If you’re not yet familiar with Margaret Mitchell—born on November 8, 1900, in Atlanta and died on August 16, 1949, in the same city—you’re surely no stranger to the work that made her famous around the world: the world-renowned novel Gone with the Wind. On the 64th anniversary of her passing, today, LEC takes a look back at this iconic figure from Georgia, a state you may have the chance to visit during your language study trip to the USA.
A legacy of the American Civil War
Margaret Mitchell was born into a Southern family. Affectionately nicknamed Peggy, the environment in which she grew up was conducive to awakening her calling as a writer. Lulled by tales of the Civil War told by former Confederates, she would draw inspiration from these stories for her masterpiece.
A language study trip to the U.S.: the origins of a cult classic
A stopover in Atlanta during your language study trip to the U.S. might be the perfect opportunity to familiarize yourself with the work of this woman who wrote her first novel at the age of 16— a work that was never published. Margaret Mitchell would go on to become a legend in literature, and later in cinema, thanks to Gone With the Wind, an epic novel published in 1936, recounting the thwarted romances of Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler, andAshley Wilkes and Melanie Hamilton. The book, which has achieved cult status, earned its author the Pulitzer Prize in 1937.