Gone with the Wind Quotes
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Source: Gone with the Wind
Speaker: Prissy
I don't know nothin' 'bout birthin' babies.
Context
This line is spoken by Prissy (played by Butterfly McQueen) in the movie Gone with the Wind, directed by Victor Fleming (1939).
Always a contender on the greatest movies of all time list, Gone With the Wind shows us the Civil War and Reconstruction through the eyes of Scarlett O'Hara, a spoiled Southern bell caught between two sexy, southern men. This famous quote comes when Scarlett presses her slave Prissy to help deliver the baby of Melanie—the wife of Ashley, the man Scarlett thinks she loves. Sound like a soap opera? Well… yes, it does. What's wrong with that?
Here's a clip with this quote and more. You just might learn something.
Where you've heard it
You can find this quote spoofed in such classic films as Escape From It's a Wonderful Life. (JK—that is not a classic.) The quote also gets spoofed on the Pound Puppies, which no one remembers except the people who were kids in the '80s. One of our favorite general Gone with Wind references was on True Blood, when Tara, who is black, joked that her neglectful mom probably named her after Scarlett's slave plantation of the same name.
Pretentious Factor
If you were to drop this quote at a dinner party, would you get an in-unison "awww" or would everyone roll their eyes and never invite you back? Here it is, on a scale of 1-10.
It's not all that pretentious to do a Prissy impression, but it might be a little racist.