Margaret Mitchell and the Curse of A Canterbury Tale

I once derailed a train by taking the Powell and Pressburger film A Canterbury Tale lightly.

I've no evidence that Margaret Mitchell, the author of Gone With the Wind, was similarly flippant about it. But ir remains a fact that she died after being knocked down by a drunk driver when she was on the way to see it.

On the latest episode of the podcast American History Hit, Sarah Churchwell talks about the way Gone With the Wind whitewashes the horrors of slavery, while condemning those who abolished it. 

And, she says, it's not alone. This is something that has happened in popular culture and the media since the civil war and continues today.