Any article about the end of the world really should include the Stand. Why? Because plague was such a unique way to end it all! Interest in the end of the world always draws a crowd, and Hollywood isn't ready to let the Stand fade away -- or the potential dollars.
Ford writes:
Warner Brothers – looking for a new franchise to replace Harry Potter – is currently in talks with Ben Affleck to direct a series of films based on Stephen King’s journal of the plague years/world-goes-to-Hell-in-a-handcart epic The Stand.And. . .
King states that “much of the compulsion I felt while writing The Stand obviously came from envisioning an entire entrenched societal process destroyed at a stroke”, and likens the desire to Alexander lifting his sword above the Gordian Knot and growling: “I’ve got a better way.” Just as every creation myth needs a Devil, so every apocalyptic scenario needs some survivors – otherwise, where’s the story? The appeal of “THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT” both to storytellers and audiences is clear. It’s a chance to start again, set humanity free from the rules and see what happens, and just how good – or bad – we really are.I'm glad this Christmas to be looking forward to the next coming. Religious freak? -- Sure! I think He really is our only hope of peace on earth, goodwill to men.
WHAT IS IT ABOUT THE REMAINING HUMAN SPECIES, THAT ENCOURAGES IT TO IMAGINE THAT IT CAN DESTROY THE WORLD, GO TO SLEEP, AND THEN WAKE UP AND BELIEVE THAT THE DESTRUCTION DIDN'T HAPPEN?
ReplyDeleteWELL, I SUPPOSE I WON'T FIND OUT THIS TIME AROUND. I DID MENTION THAT I WAS ACTIVATED WHEN YOU GUYS GLASSED YOUR OWN PLANET, RIGHT?
IT WAS ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE THINGS I SAY THAT Y'ALL IGNORE. GOOD WORK ON THAT.
OKAY, EVERYONE REMEMBER WHERE WE PARKED IN ORBIT. WE AREN'T SWIMMING HERE.
ReplyDeleteThis is the way the world ends...This is the way the world ends...This is the way the world ends...I love this book; and I absolutely LOVE Stephen!!! He is an amazing writer, and I cannot wait to read this book!!!!! LOVE YOU STEPHEN KING!!!!!
ReplyDeleteMay I suggest a way of looking at King's output. It's not mine, it belongs to philosopher and fellow terror tale teller Russell Kirk.
ReplyDeleteKirk was a conservative philosopher, however he was the kind most liberals could be comfortable with.
His wasn't the conservatism of George Bush or William F. Buckley or even P.J. O Rourke. Kirk's outlook was Christian and informed by the thinking of statesman Edmund Burke, in particular Burke's idea of the moral imagination.
I'm convinced that King, in a sense takes up where Kirk left off. From this reading, there's a link that would tie King's work not just with writer's J.R.R. Tolkien, but also T.S. Eliot.
For a better understanding of what I'm talking about I suggest the following reading list, all of it by Russell Kirk:
Ancestral Shadows (horror short story collection)
Eliot and his Age: T.S. Eliot's Moral Imagination in the Twentieth Century (this book along with T.A. Shippey's "Author of the Century" helped me understand Lord of the Rings and Tolkien's connection with Eliot)
Redeeming the Time (essays on fiction)