Gone With the Wind Since its publication, Gone with the wind has been regarded as a popular novel which shows women’s constant striving for independent. However, in my view, the novel is certifying the development of the South in American by the way of a women’s independent process. The writer of the novel, Margaret Michel was born in Atlanta, and she grew up listening to stories about Atlanta during the civil war, so this romantic story was based on the civil war background which she knew so well. The protagonist of Gone with the wind, Scarlett O’Hara, who is sharing many characteristics with Mitchell herself. In this novel, Scarlett is a beautiful Georgia woman with dark hair and green eyes who struggles though the hardship of the civil war and Reconstruction. She possesses more of her father’s hard-headedness than her mother’s refined Southern manners. Though initially she tried to behave well, her instincts defy social restrictions. She determined to achieve everything, sometimes used odd effects to excite the admiration of young boy in her neighborhood. Later, she determined to survive when threaded by starvation and even death, then she really survived by picking cotton ,running her plantation business even so killing people. Analyzed the whole story, almost all of Scarlett’s important subsequent decisions are owing to Ashley’s rejection her and marriage to Melanie Hamilton. She confused by love in half of her life and makes many mistakes. Finally, she found that Ashley wasn’t her true love; until losing her daughter and Rhett did she realized the importance of them. Thought Scarlett has remarkable talent for business and leadership, and very strong, never bows to life. She rebuilt her father’s plantation and success to running her sawmill, she almost unable to understand the motivation and feelings of herself, it’s precisely reflects that the development of South in the change from spoiled teenager to hard working window to rich opportunist for Scarlett. Rhett who is one of the representative characters in this novel also reflects the development of South. He has a good family background, but not proud of it. He has a sharp eye, has a clever mind, he can quickly find own goodwill in troubled times. He is bravery path, persistent, and wit resolute. All of them symbolize the combination of old and new South.