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Character analysis

Scarlett O'Hara

in Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

Scarlett O'Hara is the captivating and determined protagonist of Gone With the Wind, whose journey charts a dramatic shift from a pampered plantation belle to a fierce survivor. At the start of the novel, she effortlessly rules over Tara's barbecues, with her charm and vanity concealing a steely determination. However, the Civil War shatters her world: she witnesses Tara engulfed in flames, buries her mother, cares for her ailing father, and famously digs up a radish from the red Georgia soil, vowing never to experience hunger again. This vow shapes her journey — survival at any moral cost.

Scarlett's key flaw is self-deception. She convinces herself that she loves Ashley Wilkes for most of the novel, using this fantasy as emotional armor while consistently overlooking the genuine passion that Rhett Butler offers her. She marries twice for financial stability — first, out of spite to Charles Hamilton, and then through calculated deceit against her own sister with Frank Kennedy — before ultimately marrying Rhett. Each marriage exposes her transactional approach to relationships and her unwillingness to be vulnerable.

Her business savvy, demonstrated through her efforts to rebuild Tara and manage the lumber mill, positions her as a proto-modern woman in a society that punishes female ambition. Yet her emotional blindness leads to her downfall: Bonnie Blue's death fractures Rhett's devotion, and by the time Scarlett realizes she loves him, he delivers his heartbreaking farewell. She retreats to Tara, determined to "think about it tomorrow" — resilient and unbroken, yet profoundly alone.

About this character

Form
Novel
Author
Margaret Mitchell
First published
1936

The person01–03

01·Who they are

Who is Scarlett O'Hara?

Scarlett O'Hara is introduced on the first page of Gone with the Wind as a girl of sixteen who is "not beautiful," yet who bends men to her will through sheer force of personality. Daughter of the Irish immigrant Gerald O'Hara and the aristocratic Ellen Robillard, she inherits contradictory bloodlines: her father's passionate, land-hungry stubbornness and her mother's surface elegance. At Tara's barbecues she is queen—flirtatious, vain, strategically charming—but Mitchell signals from the outset that the prettiness is a shell around something far harder. Her green eyes, repeatedly described as "pale" and "cold" even in laughter, are the novel's earliest hint that Scarlett's inner life does not match her social performance. She is not a villain, not a conventional heroine, but something Mitchell deliberately refuses to resolve: a woman whose tremendous capacities—courage, commercial intelligence, physical endurance—are perpetually at war with her emotional immaturity and talent for self-deception.

02·Arc & motivation

What is Scarlett O'Hara's arc and motivation?

Scarlett's arc moves through three broad phases. In the antebellum South, she is defined almost entirely by want: she wants Ashley Wilkes, wants admiration, wants the next dance. The Civil War collapses that world and replaces want with need, a far more dangerous engine. Her vow in the scorched Tara fields—kneeling over a withered radish and swearing never to be hungry again—transforms her from a girl who pursues pleasure into a woman who pursues survival at any moral cost. This vow is her true north for the rest of the novel.

The second phase, Reconstruction, shows Scarlett weaponising every social skill she once used for vanity: charm becomes manipulation, flirtation becomes transaction. She marries Charles Hamilton out of spite, Frank Kennedy out of financial desperation, and enters both unions with eyes open and heart closed. Her goal throughout is always the same: keep Tara, stay fed, stay solvent.

The third phase—her marriage to Rhett—ought to be her arrival but instead becomes her undoing. Her motivation never genuinely shifts; she remains fixated on Ashley and on security, mistaking Rhett's love for a resource rather than recognising it as the relationship she actually needs. Only when Rhett delivers his farewell does her motivation finally clarify, but by then the clarity comes too late. She retreats to Tara, promising herself she will "think of some way to get him back" tomorrow—resilient, unbroken, and entirely alone.

03·Key moments

What are Scarlett O'Hara's key moments?

The Twelve Oaks barbecue (Part One): Scarlett's private declaration to Ashley and his gentle rejection set every subsequent plot mechanism in motion. Her impulsive proposal, his refusal, and the overheard exchange with Rhett establish the triangle that will define two decades of her life.

The radish vow (Part Two, Chapter 25): Standing in the red Georgia dirt, Scarlett raises the limp vegetable and swears on her life she will never be hungry again. It is the novel's emotional fulcrum—the moment survival displaces feeling as her primary mode.

Delivering Melanie's baby (Part Two): Prissy's lie—"I don't know nothin' 'bout birthin' babies"—forces Scarlett to act alone during the fall of Atlanta. She does, coolly and competently. The scene defines her capacity for action under catastrophic pressure.

Shooting the Yankee deserter (Part Three): Scarlett fires point-blank at a soldier ransacking Tara, then rifles his saddlebags without flinching. It is perhaps the starkest demonstration that her pre-war self has been entirely replaced.

Melanie's deathbed (Part Four): As Melanie dies, Scarlett realises simultaneously that she loves Melanie, that Ashley is nothing without her, and that it is Rhett she truly needs. Three illusions collapse in a single scene—and she arrives home to find Rhett already gone.

The cast04–05

04·Relationships

What are Scarlett O'Hara's most important relationships?

Rhett Butler functions as Scarlett's mirror and her missed education. He identifies her clearly from their first meeting at Twelve Oaks, loving her ruthlessness while refusing to be destroyed by it—until he is. Their marriage in Part Four is the novel's sustained irony: the only man who has ever truly seen her is the one she consistently looks past. His exit, and the famous "frankly, my dear" farewell, is the consequence not of his cruelty but of her prolonged refusal to see what was in front of her.

Ashley Wilkes is less a person in Scarlett's life than a projection. She loves the idea of Ashley—gentle, bookish, Old South—precisely because it is safe and unattainable. His late confession that he always knew she was stronger than him is the moment the projection finally fails; she has been clinging to a man who was quietly in awe and afraid of her.

Melanie Hamilton Wilkes is the novel's most sophisticated relationship precisely because Scarlett misreads it longest. Melanie defends Scarlett's honour publicly, accepts her into Tara's wartime household, and never withdraws loyalty despite every reason to do so. Scarlett interprets this as naivety; it is, in fact, the purest form of love she encounters in the entire novel. She recognises this only when it is irreversibly over.

Ellen O'Hara functions as an absent moral standard. Ellen dies of typhoid offstage, and Scarlett cannot even reach her in time—a loss that dramatises how completely the war has severed Scarlett from the world that shaped her. Ellen's composure, charity, and self-sacrifice are the precise qualities Scarlett must abandon to survive, and the gap between them is Mitchell's sharpest comment on what Reconstruction costs its women.

Gerald O'Hara gives Scarlett her ideology ("land is the only thing that matters") but cannot model the strength to enact it once the war breaks him. Scarlett must step into his patriarchal role—managing Tara, commanding the family, making the decisions—while he retreats into senility. The reversal accelerates her hardness and deepens her isolation.

Mammy is the only figure whose rebukes Scarlett accepts without deflection, making Mammy the novel's functional moral conscience. Where Scarlett manipulates, dismisses, or outmanoeuvres every other critic, she submits to Mammy's fussing. This asymmetry reveals that somewhere beneath the armour Scarlett retains a need for genuine, unsentimental intimacy—she simply cannot access it with the people who matter most.

05·Connected characters

How is Scarlett O'Hara connected to the other characters?

Rhett Butler

Rhett is Scarlett's great romantic foil and eventual husband.

Full commentary

Rhett is Scarlett's great romantic foil and eventual husband. He sees through her pretenses from their first meeting at Twelve Oaks, loves her precisely because of — and despite — her ruthlessness, and funds her survival after the war. Their marriage is passionate but corrosive; Scarlett's obsession with Ashley and Rhett's growing disillusionment culminate in his famous exit. She realizes she loves him only after he is gone.

Ashley Wilkes

Ashley is the idealized, unattainable object of Scarlett's self-deception. She interprets his gentle rejections as hidden love and clings to the fantasy for decades. In reality, Ashley is too weak for her world; his honest confession near the novel's end — that he always knew she was stronger than him — forces Scarlett to begin dismantling her illusion.

Melanie Hamilton Wilkes

Melanie is Scarlett's unwitting rival and, paradoxically, her most steadfast defender. Scarlett resents Melanie for marrying Ashley, yet Melanie's unconditional loyalty — defending Scarlett's honor publicly, standing by her through scandal — forms a bond Scarlett only fully appreciates at Melanie's deathbed, when she recognizes she has lost her one true ally.

Ellen O'Hara

Ellen, Scarlett's mother, represents the gracious, self-sacrificing ideal of Southern womanhood that Scarlett can never replicate. Ellen's death from typhoid during the war removes Scarlett's moral compass and forces her into full independence, but Ellen's memory haunts her as a standard she simultaneously reveres and abandons.

Gerald O'Hara

Gerald instills in Scarlett her fierce love of Tara and the land — 'Land is the only thing that matters' — which becomes her survival creed. After the war he is mentally broken, and Scarlett must assume his patriarchal role, reversing their relationship and deepening her hardness.

Mammy

Mammy is Scarlett's lifelong moral conscience and most intimate witness. She scolds, fusses, and loves Scarlett with unsentimental honesty, and Scarlett — uniquely — accepts Mammy's rebukes where she deflects everyone else's. Mammy's grief over Bonnie Blue and her quiet judgment of Scarlett's choices function as the novel's moral counterweight.

Charles Hamilton

Scarlett marries Charles impulsively to wound Ashley after his engagement to Melanie is announced. Charles dies of measles and pneumonia in camp, leaving Scarlett a wealthy, bored widow — a status she exploits throughout the war years. She feels little grief and much resentment at the social constraints widowhood imposes.

Frank Kennedy

Scarlett steals Frank from her sister Suellen by lying about Suellen's feelings, marrying him to save Tara from tax seizure. She then commandeers his business interests and pushes him into the fatal Ku Klux Klan raid. His death is partly her doing, and she registers only brief guilt before moving on to Rhett.

Bonnie Blue Butler

Bonnie, Scarlett and Rhett's daughter, is the one child Scarlett genuinely loves without calculation. Bonnie's death in a riding accident — mirroring Scarlett's own reckless spirit — destroys the last fragile bond between Scarlett and Rhett, as each blames the other in their grief.

India Wilkes

India is Scarlett's persistent social enemy, correctly reading Scarlett's designs on Ashley and spreading the scandal of her embrace with him in the lumber mill. India's hostility represents the Old South's judgment of Scarlett's transgressive ambition and lack of feminine decorum.

Prissy

Prissy's infamous lie — 'I don't know nothin' 'bout birthin' babies' — forces Scarlett to deliver Melanie's child alone during the fall of Atlanta, one of the novel's most pivotal scenes. The moment crystallizes Scarlett's capacity to act decisively under crisis, even as it reveals the limits of those she depends on.

Suellen O'Hara

Suellen is Scarlett's younger sister and a recurring victim of her ruthlessness — most pointedly when Scarlett steals Frank Kennedy from her. Their relationship is defined by rivalry and resentment, with Suellen representing the self-pity Scarlett refuses to indulge in herself.

Belle Watling

Belle, Rhett's former mistress, occupies a parallel social-outcast position to Scarlett's own increasingly tarnished reputation. Belle's loyalty to Rhett and her quiet dignity offer an ironic contrast: the 'disreputable' woman behaves with more consistency and generosity than the socially ambitious Scarlett.

Will Benteen

Will is the steady, practical Confederate veteran who becomes Tara's backbone after the war, eventually marrying Suellen. He represents the quiet competence Scarlett relies on but never fully credits, and his presence allows her to pursue Atlanta ambitions without Tara collapsing behind her.

The evidence06

06·Key quotes

What are Scarlett O'Hara’s most famous quotes?

“I'll think of it all tomorrow, at Tara. I can stand it then. Tomorrow, I'll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another day.”

Scarlett O'Hara · Final chapter (Chapter 63) · Scarlett's interior monologue after Rhett Butler leaves her

Why it matters

These are the closing lines of Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind (1936), spoken by Scarlett O'Hara after Rhett Butler leaves her, delivering his heart-wrenching farewell. Heartbroken but unwilling to give in, Scarlett turns to her familiar coping mechanism: deferral. By calling upon Tara—her family plantation that represents her deepest identity and strength—she anchors herself in the land that has always helped her regain her power. This line captures one of the novel's key themes: survival through a blend of optimistic denial and self-deception. Scarlett's tendency to avoid confronting pain in the moment has led to both her biggest successes (rebuilding Tara, regaining wealth during Reconstruction) and her most significant failures (overlooking the emotional needs of her loved ones). The phrase "tomorrow is another day" carries both hope and sadness—it reflects her unbreakable spirit while also highlighting the ongoing avoidance that cost her Rhett. This ties together the novel's exploration of the Old South's decline and one woman's fierce, flawed resolve to persevere, making it one of the most memorable closing lines in American literature.

“She was never able to recall anything except that she was very tired and that she wanted to go home.”

Narrator (focalized through Scarlett O'Hara) · Chapter 23 · Scarlett's escape from burning Atlanta and journey back to Tara

Why it matters

This line is from Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind (1936) and captures Scarlett O'Hara's mental and emotional state right after the fall of Atlanta and her harrowing escape through burning, war-torn roads back to Tara. Scarlett has just gone through the challenges of Melanie's difficult childbirth, the chaos of a city in flames, and the terrifying flight through both Confederate and Union lines — all while taking care of Melanie, the newborn, Prissy, and herself. Mitchell intentionally blurs Scarlett's memory of these events, illustrating the psychological dissociation that extreme trauma can cause. Thematically, this passage is crucial: it highlights Scarlett's defining trait — her fierce, almost instinctual attachment to Tara as home, safety, and her sense of self. For Scarlett, "home" is more than just a location; it represents her will to survive. The line also hints at her famous vow to never go hungry again, linking her resilience directly to the land. The simplicity of the language — with exhaustion distilled into a single, childlike yearning — makes this moment quietly heartbreaking amid the novel's grand narrative.

“After all, tomorrow is another day.”

Scarlett O'Hara · Final chapter (Chapter 63) · Scarlett alone at Tara after Rhett Butler leaves her

Why it matters

This famous closing line is delivered by Scarlett O'Hara, the novel's resilient protagonist, at the conclusion of Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind (1936). After being abandoned by Rhett Butler — the man she truly needed — and finally realizing her love for him, Scarlett finds herself completely alone at Tara, her family's plantation. Instead of succumbing to despair, she relies on her lifelong survival tactic: stubborn optimism and a conscious avoidance of her current pain. This line captures her defining trait — an almost reckless determination not to be defeated by her circumstances. Thematically, it highlights the novel's core conflict between loss and resilience. The antebellum South has been devastated, her marriages have fallen apart, and her illusions about Ashley Wilkes have been shattered, yet Scarlett refuses to acknowledge an end. The quote also carries an ironic undertone: her constant postponement of emotional reckoning is exactly what cost her Rhett. It stands as one of the most frequently quoted closing lines in American fiction, representing both the strength and the tragic blind spot of the ultimate survivor.

Study07–08

07·Questions

Questions readers ask about Scarlett O'Hara

Does Scarlett O'Hara actually love Ashley Wilkes, or is it just an obsession?

Scarlett's feelings for Ashley reveal self-deception rather than genuine love; she fixates on him as a safe, idealized fantasy instead of confronting his true nature. This is made clear when Ashley admits near the novel's end that he recognized Scarlett's strength, indicating he was never the equal she perceived. The illusion shatters at Melanie's deathbed, prompting Scarlett to realize she loves Melanie, that Ashley is dependent on her, and that it is Rhett she truly desires.

Why does Scarlett O'Hara marry Frank Kennedy instead of finding another way to save Tara?

Scarlett marries Frank Kennedy out of necessity for three hundred dollars to pay Tara's tax debt, viewing marriage as the quickest transaction. She lies about her sister Suellen's feelings and manipulates her family to secure the marriage. This act exemplifies Scarlett's survival-at-any-cost mentality — the same ruthlessness that saves Tara also undermines her sister's engagement and ultimately leads to Frank's demise during a Ku Klux Klan raid.

What is Scarlett O'Hara's most famous line?

Scarlett's most famous line concludes the entire novel: "I'll think of it all tomorrow, at Tara. I can stand it then. Tomorrow, I'll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another day" (Chapter 63). This line embodies themes of resilience and tragic inertia — while Scarlett remains unbroken, her response to loss is to postpone confronting painful truths, a pattern she consistently follows.

How does Scarlett O'Hara's relationship with Rhett Butler end?

Rhett departs from Scarlett after enduring years of emotional neglect, delivering his sorrowful farewell just as she comes to terms with her love for him. His departure stems from her persistent inability to see him truthfully — her fixation on Ashley and transactional view of their marriage gradually diminish his commitment, and Bonnie Blue's death severs the last bond between them. Scarlett retreats to Tara, promising to devise a plan to win him back, but the story concludes without reconciliation.

What is the significance of Scarlett O'Hara's radish vow?

The radish vow marks a pivotal emotional moment in the narrative: kneeling in the charred Tara fields, Scarlett lifts a dying radish from the Georgia soil and vows never to be hungry again, regardless of the moral implications. This moment signifies the shift where survival becomes Scarlett's primary motivation over emotional concerns. Every subsequent strategic marriage, business decision, and ruthless act can be traced back to this vow, transforming her from a spoiled belle into a proto-modern survivor.

What is Scarlett O'Hara's relationship with Melanie Wilkes really like?

Scarlett and Melanie's relationship represents the novel's most intricate dynamic, as Scarlett consistently misinterprets it. Though she feels resentment toward Melanie for marrying Ashley, Melanie publicly defends Scarlett's honor and remains loyal despite provocation — a devotion Scarlett misreads as naivety. Only at Melanie's deathbed does Scarlett realize that Melanie was her true ally and the purest love she experienced in the entire novel, albeit a realization that comes too late to effect change.

How does Gerald O'Hara influence Scarlett O'Hara's values?

Gerald instills in Scarlett the belief that land is paramount, shaping her survival mindset during the war and Reconstruction. He also imparts his stubborn, land-driven passion, a trait that fuels her perseverance amid chaos. However, after the war, Gerald's mental decline forces Scarlett to assume his patriarchal position at Tara; this shift accelerates her emotional toughening and deepens her separation from the nurturing world her mother Ellen represented.

Is Scarlett O'Hara a villain?

Scarlett is not portrayed as a villain, yet Mitchell intentionally avoids portraying her as a conventional heroine. Her remarkable traits — bravery, business acumen, physical resilience — often clash with her emotional immaturity and inclination toward self-deception. She engages in morally questionable actions, such as stealing a sister's fiancé and manipulating men for gain, contributing to Frank Kennedy's death. Yet, she also displays acts of bravery, rebuilds Tara, and loves Bonnie Blue sincerely. Mitchell illustrates her as a morally complex survivor, not easily categorized as good or evil.

08·Essay angles

Use this in your essay

Tool · Essay angles

  • Survival as moral corrosion: Argue that Mitchell presents Scarlett's vow in the radish scene as the moment her capacity for ethical reasoning is subordinated to survival instinct, tracing the progressive moral costs (the marriages to Charles, Frank, and her treatment of Suellen) as evidence of a woman who mistakes endurance for virtue.

  • Self-deception as structural device: Examine how Scarlett's sustained delusion about Ashley organises the novel's dramatic irony. Why does Mitchell sustain the illusion so long, and what does its collapse—arriving simultaneously with Melanie's death—argue about the relationship between fantasy and grief?

  • Gender and transgression: Scarlett's management of the lumber mill, her negotiation with Rhett for business capital, and her willingness to exploit the Ku Klux Klan raid's aftermath for remarriage position her as a proto-modern businesswoman in a society that punishes female ambition through figures like India Wilkes. Analyse Mitchell's ambivalence: does the novel celebrate or punish Scarlett's transgression of gender norms?

  • The land as character: Gerald's maxim—"land is the only thing that matters"—becomes Scarlett's religion. Explore how Tara functions not merely as setting but as Scarlett's psychological anchor, examining what it means that her solution to every crisis (Rhett's departure, Frank's death, financial ruin) is to *return home*.

  • Resilience versus growth: Scarlett's closing line—"tomorrow is another day"—has been read as triumphant and as tragic. Build a thesis around whether the novel frames her refusal to collapse as genuine strength or as an inability to learn, using her unchanged relationship to vulnerability across all four parts as evidence.

Gone with the Wind

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