth, and Scarlett has always been able to depend on her enslaved staff. She strikes an enslaved person for the first time in her life, suggesting that the war and her isolation have led her to violence. She is realizing, instant by instant, that she is alone and that she is the only person who can handle the situation at hand.
Themes
