Stephen King's the Dark Tower: The Complete Concordance Revised and Updated (129 page)

1. In the novel
The Wind Through the Keyhole,
we discover that the book takes its title from a Mid-World folktale with the same name. This folktale, in turn, was part of a collection of stories entitled
Magic Tales of the Eld.
What is the literal significance of this title? What is the symbolic significance of this title? Why do you think Stephen King chose to name his novel after this folktale? Once you discovered where this title came from, did it affect how you read or interpreted the novel’s three intertwined narratives?

2. 
The Wind Through the Keyhole
is composed of three intertwined narratives. What are these three narratives? How do they relate to one another? How does Stephen King manage to link them together so that the stories transition smoothly, one into another?

3. All of the Dark Tower novels are told predominately in the third person, through the voice of a narrator. However, in
The Wind Through the Keyhole,
Roland becomes the narrator. In “The Skin-Man,” Roland recounts an autobiographical tale in the first person, and then in “The Wind Through the Keyhole,” he narrates a folktale. How does this switch to first person in “The Skin-Man” affect how you perceive Roland? Do you feel you have learned more about his personality? His soul? Roland is often presented to us as distant, reserved, and emotionally cool. Does this first-person narrative alter this perspective? Does Roland’s narration of a folktale affect how we see him? What about the circumstances under which he narrates this folktale?

4. Roland refers to Jamie DeCurry as his
ka
-mate. What is the significance of this term? What is its literal definition? What does it say about Roland and Jamie’s friendship? What does it tell us about the relationship between gunslingers?

5. Over the course of the Dark Tower novels, Roland Deschain changes tremendously. In
The Gunslinger,
he was depicted as an emotionally distant, goal-obsessed loner who was willing to sacrifice anyone—including Jake Chambers—in order to fulfill his quest. By the time he reaches the Dark Tower in the seventh book of the series, he is a man who has reclaimed his compassion and humanity. How would you describe the adult Roland we meet in
The Wind Through the Keyhole
? How does he compare to the young Roland we meet in
The Wind Through the Keyhole?
In what ways can you see the adult man in the boy? What parts of the boy have been lost by the man?

6. “The Skin-Man” begins after the death of Roland’s mother. How was Gabrielle’s death explained publicly? How does this compare to the truth? Why do you think Steven Deschain chose to explain his wife’s death the way he did? Do you think it was the right thing to do? How do you think word of Gabrielle’s death in places such as Arten affected the position of the gunslingers? How might it have affected people’s support for John Farson?

7. In Roland’s mind, what is the relationship between Gabrielle Deschain and the starkblast? Why does Roland associate them?

8. Although Roland’s mother is dead and never appears as a character in our tale, she is a haunting presence throughout the narrative. How does Roland’s mother haunt young Roland? How does she affect his behavior at the beginning of “The Skin-Man”? How does she haunt his time in Debaria? What about how she haunts the adult Roland? What new light did this novel shed upon Roland’s relationship with his mother? Did anything about that relationship surprise you?

9. What does the young Roland have in common with the Young Bill Streeter? What does Young Bill Streeter have in common with Tim Ross?

10. Although the story “The Wind Through the Keyhole” is a fairy tale, the evil figure of the Covenant Man turns out to be none other than Marten Broadcloak/Walter O’Dim, who is Roland’s enemy. Although it is tempting to take the Covenant Man’s identity at face value (after all, we know that Roland’s nemesis is an ageless sorcerer who can change his identity at will), it is important to contemplate the deeper reasons why both young Roland and adult Roland might have chosen to cast Broadcloak as the evil Covenanter. What personal grudge does the young Roland have against Broadcloak? What grudge does the older Roland have against O’Dim? Do you think that the tide of opinion against the gunslingers and in favor of John Farson, affected young Roland’s decision to cast Broadcloak as the villain of the tale?

11. What is a skin-man? Does this figure remind you of any other monsters in Stephen King’s fiction? (HINT: Think about the novel
Desperation.
)

12. “The Wind Through the Keyhole” is a fairy tale. How would you define a fairytale? Why does this story have a special place in Roland’s heart? Although as a fairytale it takes place in the land of “Once upon a bye,” it has particular relevance to Roland and his
ka-tet.
Why? Do you think that such fairy tales—in Mid-World and in our world—serve a greater purpose? Do you think the figure of Tim Ross—the lowborn lad who eventually becomes a gunslinger—is especially important in the context of our three intertwined tales? If so, why?

13. The wind is an extremely important force in
Wind Through the Keyhole.
How does the wind bind the three tales together? What is its symbolic significance?

14. How do the emotions and actions found in Tim Ross’s story—jealousy, murder, grief, regret, questing, and redemption—relate to Roland’s story? What about how they relate to Young Bill Streeter’s story?

15. Who is Maerlyn? How does his depiction in this novel change how we view him?

16. At the end of “The Skin-Man,” Roland tells us that he kept his mother’s final letter for many years, tracing the words over and over. He says:

I traced them until the paper fell apart and I let the wind take it—the wind that blows through time’s keyhole, ye ken. In the end, the wind takes everything, doesn’t it? And why not? Why other? If the sweetness of our lives did not depart, there would be no sweetness at all.

What do you think Roland means? Do you think these words would be spoken by a younger character, and written by a younger author, or do you think that this perspective comes from maturity? Do you agree with what Roland says?

17. Why is it so significant that
The Wind Through the Keyhole
ends with Roland’s dead mother telling her son that she forgives him and asking for his forgiveness in return? Does this affect how you see Gabrielle? Does it affect how you see Roland?

1. Who is Roland of Gilead? What is his ancestry? How does his personal history reflect the history of his land?

2. In many ways, Roland reminds us of the semimythical gunslingers of the late-nineteenth-century American West. Like them, he is simultaneously part lawman and part outlaw. Are there any figures from folklore, history, or film that remind you of Roland? How is he similar to them and how is he different? Would you call Roland a hero or an antihero?

3. Why does the term
Man in Black
have such emotional impact? What images do we automatically associate with such a figure? Do you believe that Walter is actually human? Is he demonic? What role does the demonic play in Roland’s world?

4. One of Roland’s favorite phrases is “the world has moved on.” What does this mean? What do you think Roland’s world was like before it moved on?

5. Throughout
The Gunslinger,
we are struck by the number of similarities between our world and Roland’s world. The townsfolk of Tull know the words to the Beatles’ song “Hey Jude,” and they use
bocks
(bucks, or dollars) as their currency. Jake’s description of New York (recounted while he is under hypnosis) reminds Roland of the mythical city of Lud, and the tunnels beneath the Cyclopean Mountains contain the ruins of a subway system that remind Jake of home. How do you explain these similarities? What is the relationship between Roland’s world and our world?

6. Although Sylvia Pittston claims to be a woman of God, she is actually one of the most actively destructive characters found in
The Gunslinger.
As Roland’s lover Allie says, Pittston’s religion is poison. What role does Pittston play in the novel? Have you come across Pittston-like characters in any of King’s other fiction? How do you explain the discrepancy between Pittston’s professed role as a preacher and her actual allegiance to the Man in Black and the Crimson King? What are the divisions between good and evil in Roland’s world?

7. Nort, the weed-eater Roland meets in Tull, suffers a terrible fate. After being poisoned by the addictive devil grass, he is resurrected by the sinister Man in Black, only to be later crucified by Sylvia Pittston and her followers. The
terms
resurrection
and
crucifixion
automatically make us reflect upon the biblical account of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, and the belief that, come Judgment Day, the dead will rise and be held accountable for the good and evil of their lives. Why do you think King includes these references? Why do you think Nort is crucified
after
being resurrected, a direct reversal of the biblical events?

8. Nort is not the only sacrificial figure found in
The Gunslinger.
Why does the Man in Black call Jake Roland’s “Isaac”? What does this tell us about Roland, about his relationship to the Man in Black, and his relationship to the Dark Tower?

9. When do the characters of
The Gunslinger
use High Speech? Would it be justified to call this a sacred language? What languages, in our world, are associated with religious ceremonies, ritual, and magic? What makes them special? Can these same attributes be said to belong to High Speech?

10. In literature, settings often serve a symbolic purpose. Throughout
The Gunslinger,
the landscapes Roland traverses are described as hostile, dry “purgatorial wastes.” Even relatively lush environments, such as the willow jungle, are full of dangerous forces, both mortal and demonic. In terms of its history, why is Roland’s land so dangerous and desolate? What is the symbolic significance of this harshness?

11. Although the setting of the Dark Tower series reminds us of a cowboy Western, King’s Tower novels draw from many other literary genres, including gothic fiction, science fiction, horror, and medieval Romance. Can you identify these elements in
The Gunslinger
?

12. One of Stephen King’s central inspirations for writing
The Gunslinger
was Robert Browning’s poem “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came.” The Victorians who first read “Childe Roland” saw it as a story of heroism and duty. For them, it was a Romance in which a brave knight attempted to make a pilgrimage even though all before him had failed. More recent critics, however, have read the poem in much more psychological terms. They interpret the landscape that Browning’s Roland traverses as a reflection of the character’s fears, terrors, and preoccupations—in other words, as a reflection of his internal state. In this interpretation, the knight’s search for the Dark Tower ultimately leads him to the center of himself, and to the truth of self-awareness. Do you think that either of these interpretations can be applied to
The Gunslinger,
in all or in part? Is Roland’s story a heroic tale of a knight on a quest, or can Roland’s travails be read as an allegory for the decisions, strivings, successes, failures, and personal betrayals we all face?

13. Ancient warrior cultures developed strict codes of honor and duty, which we now refer to as
heroic codes.
Great heroes were expected to be courageous, fearless, and headstrong. They had little or no regard for personal safety and in fact often acted rashly. What a warrior’s peers thought of him mattered above all else, and he thought little or nothing about personal conscience (in the modern sense) or the well-being of the soul. The warrior did not aim to enter Heaven, but to become legendary. Personal honor, family honor, and/or loyalty to the king or chieftain were what made a man worthwhile. Did the gunslingers of Gilead obey a Christian code or a heroic code? What about Roland? Is there a shift between these two codes as the novel progresses?

14. Judeo-Christian culture is primarily a guilt-based culture. In other words, people believe that God alone has the right to judge sins, and that He knows our guilt or our innocence, no matter what the world thinks of us. If an individual is innocent, he (in theory at least) can hold his head high, even though his reputation has been ruined. What matters is personal conscience. Hence, by the same token, if an individual believes he has committed a crime, he will be consumed by guilt, even if no one else ever discovers what has been done. Warrior cultures, on the other hand, were often shame-based cultures. In shame-based cultures, an individual must avoid “losing face,” since the disgrace he or she accrues reflects not only on the individual, but upon the family and the lineage. What a person thinks of himself matters less than what society thinks of him. Did Cort train apprentice gunslingers using guilt or shame? What does this tell us about gunslinger culture? At his hanging, does Hax show either guilt or shame? Why? What kind of culture does he seem to reflect? Does Roland primarily experience guilt or shame? Does this change over the course of the novel? Why, in terms of Roland’s personal development (or lack of it), might this happen?