The Design

Okay, now that I've introduced myself, let me explain what's going on here, on this blog.

The title and theme floating around this is from the seventh book of Stephen King's Dark Tower series. The picture underneath the title is actually from his short story "The Little Sisters of Eluria", and the picture in the sidebar is from The Wastelands, the third book in the series. The title above that particular picture is a line from "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" by Robert Browning - although the poem doesn't mention roses at all, that is what King's tower is in the midst of - a gigantic field of roses. Near the end of the seventh book, King explains exactly what these roses are and do.

I suppose the seventh book appeals to me so much because it draws together all the elements that have built up over the six previous books, as well as various links from other King novels that only briefly reference the Dark Tower canon. For example, Walter O'dim (better known as Flagg from Eyes of the Dragon and Randall Flagg from The Stand) is wearing a hoodie that he "borrowed" from French's Landing, Wisconsin, the site of the King-Straub collaboration, Black House. Another example is the character Patrick Danville, who was the target of the Crimson King's machinations in Insomnia (my favorite Stephen King novel to date). Patrick plays the part that he was mentioned and meant to play, but how he came from being a slightly battered, yet happy boy to a voiceless young man is not completely known.

The seventh book is also a book of endings. Resolutions. King gave it four subtitles - Reproduction, Revelation, Redemption, and Resumption. The final subtitle is actually the subtitle that he later gave to his first novel in the series, The Gunslinger. That is telling - because if the reader decides to go past the given ending and read the coda of the book, they will understand why that subtitle is there. The whole series, it turns out, is a cycle. Roland will start on his journey again and again until... until what? Each time, he changes a little, and hopefully he learns, although he also starts afresh, with no true memory of what occurred to him when and before he reached the Tower. The tarot reading in the end of the first novel now becomes clearer - Walter's final card drawn was Life ("... but not for you"). Roland does not die, but neither does he live in the sense of time that we do. He may have started out as a mortal, but he has gained an aspect which keeps him in this long loop... maybe it's because he has indeed become a Hero, the last that those worlds will ever truly see.

And he is a tale! As King has said in other stories, "it is the tale, not he who tells it". As long as these stories exist, Roland is immortal, and folks like me will go back and read his story through and through, over and over, relearning all the details. Folks like me... the obsessives, maybe, but can I really call myself an expert yet? I've impressed my old advisor (and second dad), Tony Magistrale, with the knowledge that I have of King's canon. I want to write the second Stephen King encyclopedia, once I have the ability to focus on the texts. It'll be time-consuming, and it'll take years, and I need to talk to the first author to see what may be necessary (hopefully Tony can help me out there). But it is my logical dream, my ambition, and with time, I will get it done. King's writing has slowed considerably since his accident in 1999, so there will be less worry of missing out on new novels.

Until then, there is the Tower to continually delve into - the linch-pin of all worlds, all the universes that King has created. Such a multiverse is what I want as my mental playground.

Hile and well met,
Grety