Welcome to the Second Life Forums Archive

These forums are CLOSED. Please visit the new forums HERE

Stephen King's - The Dark Tower

Merwan Marker
Booring...
Join date: 28 Jan 2004
Posts: 4,706
10-16-2004 05:26
Anyone reading, or have read The Dark Tower, by Steven King. Unlike anything he has written, begun in 1970, and finally finished with the publishing of Vol. 7 in Sept.

The titles are:

Vol.

1 The Gunslinger
2 The Drawing of the Three
3 The Waste Lands
4 Wizard and Glass
5 Wolves of the Calla
6 Song of Susannah
7 The Dark Tower

I've just begun #5.
_____________________
Don't Worry, Be Happy - Meher Baba
Urusula Zapata
I love my Pugs!
Join date: 20 Mar 2004
Posts: 1,340
10-16-2004 05:51
I am currently reading the last one, The Dark Tower. :)
_____________________
Get your decorated jeans, shorts and shirts at Jeans & Things by Urusula. Don't forget to check out Lecktor's Crappy T's while you are there. Jeans & Things by Urusula at Healy (190, 247) Shorts and shirts on SLBoutique.
Edav Roark
Bounty Hunter
Join date: 4 Sep 2003
Posts: 569
10-16-2004 08:47
I just finished "Wizard and Glass" a few days ago.
_____________________
Trinity Serpentine
Schwan's Avitar Reject
Join date: 1 Oct 2003
Posts: 2,972
10-16-2004 08:54
My favorite series ever! Doh! He put out the final one? *Runs out to buy the book*
_____________________
From: someone
Yeah, the toaster has great speakers, but all I want is fucking toast.
- The Filthy Critic reviewing Aeon Flux
Merwan Marker
Booring...
Join date: 28 Jan 2004
Posts: 4,706
10-16-2004 10:25
From: Trinity Serpentine
My favorite series ever! Doh! He put out the final one? *Runs out to buy the book*


Don't know where you live Trinity, but Vol. 7 , The Dark Tower is being sold at CostCo for $19.99.


:)
_____________________
Don't Worry, Be Happy - Meher Baba
Trinity Serpentine
Schwan's Avitar Reject
Join date: 1 Oct 2003
Posts: 2,972
10-16-2004 10:37
Thanks Mer! :D
_____________________
From: someone
Yeah, the toaster has great speakers, but all I want is fucking toast.
- The Filthy Critic reviewing Aeon Flux
Goodwrench Grayson
Classic Gaming Nut
Join date: 18 Jun 2004
Posts: 223
10-16-2004 10:56
Wow... I can't believe this. I wondered if my eyes deceived me at the bookstore. When I was younger, I read volumes 1-3 eagerly (rereading the originals each time). Then, I got distracted by all sorts of other materials and never revisited it.

I may just have to. Back when the original books were published, Mr. King said that there was no way the series could be completed (that he could see). I'm thrilled he's decided to complete it after all.
_____________________
We used to remember our Roots at The Mushroom Kingdom - memorial can be found at Davenport 200, 150
Section 8 Server - my home on the web
Torley Linden
Enlightenment!
Join date: 15 Sep 2004
Posts: 16,530
10-16-2004 15:57
YOU KNOW I JUST HAD TO POST HERE.

AND I SAY THANKEE, SAI. :)

I also like Costco for their great prices and return policy! I think they've had all the recent Stephen King books in memory, at one time or another.
_____________________
Foster Virgo
Registered User
Join date: 16 Jun 2004
Posts: 175
10-17-2004 08:26
I listened to part of an audio version from the gunslinger and found myself so bored I had to turn it off. I found the characters boring and lifeless aswell.

Compared to say The Talisman it seems weak to me, plus just too damned long.

I suppose I'm too harsh on lesser books, after reading Snow Crash there really isn't anything that even compares. I even tried some classics like brave new world and do androids dream and still can't find a decent book. I suppose Hitchikers guide rates up there though.
Nephilaine Protagonist
PixelSlinger
Join date: 22 Jul 2003
Posts: 1,693
10-17-2004 10:21
I am rereading the series over in anticipation of getting to read Song of Susannah and The Dark Tower. I've read them all up to Wolves of the Calla previously, am rereading to freshen up my memory of the stories a bit :D

So pls forgive me if i didnt read anything in this thread but the first post. ;) i am terrified of spoilers, and SO EXCITED about getting to the last two books. :)

Neil has finished the whole series, and he opined that the ending is worthy of the rest of the story. **cant wait**

that said:
This is King's best work. I LOVE LOVE LOVE these books. :D
_____________________
April Firefly
Idiosyncratic Poster
Join date: 3 Aug 2004
Posts: 1,253
10-17-2004 13:57
I have read them as they were published. I waited anxiously for each book to come out. I've read 5 twice already and I am now reading 6 for the second time and I have 7. I have always been a little jealous of all the newcomers to the Dark Tower series who can now read through them all without the wait. But at the same time, I have felt Roland to be a part of my life. I'm almost a little scared and sad to get to the last book, but of course of have to, because it's ka.

Oh, btw, the first book, The Gunslinger, was published in 1982.
Merwan Marker
Booring...
Join date: 28 Jan 2004
Posts: 4,706
10-17-2004 14:18
From: Nephilaine Protagonist

---
So pls forgive me if i didnt read anything in this thread but the first post. ;) i am terrified of spoilers, and SO EXCITED about getting to the last two books. :)
---


Excellent! point Neph - no spoilers seen!

I use to moderate a Robert Jordan, WHEEL OF TIME eMail LISTServe discussion group, and we used a format like this to indicate spoiler messages:



Message Title: SPOILER - Vol. xx


and in the body of the message type - that way people were warned. :)



**** SPOILER WARNING ******
_____________________
Don't Worry, Be Happy - Meher Baba
Torley Linden
Enlightenment!
Join date: 15 Sep 2004
Posts: 16,530
10-17-2004 14:42
From: Nephilaine Protagonist
I am rereading the series over in anticipation of getting to read Song of Susannah and The Dark Tower. I've read them all up to Wolves of the Calla previously, am rereading to freshen up my memory of the stories a bit :D

So pls forgive me if i didnt read anything in this thread but the first post. ;) i am terrified of spoilers, and SO EXCITED about getting to the last two books. :)

Neil has finished the whole series, and he opined that the ending is worthy of the rest of the story. **cant wait**

that said:
This is King's best work. I LOVE LOVE LOVE these books. :D


I'll never forget one of the first times I came to Pixeldolls, and you and Tae and Fran were there, and we talked about Stephen King . . . and then I saw the caterpillar smoking a hookah! That was sooo exciting! :D
_____________________
Rose Karuna
Lizard Doctor
Join date: 5 Jun 2004
Posts: 3,772
10-18-2004 06:59
From: April Firefly
I have read them as they were published. I waited anxiously for each book to come out. I've read 5 twice already and I am now reading 6 for the second time and I have 7. I have always been a little jealous of all the newcomers to the Dark Tower series who can now read through them all without the wait. But at the same time, I have felt Roland to be a part of my life. I'm almost a little scared and sad to get to the last book, but of course of have to, because it's ka.

Oh, btw, the first book, The Gunslinger, was published in 1982.


My hubby saw the Dark Tower book in the store last night but hesitated to buy it because he never knows if I have read them already. :( And I hadn't . So I'm running out to get it on my way home from work tonight. (I might be absent from SL for a day or two). :D

I have to agree - Roland, Suzanna, Jake & Oy have been a part of my life and I hate think about them not waiting for me in another book a year or two down the road.
_____________________
I Do Whatever My Rice Krispies Tell Me To :D
Merwan Marker
Booring...
Join date: 28 Jan 2004
Posts: 4,706
10-23-2004 11:35
I noticed April is doing a Dark Tower Event on Mondy - check it out at:



Dark Tower Gunslinger - Discussion & Trivia Quiz

Excellent!

:cool:
_____________________
Don't Worry, Be Happy - Meher Baba
Calla Neva
Registered User
Join date: 15 Dec 2004
Posts: 30
Love the Dark Tower
03-13-2005 10:33
My SL name come from the series:)

I even had the honor of working with him on a photoshoot. (I am a makeup artist in RL)
Merwan Marker
Booring...
Join date: 28 Jan 2004
Posts: 4,706
03-13-2005 10:48
From: Calla Neva
My SL name come from the series:)

I even had the honor of working with him on a photoshoot. (I am a makeup artist in RL)

Excellent!

Since starting this thread back in Oct. I'm still not finished with the series - am in the first half of Song of Susannah.


:)
_____________________
Don't Worry, Be Happy - Meher Baba
Jack Lambert
Registered User
Join date: 4 Jun 2004
Posts: 265
03-13-2005 13:03
I read and thouroughly enjoyed the first three (although The Drawing of the Three was a bit tiresome in spots) ...

Then I got to the love story in The Wizard and Glass and just couldn't finish it. It was boooring. I'm sure someday I'll go back and re-read the series now that all the books are out.

I never liked any of his horror stuff but this series was pretty cool. I read somewhere (the inside cover of one of the books maybe?) that King started the whole series with just that one line from The Gunslinger (I don't recall exactly what it was but it was something like "The man in black fled across the desert and the Gunslinger followed."

If any other novelist started a book with that rubbish these days, the publisher would close it before the end of the first paragraph.

--Jack Lambert
_____________________
----------------------------
Taunt you with a tree filled lot? hahahahahahaha. Griefer trees! Good lord you're a drama queen. Poor poor put upon you.

-Chip Midnight
Torley Linden
Enlightenment!
Join date: 15 Sep 2004
Posts: 16,530
03-13-2005 13:35
^ I get the impression that it's the sort of line only Stephen King could have written, which, setting "other worlds than these" aside, is precisely why he wrote it. (Relatively early on in his career, too!) :)

Without giving away spoilers, if you keep reading on... ;)
_____________________
Torley Linden
Enlightenment!
Join date: 15 Sep 2004
Posts: 16,530
03-13-2005 13:38
^ I get the impression that it's the sort of line only Stephen King could have written, which, setting "other worlds than these" aside, is precisely why he wrote it. (Relatively early on in his career, too!) :)

Without giving away spoilers, if you keep reading on... ;)
_____________________
Ewan Took
Mad Hairy Scotsman
Join date: 5 Dec 2004
Posts: 579
03-14-2005 05:29
Don't forget to read 'The Talisman' as well. The story, though not directly about Roland, revolves around the Dark Tower. A lot of people like to read 'Insomnia' as part of the series too, because of the references to 'The Crimson King', though I feel it isn't as connected to the story the way 'The Talisman' is.
Xtopherxaos Ixtab
D- in English
Join date: 7 Oct 2004
Posts: 884
03-14-2005 07:19
I've been aiming with my hands....I have forgotten the face of my father :mad:

King's inspiration:

Childe Roland To The Dark Tower Came
by
Robert Browning


My first thought was, he lied in every word

That hoary cripple, with malicious eye

Askance to watch the working of his lie

On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford

Suppression of the glee that pursed and scored

Its edge at one more victim gained thereby.


What else should he be set for, with his staff?

What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare

All travelers that might find him posted there,

And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh

Would break, what crutch 'gin my epitaph

For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare.


If at his counsel I should turn aside

Into that ominous tract which, all agree,

Hides the Dark Tower.Yet acquiescingly

I did turn as he pointed; neither pride

Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,

So much as gladness that some end might be.


For, what with my whole world-wide wandering,

What with my search drawn out thro' years, my hope

Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope

With that obstreperous joy success would bring, -

I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring

My heart made, finding failure in its scope.


As when a sick man very near to death

Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end

The tears and takes the farewell of each friend

And hears one bid the other go, draw breath

Freelier outside, ("since all is o'er," he saith,

"And the blow fallen no grieving can amend;";)


While some discuss if near the other graves

Be room enough for this, and when a day

Suits best for carrying the corpse away,

With care about the banners, scarves and staves, -

And still the man hears all, and only craves

He may not shame such tender love and stay.


Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest,

Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ

so many times among 'The Band' - to wit

The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed

Their steps - that just to fail as they, seemed best,

And all doubt was now - should I be fit.


So, quiet as despair, I turned from him

That hateful cripple, out of his highway

Into the path he pointed. All the day

Had been a dreary one at best, and dim

Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim

Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.


For mark! no sooner was I fairly found

Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two,

Than, pausing to throw backward a last view

To the safe road, 'twas gone: grey plain all round;

Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound.

I might go on; nought else remained to do.


So, on I went, I think I never saw

Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve;

For flowers - as well expect a cedar grove!

But cockle, spurge, according to their law

Might propagate their kind, with none to awe

You'd think; a burr had been a treasure trove.


No! penury, inertness and grimace,

In some strange sort, were the land's portion, "See

Or shut your eyes," said Nature peevishly,

"It nothing skills; I cannot help my case:

"Tis the Last Judgment's fire must cure this place,

Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free."


If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk

Above its mates, the head was chopped - the bents

Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents

In the dock's harsh swarth leaves - bruised so as to baulk

All hope of greenness? 'tis a brute must walk

Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents.


As for the grass, it grew scant as hair

In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud

Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood

One stiff blind horse, his every bone astare,

Stood stupefied, however he came there:

Thrust out past service as the devil's stud!


Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,

With that red, gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,

And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane;

Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;

I never saw a brute I hated so;

He must be wicked to deserve such pain.


I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.

As a man calls for wine before he fights,

I asked for one draught of earlier, happier sights

Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.

Think first, fight afterwards - the soldier's art:

One taste of the old time set all to rights.


Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face

Beneath its garniture of curly gold,

Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold

An arm in mine to fix me to the place

The way he used. Alas, one night's disgrace!

Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold.


Giles then, the soul of honour - there he stands

Frank as ten years ago when knighted first

What honest men should dare (he said) he durst

Good - but then the scene shifts - faugh! what hangman's hands

Pin to his breast a parchment? his own bands

Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst!


Better this Present than a Past like that:

Back therefore to my darkening path again.

No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.

Will the night send a howlet or a bat?

I asked: when something on the dismal flat

Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train


A sudden little river crossed my path

As unexpected as a serpent comes

No sluggish tide congenial to its glooms -

This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath

For the fiend's glowing hoof - to see the wrath

Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.


So petty yet so spiteful! all along,

Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it;

Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit

Of mute despair, a suicidal throng:

The river which had done them all wrong,

Whate'er that was, rolled by, determined no wit.


Which, while I forded, - good saints, how I feared

To set my foot upon a dead man's cheek

Each step, or fell the spear I thrust to seek

Tangled in his hair or beard!-

It may have been a water-rat I speared,

But, ugh! it sounded like a baby's shriek.


Glad was I when I reached the other bank.

Now for a better country. Vain presage!

Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage

Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank

Soil to a plash? toads in a poisoned tank,

Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage -


The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque.

What penned them there, with all the plain to choose?

No foot-print leading to that horrid mews,

None out of it. Mad brewage set to work

Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk

Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.


And more than that - a furlong on - why, there!

What bad use was that engine for, that wheel,

Or brake, not wheel - that harrow fit to reel

Men's bodies out like silk? with all the air

Of Tophet's tool, on earth left unaware,

Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.


Then came a bit of stubbled ground, once a wood,

Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth

Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth,

Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood

Changes and off he goes!) within a rood -

Bog clay, and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.


Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim,

Now patches where some leanness of the soil's

Broke into moss or substances like boils

Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him,

Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim

Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.


And just as far as ever from the end!

Nought in the distance but the evening, nought

To point my footstep further! At the thought,

A great black bird, Apollyon's bosom-friend,

Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned

That brushed my cap - perchance the guide I sought.


For, looking up, aware I somehow grew,

'Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place

All round to mountains - with such name to grace

Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view.

How thus they had surprised me, - solve it, you!

How to get from them was no clearer case.


Yet half I seemed to recognise some trick

Of mischief happened to me, God knows when -

In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then,

Progress this way. When, in the very nick

Of giving up, one time more, came a click

As when a trap shuts - you're inside the den!


Burningly it came on me all at once,

This was the place! those two hills on the right,

Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight;

While to the left, a tall scalped mountain . . . Dunce,

Fool, to be dozing at the very nonce,

After a life spent training for the sight!


What in the midst lay but the Tower itself?

The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart,

Built of brown stone, without a counterpart

In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf

Points to the shipman thus the unseen self

He strikes on, only when the timbers start.


Not see? because of night perhaps? - Why day

Came back again for that! before it left,

The dying sunset kindled through a cleft;

The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay,

Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay, -

"Now stab and end the creature - to the heft!"


Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled

Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears,

Of all the lost adventurers my peers, -

How such a one was strong, and such was bold,

And such was fortunate, yet each of old

Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.


There they stood, ranged along the hillsides, met

To view the last of me, a living frame

For one more picture! in a sheet of flame

I saw them and I knew them all. And yet

Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,

And blew. "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came."
_____________________
Tatiana Jensen
Registered User
Join date: 24 May 2004
Posts: 42
03-14-2005 08:35
now i know what to buy lecktor.... thanks!
Sugar Street
My own little world rocks
Join date: 2 Aug 2004
Posts: 58
03-14-2005 09:03
I was reading Wolves of Calla and have Susannah's Song all lined up when i discovered SECOND LIFE - now I barely read my e-mail. In my opinion, they are overall very good books but I have to say so far nothing compares the the creeps I got from reading my first Stephen King - "the Shining" and I've read just about everyone of em!
_____________________
It's MY DIME, I'll be spending it as I like, even if that includes buying little balls that let my pixels do dirty things
Rose Karuna
Lizard Doctor
Join date: 5 Jun 2004
Posts: 3,772
03-14-2005 09:48
From: Sugar Street
I was reading Wolves of Calla and have Susannah's Song all lined up when i discovered SECOND LIFE - now I barely read my e-mail. In my opinion, they are overall very good books but I have to say so far nothing compares the the creeps I got from reading my first Stephen King - "the Shining" and I've read just about everyone of em!


Seems like everyone who reads Stephen King has one book they can site that chilled them the most.

For me, it was Geralds Game. It just seemed so plausible - a couple that has been married more than 20 years gets bored, the sex games begin, she wants a trip to the secluded lake house and meaningful sex, he wants to handcuff her to the bed and play rough, she gives in and he, being the out of shape yuppie lawyer that he is, croaks in the middle of the entire thing leaving her hand cuffed to the bed, for days, and no one knows she's there - except for a serial killer loose in the area.

What kind of mind thinks up this stuff?

No one has ever tied me down with anything that I can't gnaw through since I read that one. :D

Oh and BTW - It has been so long since I read the Gunslinger that I'm starting to read the entire series again. I finally bought the Dark Tower but I have held off reading it because I think I'd like to read all the others first, since the Dark Tower is the last of the series. :(
_____________________
I Do Whatever My Rice Krispies Tell Me To :D
1 2