The Wind Done Gone
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Randall, Alice. The Wind Done Gone. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.
The diary of Cynara, half-sister of "Other" (who, except for the insistence of the estate of Margaret Mitchell, could be called "Scarlett O'Hara"). Everything you think you know about the world of Gone with the Wind is inverted: straight characters turn out to be gay, white to be black, love affairs to be hiding more secret loves.
A fascinating novel that imagines a positive and powerful future for the blacks of Tara, even after the disappointments of Reconstruction.
The Wind Done Gone became embroiled in one of the more bitterly contested intellectual-property struggles of the turn of the 21st century. The ensuing controversy has somewhat detracted from the novel's considerable strengths as parody and rebuttal of the dominant presence of Gone with the Wind.
Links
- John Sitter on the Wind Done Gone trial
- An interview with Alice Randall