Steioliepnen Jibing s Dart Towers Quest. Apocalypse, and American Culture. Hear The swish of the blade And see the Rose Suspended in air Then falls And a muffled thud As soft red strikes Unyielding Earth The shrieks of Agony As life- blood spills And Remorse The wish to be shrieved of SIN. 303772 303772 *1* Scot McCann *** *** *** Introductory comments (Argument?) Stephen King is, in my view, a writer sadly neglected by serious scholars of American literature as a result of the widely held view that he is a purveyor of popular schlock horror; and because he is a very successful writer, is still alive, and has a stable family life, not to mention a highly irreverent, and sometimes joyously vulgar sense of humour it is the accepted premise that he hasn't really suffered for his art, and is therefore a poor writer. That such a premise should be so widely accepted is a mystery- Kurt Vonnegut has a similarly irreverent sense of humour, indulges in sci- fi 'schlock' as well as horror (probably to a greater extent than King), and gives no indication of suffering for his work, yet the man is regarded as a genius. Another widely held assumption (mainly adhered to by those who have never read King's work) is that King deals exclusively in supernatural horror, and does it on the technicolour 'gross- out' level. Unfortunately for King's critics, this is just not so: most of King's novels work on a decidedly plain, everyday level, providing a social critique on contemporary America. Most of the horrors King presents are everyday horrors, shining out against the drab background of day to day life, and proving most terrifying in their very commonness. His epic Apocalypse novel, The Stand, in which most of the world's human, horse, and dog population is wiped out by a 'superflu' developed by the US army is a powerful cry against the follies of the Cold war and post- Cold war fascination with weapons of mass destruction. The second half of the novel focuses on what we might call the outrage of the eternal human condition, the struggle between good and evil in the face of the loss of that essential religious impulse, and the urge toward order and authority that can initially create a Utopia, but eventually becomes a fresh dystopia as size increases. The Stand ends on a particularly pessimistic note, realising that all the survivors ever wish to do is recreate the antediluvian order and get back down to the business of slaughtering each other and producing VCR's as quickly as possible. The Dark To wer. the topic of this thesis, is a much more optimistic, though far more apocalyptic (appearing to be moving toward the ending, rather than the gloominess of a new beginning as in The Stand), narrative consisting so far of three books- The Gunslinger. The Drawing of the Three, and The Wastelands, with the fourth book to probably appear about two days alter I finish this. 11 There may be some doubts as to the feasibility or value of writing on a series that has not been completed yet. To dispel them I would say that there is sufficient scope to write twice as much as I have already on the first book alone, and in my defence I will point out that I will not be attempting to draw any grand conclusions, merely to outline some of the more intriguing philosophical and political aspects of what is a strangely compelling work. My only request is that you explore the themes King presents at first hand- and be open mindedly addicted. Chapter 1 : synopsis "The opening segment of [The Dark Tower] defines the epic quest to follow by introducing the Gunslinger, Roland, and his search for the man in black. A tale within a tale , "The Gunslinger” includes one of King’s most potent ",monstrous women",Sylvia Pittston, whose intrusion into the Gunslinger's life leads to the destruction of an entire town."1 ) The Dark Tower begins with the words " The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed." 2 , 3a phrase which, in (the gunslinger) Roland's mind, would amply sum up not only the action to follow, but also the reasons for it, and signals to the reader that questions of who, what, and why, will be answered in good time. For now it is enough to know that Roland is a gunslinger (although we don't learn his name until much later in the book, I use it here for convenience). The opening phase of The Gunslinger (Book One Of The Dark Tower) follows Roland through "the apotheosis of all deserts"J in pursuit of the enigmatic Man in Black. It is literally the cleansing wilderness period of a prophet4, for Roland follows on the path of the Adversary's henchman and his temptations, though no visions are presented until the end of the book. As he travels through the sterility of the desert Roland reflects periodically on the events of his journey so far, a process which fills in some of the more pressing blanks. Roland's first flash back concerns his last human contact, a night spent with a young hermit named Brown, in his shack on the edge of the desert. It is here that Roland is compelled to prove his worthiness to continue the quest by confessing the killing of the population of the desert- fringe town, Tull, to Brown. Tull is a metaphoric Sodom/Gomorrah, and as such Roland acts as the avenging angel of the Lord, yet he must present his confession to both cleanse Michael.R. Codings, The Annotated Guide to Stephen King. Starmont house, Mercer Island WA 1986, p34. 2 The Gunslinger, pll. 3 Ibid, pll. "There were several American Indian tribes that used to make 'having a vision' an integral part of their manhood rite. When it was your turn to become a man, you were supposed to go out into the wilderness unarmed. You were supposed to make a kill, and two songs- one about the Great Spirit and one about your own prowess as a hunter and a rider and a warrior and a fucker- and have that vision. ... gain strength and holiness by a purging process, ... The casting away of things is symbolic, ... Tahsmanic. ... When you cast away tilings, you're also casting away the self- related others that are symbolically related to those things. You start a cleaning out process. You begin to empty the vessel." Stephen King, The Stand. New English Library, London 1980 p653- This is not entirely accurate of what Roland does, but its close enough for government work... 2 himself for the next stage of the quest, and to prove himself to have been worthy of the destruction. When Brown invites Roland to confess, a second narrative frame is set up within that created by Roland’s memory. In Tull Roland becomes the lover of the girl/ bar owner, Allie, in exchange for information about the passage through Tull of the man in black. The bed of Allie has many overtones: it is a satanic temptation, a trap left by the man in black and an overt badge of Sodom ("You Know my price"f; an oasis for rest before the ritual of the desert; and a visage of youthful despair in the face of God's withdrawal west ("the gleam was replaced by hopelessness, by a dumb need that had no mouth. ")6. In the face of this last Roland becomes the harbinger of a greater hope- love, for at least a while; and the gift of death over the hopelessness of the spiritually undead Tull (a place so far beyond despair that it has become a spiritual vampire feeding on its own barren-ness), given in stark contrast to the mocking gift of life left by the Man in Black. As Allie speaks, we learn that the man in black performed a ressurection in the saloon, bringing back to life the town 'junkie', but mockingly leaving him addicted to the "devil- weed" (it is perhaps appropriate that he remain addicted to the devil weed, since he was resurrected by the Adversary; it is ironic that he believes "/ been touched by by God")7. Roland performs a double Exorcism on the town: the first is when he invades the body of Sylvia Pittston, the town 'preacher' ("The woman who preaches has poison religion")* pregnant to the Man in Black with a demon- child (Sylvia also believes the man in black to be divine- "You dare not touch the Bride of God")9, with his revolver and thus casts out the demon- gaining further information about his quarry as he does so. His second exorcism is the slaying of Sylvia and the rest of the townsfolk in an orgy of violence, with Allie and the infernally resurrected junkie, Nort, becoming sacrifices to the Lord. The final departure of God’s purpose from Tull is symbolised in the shooting of the crucifix carried by Sylvia Pittston, just before Roland kills her and thus casts the devil from Tull. "He ended up where he had started, in the middle of the deserted mam street. He had shot and killed thirty-nine men, fourteen women, andfive children. He had shot and killed everyone in Tull"'0. The Gunslinger. p30. Ibid., p30. Ibid., p39. ibid., p47. Ibid., p55. 10 Ibid., p63. 2 The narrative frame containing the confession to Brown ends with the gunslinger walking off into history, rather than riding into the sunset as is customary, for his mule is dead.