In the opening scenes, King spent time giving us peeks at Pennywise. In chapter three he introduces the seven protagonist who will face off against the monster. All of the adults have forgotten the events of their childhood, until Mike gives them a call.
.The sub-chapters are titled, making this very long single chapter a series of short stories. When the mini-series was filmed, they paired these introductory scenes with an encounter with Pennywise. So each character got a shot as an adult, then a flashback. Anyway, the book doesn't do that.
.Interestingly, just from a literary standpoint, is that King tells several of these scenes from the viewpoint of someone who loves the central character. So Stanly Uris' story is told from the standpoint of his wife; Beverly Rogan's story is told through the eyes of her abusive boyfriend.
.It is scary how easily King takes the reader inside the head of an abuser. In this case, a violent abuser who likes to whoop on Beverlay Rogan. No slow build-up like in The Shining, you're just dropped right into this guys head. Ouch.
.
Some quick notes:
.
1. I really like Bill asking, "can't you guys let a story be a story?"
2. Eddie marry's a fat woman who reminds him of his mother. She is both pathetic and icky.
3. George Orwell makes appearances in this book also, as he also had quite a role in Firestarter. It is obvious that Orwell's work has had an influence on King.
4. King also gives honorable mention here to Ray Bradbury and William Goldman.
5. Bill Denbrough appears to be King's closest alter-ego in this novel. He's not only a writer, Denbrough is even published by Viking.
6. The cultural references are more than I can count. Grateful Dead, Carson, O.J. Simpson (Hertz ad), Esquire -- and a trillion more.
7. All of the characters are very successful. I'm not sure how King is going to play on that. But they're certainly not "losers" as adults.
.
Foreshadowing - The Scar
The foreshadowing is awesome in this section. I especially like Bill showing his wife his scarred hands, a sign of a blood covenant. But it is a scar that has suddenly appeared -- come back with a single phone call. How cool is that?! And then, King delivers a true shiver: Stan did it. What did Stan do? He cut their palms. Now this is powerful because Stan just killed himself.
.
Bill tells his wife, "I can' remember Stan doing his own hands last, pretending he was going to slash his wrists instead of just cut his palms a little. I guess it was just some goof, but I almost made a move on him . . . to stop him. because for a second or two there he looked serious." p. 131 pb
.
The titles all make use of the verb "take."
Stanly Uris takes a bath
Richard Tozier takes a powder
Ben Hascom takes a drink
Eddie Kaspbrak takes his medicine
Beverly Rogan takes a whuppin
Bill Denbrough takes time out
.
Hemingford Home
In the section about Ben Hascom, we learn that he lives in Heminford Home. This is the same place mother Abigail from the Stand lives. It is also the site of one of the upcoming stories in King's upcoming book, Full Dark, No Stars. We are given this description of Hemingford Home, "Downtown Hemingford Home made downtown Swedholm look like New York City; the business district consisted of eight buildings, five on one side and three on the other." These include a barber shop, a hardware store, a bank and a 76 gas station and the Red Wheel -- the local bar.
No comments:
Post a Comment