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Gone with the wind

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Gone with the Wind

Gone with the Wind Based on Margaret Mitchell’s famous best-selling novel, Gone with the Wind is a historical romance set in northern Georgia during the Civil War. The story traces the lives of Scarlett O'Hara, Rhett Butler, Ashley and Melanie Wilkes and the complex social and psychological factors that shape their aspirations, relationships and capacity for romantic fulfilment.

 

Articles on Gone with the wind

The relationship between Rhett and Scarlett is classic example of intense energy and turbulence, which never manages to become stable and harmonious. See Opposition Level 1 in Scale of Harmony. See the article and videos.

It also illustrates the problems inherent in a relationship based primarily on physical attraction. See Physical Attraction Level 2 in Scale of Romance. See the article and videos.

The quiet, idealized love between Ashley and Melanie is an exceptional example of Mental Love Level 7 in Scale of Romance. See the article and videos.

Their relationship also illustrates the highest level of harmony that can be achieved under the most challenging and impossible external circumstances. See Complementarity Level 10 in Scale of Romance See the article and videos.

Read more and ask questions about this movie in the Movie Forums.

 

Plot Summary

 Scarlett is a narcissistic plantation belle, the daughter of a French aristocratic mother and an Irish peasant immigrant who managed to acquire a large cotton plantation and a lovely cultured wife. Scarlett inherited her mother’s beauty and manners and her father’s raw energy and ambition. Beneath her polished exterior, she is dynamo of unruly impulses. Although her beauty and flirtatious behavior have enslaved almost every young man in the region, Scarlett longs to marry Ashley Wilkes, the educated son of a distinguished Southern family. Heartbroken when Ashley marries his cousin Melanie instead, Scarlett marries Melanie’s brother just to spite Ashley. When her husband is killed in the war, she marries a store owner for his money, but never abandons her hope of finally winning Ashley for herself.

Scarlett’s only real relationship is with Rhett Butler, the dashing young blockade runner who was disowned by his family and expelled from Charleston for dishonorable behavior. Rhett sees right through Scarlett’s façade of ladylike elegance and knows the ruthless, unscrupulous, wildcat which lies behind her pretty face. Attracted by her energy, strength, courage and beauty, he pursues her first to become his mistress and later his wife. Scarlett’s heart has always been after Ashley. She admires Rhett’s brute strength, his courage to defy society, his tall handsome appearance and his considerable wealth, but she never feels for him anything like true affection.

But the real love story in Gone with the Wind is not between these two selfish, self-centered characters whose passion torments and ultimately ruins the happiness of both. It is rather the quiet, idealized love between Ashley and Melanie Wilkes that depicts the true qualities and power of love to nurture, save and protect, even in times of extraordinary upheaval. Though Scarlett has set her heart on marrying the refined and cultured Ashley, he chooses instead his mild-mannered and frail cousin Melanie and marries her. Melanie lacks the captivating beauty, energy, vitality, and feminine wiles of Scarlett. But her gentle heart is made of pure goodness and possesses extraordinary power of goodwill that protects Ashley through the long years of fighting and imprisonment. But Scarlett and Rhett's turbulent and unfulfilling marriage is marred by constant quarrels.After the death of their young daughter, Rhett finally leaves her. Only then does she realize how much she needs and wants him. Through her sobs in the final scene, Scarlett begins to think of her home Tara, from which she has always gained strength, and determines that she will return there and will think of a way to get Rhett back.

 

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Gone with the Wind
Directed by Victor Fleming
Written by Margaret Mitchell (novel) & Sidney Howard (screenplay)
Starring Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara, Leslie Howard as Ashley Wilkes,
Olivia de Havilland as Melanie Hamilton, Clark Gable as Rhett Butler
Copyright belongs to Selznick International Pictures

 

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Level 10 Complementarity

Relationships at this level are characterized by ever-increasing joy of harmonious energies. Partners relate to each other through pure self-giving that expects nothing in return and knows there is greater joy in giving than in receiving. They recognize each other as the spiritual complement that fulfills and completes them.

The true basis for human harmonious relationship is not similarity or identity between partners. It is complementarity. Each of us is completed and stimulated to grow by contact with a person of complementary nature who sees, feels and responds differently than we do. Complementarity releases energy for self-discovery and growth. Instead of trying to wipe out or gloss over differences, discover the richness they contain.

Jane & Bingley (Pride & Prejudice)

Accepting another with all their imperfections results in a beautiful relationship. But not noting the imperfections at all ensures perfect and complete harmony. Jane Bennet and Charles Bingley in Pride and Prejudice achieve this level of harmony. From their first meeting, they are happy to be together. She is the most beautiful creature he ever beheld, he feels. He is just what a young man ought to be, she believes. As they get better acquainted with each other, they are convinced more and more of each other's perfection. They never argue or disagree. There is not a single aspect of each other's personality that they would like to change or improve. They do not gloss over each other's faults, ignore them, make excuses for them or forgive them. They simply do not see them. What looks to the rest of the world as Bingley's weakness is to Jane only his modesty. Jane's timidity and reticence make her more angelic to Bingley. This is not a result of infatuation that wears off with time or an illusion that vanishes giving way to reality. This IS reality. They refuse to see the defects out of an idealism of harmony. Rather than expecting perfection in each other and trying to find it, they discover the perfection that is already there.

Ashley & Melanie (Gone with the Wind)

Harmony is an inner state, not an outer condition. The highest level of harmonious relationship can be achieved in the most challenging and impossible external circumstances. It is our response that determines the level of harmony, not life. Wealthy plantation owner Ashley Wilkes married his cousin Melanie in Georgia just before the outbreak of the Civil War and lived to struggle against starvation and death during the darkest days of the Reconstruction that followed the defeat of the South. The hardships they underwent make their story one of the most dramatic and realistic depictions of the destruction and pain wrought by war. During the war Ashley was seriously wounded, captured by the Yankees and incarcerated in a camp of disease-ridden dying prisoners of war. Melanie saw their plantation destroyed and Atlanta burned. Despite her frail health, she nursed wounded soldiers and worked in the fields like a slave to keep herself and her friends alive. When Ashley finally returned from the war, they faced more years of physical hardship and spent the rest of their life together in a meager shack of house sharing what little they had with friends and family.

Yet in spite of the hardship and suffering, no one can recall ever hearing a word of complaint or resentment expressed by either against the other. They loved and cherished one another as though they were one person instead of two and never for a moment blamed their partner for any suffering or deficiency they had to undergo.

 

Jodhaa Bai and Emperor Akbar (Jodhaa Akbar)

Jodhaa Akbar is a sixteenth century love story about a political marriage of convenience that gave birth to true love between a great Mughal emperor, Akbar, and a Rajput princess, Jodhaa.

Jodhaa is forced to marry the Emperor Akbar to protect her father’s kingdom. Their relationship starts off with a lot of dislike and prejudices. Gradually as they started to live together, she came to feel an awe inspired by his bravery, his fair and just methods of ruling a vast empire, and his strong personality. At the same time, she was amazed by his kindness, goodness of character and respect for her. Akbar in turn was impressed by her beauty, poise and compassion towards others. He fell deeply in love with her but waited for her to reciprocate his love. He built a small temple for her inside her quarters and did not interfere in any of her activities. She learned his language, cooked for him in spite of being the Queen of Hindustan, and when he fell ill, she nursed him with true devotion. They fell deeply in love and their true union took place mentally and physically. They complemented one another and what started as a marriage for political and social obligation turned into a lifetime of eternal love and true devotion.

To raise your relationship to a higher level of harmony, see Strategies to Increase Harmony in Your Relationship

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Level 1 Opposition

Relationships at this level are characterized by shouting, mean accusations, deceit, and threats or actual acts of violence. Disharmony can increase in negative intensity until even an insignificant act, a casual word or glance triggers a chain of unpleasant reactions, acrimony or hostility.

Relationships become strained to the breaking point when partners exhibit offensive or mean behavior that intentionally or unintentionally hurts the other person. No positive relationship can ever be built by conscious meanness or intentionally inflicting pain, no matter how justified we may feel in 'hitting back'.

Partnerships at this level are caught in a destructive blame game in which the main objective is to find fault with the other person and put them down. All relationships are based on intensity. We feel intense about people who matter to us. No intense feelings arise when we are not closely related in feeling with the other person. The mother scolds her child who misbehaves, another's child doing the same does not elicit the same reaction. It is her concern for her child that comes out as scolding. Similarly, when a strong negative intensity is visible on the surface, it shows that there is a deeper attraction underneath. A couple living in the slums of Mumbai invariably quarreled every night after the husband returned from work. When the husband suddenly died of heart attack, a few days later his wife also died because she simply could not live without him. Attraction that expresses negatively can be converted into positive intensity. Indifference is the opposite of relationship. It is indifference that is more difficult to change. Disharmony on the surface is proof that there is scope for creating harmony.

Blaming one's partner for bad manners or offensive behavior never solves the problem. It only provides a very temporary satisfaction to the ego which inevitably prompts reaction and retribution. Putting another person down and gloating over one's success is a sure formula for a failed relationship. It takes two people to dance but only one to improve a relationship. Inevitably each partner blames the status quo on the other and expects the other to change first. That never happens. Relationships improve only when one of the partners resolves to take unilateral initiative and sticks to that resolution. The first thing necessary is for one of the partners to totally eliminate any and all expressions of meanness or spitefulness without expecting or demanding any change in the other partner. That effort is sure to bring about a substantial improvement in the relationship for as long as it is maintained. If it fails, it is only when the habit or urge to fall back overcomes the commitment to be positive.  

Many people enjoy the intensity that comes from complaining, quarreling and even from getting angry. As long as you enjoy it, it will continue and grow more intense. Others have a way of relating negatively to the very person they find most attractive to get their attention or assert their own value. If you are experiencing intense disharmony in your relationship, try to become conscious of the underlying attraction that expresses as negative intensity between you. Often anger is a disguise for feelings of not being loved, respected or appreciated.  Try to shift your attention from the sources of quarrel to the sources of attraction. Even when you feel most intensely negative, remind yourself it is only an inversion of a deeper positive attraction and need for one another. Negative intensity can be addictive because it makes us feel alive and it is easier to generate than positive intensity. Adopt at least one strategy for generating positive intensity in the relationship and work seriously to achieving it.

 

Scarlett & Rhett (Gone with the Wind)

Rhett and Scarlett are a classic example of a relationship based on intense energy and turbulence, which never manages to become stable and harmonious. The partners go through brief periods of pleasantness, interspersed with frequent quarrels and occasional violence. Both are high energy, head strong, selfish and opinionated people who look for fulfillment from relationship by taking rather than giving and end up frustrated, empty and disappointed. Scarlett is immature, impulsive, self-centered and totally selfish. That leaves no scope for harmony, let alone the romance she so passionately longs for.

Both harmony and romance require self-giving, accommodation and patience. Rhett tried to win the heart and possess the body of a woman he knows is in love with someone else by providing her the financial security and luxuries she longed for. Gifts and material security may satisfy a customer in a business relationship, but it is not enough to win the heart of an intimate partner. Scarlett thought merely of taking what suited her from the relationship and simply ignoring the rest as far as possible.

 

Mr. & Mrs. Smith

The degeneration of a marriage from harmony to violence and its remarkable recovery are humorously depicted in the spoof thriller Mr. and Mrs. Smith. After six years of polite and seemingly harmonious marriage, Jane and John Smith suddenly discover that they really do not know each other at all. Both feel betrayed when they find that their spouse has concealed fundamental truths about themselves. When distrust, suspicion and fear compound their difficulties, the relation lapses into violence and a seeking for vengeance, in spite of the fact that each is still intensely attracted to the other. Eventually they learn to accept and admire each other's true personalities and reunite more happily and genuinely than before. Though the story is pure fiction, the process and stages of relationship they undergo resemble the course of some relationships that drop to level 1 and then ultimately recover.

 

Serge & Josephine (Chocolat)

Serge and Josephine Muscat own a small tavern in a small town in rural France. He is uneducated, stupid and brutal. She has intelligence and refined taste but has been reduced to fearful submission by Serge's heavy-handed, authoritarian dominance and the conservative values of the society in which they live. When Serge drinks, he is likely to take out all his bitterness, frustration and disappointment in life on Josephine, occasionally even becoming violent. The arrival of a newcomer, the spirited, independent-minded  Vianne Rocher gives Josephine the strength and courage to stand up to her brute husband and cast off his oppressive domination. Soon Serge repents his violent, dominating behavior and promises to reform, but Josephine seems bent on freedom. Violence destroys not only harmony. It undermines the very foundation of trust and security that is the bedrock of human relationship.

To raise your relationship to a higher level of harmony, see Strategies to Increase Harmony in Your Relationship

If you would like to raise general questions on romance, love, marriage and relationship or about any of the content in this article, please post your entry in the appropriate forums

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Level 7 - Mental love

Real love is a pure and special vibration between people that differs from the intense longings and passions many describe by the word. It is difficult to sustain vital forms of love without strong positive encouragement from the other person, whereas mental love does not depend on reciprocity. The power of Mind arises from an organization of ideas. Mental love is based on an idealistic conception of what love is and a perception of idealized values in the other person. Mental love gives rise to unwavering loyalty. It involves a lasting commitment to the other person which does not depend on circumstances, personal contact or even the response of the other person. We can love another person as an individual only when we fully recognize and respect the ways they are unique and different from ourselves and value them for those differences rather than trying to change them or mold them into our ideal image. Mental love may lack the intense sensations of previous stages, but it brings a lightness, sweetness and refinement of feeling that is uplifting and more deeply fulfilling.

An Angelic Goodness (Gone with the Wind)

The relationship between Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara is glorified in the public imagination as the quintessence of romance. But the real love story in Gone with the Wind is not between these two selfish, self-centered characters whose passion torments and ultimately ruins the happiness of both. It is rather the quiet, idealized love between Ashley and Melanie Wilkes that depicts the true qualities and power of love to nurture, save and protect, even in times of extraordinary upheaval. Scarlett has set her heart on marrying the refined and cultured Ashley. But he chooses instead his mild-mannered and frail cousin Melanie and marries her just before the outbreak of the Civil War. Then he is called to serve in the Southern army and they are separated for the duration of the war.

 

Melanie lacks the captivating beauty, energy, vitality, and feminine wiles of Scarlett. But her gentle heart is made of pure goodness and possesses extraordinary power of goodwill that protects Ashley through the long years of fighting and imprisonment. She combines goodness and goodwill with a capacity for total self-giving to those she loves, which makes her one of the most remarkable women in life or literature. Incapable of a selfish act, she yearns only for the well-being and happiness of her husband, family and friends. Incapable of suspicion or recriminations against anyone, she loves Scarlett even though she knows of Scarlett’s secret yearning for her husband and on her death bed urges Scarlett to care for Ashley. The suffering and destruction wrought by Civil War leave little scope for pleasure or happiness of any description, but through it all Melanie’s unshakeable loyalty and commitment to those she loves creates a cocoon of sweetness and affection which nurtures and protects. Ashley is devastated by her death. Only after her passing, does Scarlett realize the immense power of her idealized love.

A Queen’s Love (First Knight)

Can a person truly love more than one person? In the movie First Knight, Lady Guinevere is torn between her deep, idealistic admiration for the good and noble King Arthur and her passionate emotional attraction to valiant Lancelot. Her love and loyalty to her husband King are juxtaposed to the yearning of her heart and body for the knight who has twice saved her life. Her love of Arthur is the mind’s idealism which cherishes all that is true and noble. Her love of Lancelot is yearning vital-emotional passion. Though very different in nature, Guinevere’s love and loyalty to Arthur are as real and compelling as her powerful physical and vital attraction to Lancelot. A human being is capable of loving more than one person, but few have the energy and intensity to maintain it. In this case, Arthur dies so she can live out her love with Lancelot.

Learn unfailing strategies to rise up the scale of romance in your relationship

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Level 2 - Physical Attraction

Most people are attracted to people who other people find most attractive and desirable, like the young woman who decided to abandon her interest in a boy she really liked because she knew her friends would never approve of the way he dresses. This is what exactly Lydia did. She is a lively and energetic girl, bold, aggressive and always smiling, exactly what you might expect of a precocious teenager experiencing the first thrill of adult social life and popularity. She wears the most fashionable dresses, has many friends and frequent invitations to parties and dances. She thinks about nothing but flirting, has no goals or responsibilities, no manners other than her liveliness and no formed values or character. She is self-centered, selfish and foolish.


Lydia & Wickham (Pride & Prejudice)

 

 

 

When Elizabeth’s youngest sister Lydia fell in love – if we can call it love – she was attracted to George Wickham, a tall, slim and dashing young military officer with a winning smile and charming manners, without knowing anything of his background, family, character, intentions or personal reputation as a gambler, womanizer and scoundrel. Lydia valued him for his handsome appearance and popularity with his fellow officers and with other women. He was the heart throb of all the girls whereever he went. He deceived people with his good looks and excellent manners. He was deeply in debt and seeking a rich bride to solve his financial problems. As soon as Lydia’s eyes fell on him she singled him out as an object to be attained at any cost. At a time when a woman’s reputation and marriagability depended on her chastity, she agreed to run away with him based on a vague promise of marriage in the future. For Wickham the only motive was a weekend fling that he would forget as soon as a more interesting and eligible partner came his way. Yet he was ultimately pressurized into marrying her in order to escape from public disgrace and financial ruin.

It is not surprising that a relationship founded on superficial interests, physical appearance and sexual attraction should prove a poor basis for lasting harmony and affection. Yet how often this is the case. Vibrant youthful energy imparts an enchanting flush of charm and beauty to many young people which quickly gives place to dull and unappealing plainness a few years later. The excitement, enthusiasm and adventurousness of carefree youth unburdened by responsibilities is easily mistaken for more positive, lasting endowments of personality. But the novelty of infatuation, especially physical allurement, is rarely lasting. At this level people value other people almost as if they are precious objects to be obtained and possessed. Under the pressures of work and family responsibilities, youthful enthusiasm readily gives way to frustration, friction, quarrels, anger, distrust, jealousy, suspicion and sometimes violence. If at all the relationship survives, it survives only on intensity without a stable or organized foundation for lasting success.

Physical attraction can be very intense, especially during the early stages of relationship, so intense that it is often mistaken for real love that will last forever. But over time the novelty of the experience tends to wear off. Sexual attraction by itself is not a sufficient basis for long term positive relationships. Physical attraction may form a natural positive part of any relationship, but relationships based primarily on physical attraction will be fulfilling only to those in whom the satisfaction of their sensations is the primary source of interest and enjoyment in life. Those who value family, career accomplishment, emotional commitment, education and higher ideals or values usually discover physical sensations an inadequate basis for lasting relationship. Lydia got what she aspired for and was the envy of her friends. But at what gain and what cost? Wickham’s attraction for her lasted only weeks and hers for him a few months. After that they each spent their lives searching for satisfaction outside their relationship.

Scarlett & Rhett (Gone with the Wind)

The turbulent relationship between Rhett Butler and Scarlet O’Hara depicts the problems inherent in a relationship based primarily on physical attraction. Scarlett is a narcissistic plantation belle, the daughter of a French aristocratic mother and an Irish peasant immigrant who managed to acquire a large cotton plantation and a lovely cultured wife. Scarlett inherited her mother’s beauty and manners and her father’s raw energy and ambition. Beneath her polished exterior, she is a dynamo of unruly impulses. Although her beauty and flirtatious behavior have enslaved almost every young man in the region, Scarlett longs to marry Ashley Wilkes, the educated son of a distinguished Southern family. Heartbroken when Ashley marries his cousin Melanie instead, Scarlett marries Melanie’s brother just to spite Ashley. When her husband is killed in the war, she marries a store owner for his money, but never abandons her hope of finally winning Ashley for herself.

Scarlett’s only real relationship is with Rhett Butler, the dashing young blockade runner who was disowned by his family and expelled from Charleston for dishonorable behavior. Rhett sees right through Scarlett’s façade of ladylike elegance and knows the ruthless, unscrupulous, wildcat which lies behind her pretty face. Attracted by her energy, strength, courage and beauty, he pursues her first to become his mistress and later his wife. Scarlett’s heart has always been after Ashley. She admires Rhett’s brute strength, his courage to defy society, his tall handsome appearance and his considerable wealth, but she never feels for him anything like true affection. Their turbulent and unfulfilling marriage is marred by constant quarrels. After the death of their young daughter, Rhett finally leaves her. Only then does she realize how much she needs and wants him. Their failed partnership founded on sexual energy, physical strength, the desire to control and dominate shows the inherent instability and potential destructiveness of negative relationship at this level.

Avery’s response to adversity (Jerry Maguire)

Relationships based on physical and sexual attraction often end in anger, violent upheaval and bitterness. Jerry Maguire is a high flying sports agent engaged to a very attractive, sexy hard driving business woman, Avery Bishop. When in a moment of idealism Jerry speaks out against the hypocritical policies of his firm and loses his job, he comes to Avery looking for understanding and support. Instead, she bluntly tells him his act was stupid and foolish and refuses to offer a drop of sympathy. Avery’s response was not just based on her own nasty personality. It exposed the fact that their relationship was based on only one thing – pleasure. Jerry was a good looking object to possess and enjoy. When the fun ended, she expressed her scorn. As soon as the pleasure ended, the relationship ended as well. When Jerry responded to her caustic abuse by telling her the relationship was over, she was hurt and angry, not because she would miss him, but because to be jilted was an insult to her ego. To her relationship is only a way to take. It has nothing to do with giving.

Woman Hunter

The guy who tried to hire a consultant to help him sleep with a woman he was attracted to in Hitch may have succeeded in his immediate conquest but did not fare any better in relationships than Wickham.

 

Rob & Laura (High Fidelity)

Progress upward from level 2 begins with the realization that in order to be fulfilling, human relationship must be based on something more than physical satisfaction. High Fidelity depicts a man who has explored all the possibilities of level 2 relationships and discovered them to be unstable, unsatisfactory and empty. His lifetime pursuit of the perfect physical relationship is an example of how the high ideal of romance is perverted into a shallow, selfish fantasy – a good example of everything that real romance is not.

Rob’s frank introspection leads him to recognize the emptiness of his sexual pursuits and to yearn for a more lasting, meaningful and fulfilling relationship with Laura.

Marianne & Willoughby (Sense & Sensibility)

Mr. Dashwood dies leaving his wife and three daughters with no home and little means to support themselves. His second daughter, Marianne, is excitable, passionate, romantic and driven by intense emotions. When she is caught in a storm with an injured leg, she is rescued by the dashing young Mr. Willoughby who happened to be passing by and carries her safely home. Marianne is charmed and swept off her feet by his physical appearance and gallant manners. Willoughby courts her and leads her to believe he is deeply in love.

She is overcome by intense passion for the man, which she expresses quite openly. After initial encouragement, Willoughby disappears from her life and refuses to answer her letters. She is heartbroken. She later learns that when his aunt threatened to disinherit him, he agreed to marry a wealthy heiress, Ms. Grey. She also discovers that he has ruined the reputation of a young woman by refusing to acknowledge their illegitimate child as his own.

Marianne experiences all the grief of a sensual attraction based on nothing more substantial than physical appearance and external behavior. She discovers that a lover's character, capacity for real affection and personal values are a far truer and more lasting basis for successful relationship than external appearances.

Alex & Claire (The Mirror has two faces)

Claire is the beautiful and vain younger daughter of a vain and aging mother who always considered physical beauty her greatest asset and is now plagued by the scars of middle age. Like her mother, Claire values her beauty above all else and has used it to snare handsome, gallant Alex into a marriage. Once having caught him and won his admiration, Claire can derive no further gratification for her vanity from the marriage, so she immediately starts pursuing younger men to reinforce her sense of being attractive. Mistaking physical attraction for love, the more affection Alex expresses, the less satisfied Claire becomes. She needs the excitement of fresh conquests to prove her worth. Finally she leaves Alex for someone else, who surely will not be the last in a series of failed relationships based on physical attraction.

David Larrabee(Sabrina)

The contrast between physical attraction and emotional love is beautifully portrayed in the love affair of two brothers with the chaffeur’s daughter. David is the handsome, playboy younger son of the fabulously wealthy Larrabee family of Long Island, owners of a multi-billion dollar business empire established by David’s father and expanded by his brother Linus and his mother. With great good looks, money to burn and all the leisure time in the world, David gallivants through New England’s high society courting, dating and sleeping with every attractive young debutante within his reach, with a long line waiting in the wings to become his next fling. After years of free-wheeling, David finally meets a beautiful physician, Elizabeth Tyson, who it the first woman he feels more than a passing physical attraction for. He has no idea that she is also an heiress, daughter of the man who is negotiating a multi-billion dollar merger with Linus. Finally on her urging, he proposes marriage and their engagement is announced. A few days later, the Larrabee chaffeur’s daughter, Sabrina, returns from Paris a full grown, gorgeous woman. A year abroad has not only helped Sabrina blossom, but also helped her outgrow the childhood crush she felt for David. But what she has outgrown, David suddenly acquires. Unable even to recognize her as the clumsy teenager who climbed trees on the Larrabee estate, David feels powerfully attracted to her and is ready to call off his engagement with Elizabeth so he can pursue Sabrina, even if it means scotching the Tyson deal for his family. At the last moment, David discovers that his workaholic, level-headed brother Linus is actually so much in love with Sabrina that he too is ready to scotch the deal in order to see Sabrina happy. After trying so hard to keep David and Sabrina apart, now Linus wants to send David to Paris to be with her. Although he finds her ravishingly attractive, David is able to see that Linus is more deeply and truly in love with Sabrina than he could ever be. In a rare moment of self-awareness and sincerity, he dispatches Linus to Paris, agrees to marry Elizabeth and takes over negotiations on the merger.

Learn unfailing strategies to rise up the scale of romance in your relationship

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