Re-Reading The Dark Tower
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- wayfriend
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I don't know ... that's why I don't try to write stories about dark towers.
People often claim that King's stories have disappointing endings. (I never really did.) If so, then in a way it's fitting that the Dark Tower, once you climb it, is a bit of a disappointment.
But I can't think of an ending that would be more satisfying AND stick to the metaphor he used.
Doesn't mean I hadn't hoped to find one.
People often claim that King's stories have disappointing endings. (I never really did.) If so, then in a way it's fitting that the Dark Tower, once you climb it, is a bit of a disappointment.
But I can't think of an ending that would be more satisfying AND stick to the metaphor he used.
Doesn't mean I hadn't hoped to find one.
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- wayfriend
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Correct. But I won't take that as evidence that a better ending wasn't possible.Avatar wrote:So you can't imagine a better ending either.
And it might very well be that the direction King chose made it impossible to have a better ending without violating his own story. That would be an intrinsic flaw in the story he was telling. Which doesn't decrease the disappointment.
hmmm... according to DT, King doesn't actually write his stories, he's only a channel for Gan. But when he completes his story, he gets the reward for it, which enables him to write more stories. And plausibly Gan becomes assured that he is a good channel for more stories. The end result of both of these is that the culmination of a story enables new stories. Similiarly for readers, when you finish a story, you begin a new one. The old story is put aside once it's over, in all cases. And, as we know, every story borrows something from other stories, as it's a shared universe of sorts (united by the Dark Tower), so certainly any new story King writes will have to somehow lift something from his earlier stories.
Therefore, I suppose a good and also valid ending to DT might have had the gunslinger emerge, somewhat superficially transformed, as a new character in a new story, where the quest for the dark tower takes on some other form.
Would that be a bit better?
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- Horrim Carabal
- <i>Haruchai</i>
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- Horrim Carabal
- <i>Haruchai</i>
- Posts: 612
- Joined: Sat Jan 01, 2011 5:13 am
- Location: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
- Horrim Carabal
- <i>Haruchai</i>
- Posts: 612
- Joined: Sat Jan 01, 2011 5:13 am
- Location: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada