Stephen King's the Dark Tower: The Complete Concordance Revised and Updated (131 page)

2. At the beginning of Chapter I of
Wolves of the Calla,
Eddie Dean reflects upon the old Mejis saying
Time is a face on the water.
Do his theories explain why time passes differently in our world and in the borderlands? Why or why not? Do his observations hold true for you, personally? Have you ever experienced such time-dilation or time-contraction?

3. Why are Eddie, Jake, Susannah, and Roland so wary of Andy when they first meet him? Why is this significant, both in terms of our
ka-tet
’s history and in terms of the history of Roland’s world?

4. What is happening to Susannah Dean’s personality? How did this come to pass? Do you think this process is part of her
ka
? Given her condition, what do you think will happen to our
ka-tet
in the final two books of the series?

5. Who are the roonts? How did they become roont? Do you think that the roonts understand what has happened to them? What, from the text, makes you say this?

6. What power do the Wolves ultimately serve? Why are the people of the Calla so afraid to fight them? Can you understand their fear?

7. What mythical event do the Sisters of Oriza honor? What purpose do they serve in terms of plot? Do you think that King is trying to make us reexamine traditional ideas about men and women?

8. Describe Black Thirteen. What is its history? What role does it play in the book? How does it compare to Maerlyn’s Grapefruit, which figured prominently in
Wizard and Glass
?

9. What is
todash
? Why is it dangerous to travel
todash
? Who are the Manni? Why do they believe that
todash
is “the holiest of rites and most exalted of states”?

10. What role does the number 19 play in
Wolves of the Calla
? Where have we seen it before? (Hint: You’ll need a 2003 edition of
The Gunslinger
to answer the second part of this question.)

11. Describe the Cave of Voices (also known as Doorway Cave). What is its function? Is it magical or mechanical? What voices do the various characters hear when they are inside the cave? In what way does the “demon” or “mechanism” of this cave expose unconscious fear or guilt? If you were suddenly transported to the Cave of Voices, who would come to speak to you?

12. What is the meaning of the term
commala
? Why would the Commala Song be so important in a rice-growing community? Does the Commala Song—and its accompanying dance—remind you of any ceremonies from our world?

13. Compare the tale of Lady Oriza to the story of Lord Perth, which we learned about in
The Waste Lands.
What do they have in common? How do they differ? What themes do they share with the Dark Tower series as a whole?

14. Where, in King’s fiction, have we met Father Callahan before? Why do you think King decided to link a non–Dark Tower book so closely to the Dark Tower series?

15. As we all know from experience, few people are completely good or completely evil. Even the most annoying individual can surprise us with a selfless act, and an otherwise admirable person can sometimes shock us with an angry word or an unfair judgment. The same goes for well-drawn, believable characters. Make a list of the most important characters we meet in Calla Bryn Sturgis. Who is “good”? Who is “bad”? Who would you say is “brave” and whom would you call “cowardly”? Now take a look at any scenes where these characters exhibit unexpected, opposite tendencies. How does the author make us sympathize with the wicked or feel disappointment with the opinions and actions of the “good”? How does King let us see both the savory and unsavory traits of each character?

16. Roland’s world contains both machinery and magic. Most of the machinery we’ve encountered so far has been hostile, but the magic is more ambiguous. In
Wolves of the Calla,
the most potent magical objects are the Rose and Black Thirteen. Is one completely good and the other completely evil? Why or why not? What greater forces do these objects represent? Do you think that they symbolize a struggle found in our world as well?

17. Both fans and reviewers often refer to King’s large body of work as “the Stephen King Universe” or “the Stephen King Multiverse.” How do you interpret these terms? What part does the Dark Tower play in this universe? What part does our world play in this universe? Do you think that Stephen King’s realistic fiction should also be classed as part of the “Stephen King Universe”?

18. Human beings have always craved magical, supernatural tales. In fact, many of the earliest and greatest of our stories—
The Epic of Gilgamesh, Beowulf,
and
The Odyssey,
to name just a few—tell about man’s interaction with the unseen worlds. Although “official” culture denies that telepathy, spirit worlds, and magic exist, such ideas still thrive as part of modern folklore. Why do you think that magical and supernatural tales are still popular? Do you think their appeal has grown over the past few years? Why? Do these kinds of tales serve a particular purpose, either socially or personally? Do you think the appeal of the Dark Tower series lies in the way it successfully weaves together both technology and magic?

1. Stephen King placed two unusual facing pages at the beginning of
Song of Susannah.
At the center of the left-hand page (which is otherwise blank) is the word
REPRODUCTION.
At the center of the right-hand page is one large number—19. However, in the bottom left-hand corner of the right-hand page is the tiny number 99. What effect is King striving for? What effect do these pages have upon you as a reader?

2. How does King shift our mood from one of elation, when the Wolves are defeated near the end of
Wolves of the Calla,
to one of anxiety at the beginning of
Song of Susannah
? What series of tragedies—and inexplicable events—takes place?

3. What is a Beamquake? What effect does it have on the borderlands? What is its significance, as far as our characters’ quest is concerned?

4. Who, or what, is Mia? How does her appearance (and disappearance) drive the action of
Song of Susannah
? In what ways does her history intertwine with Roland’s?

5. When the Manni help Roland, Eddie, Jake, and Callahan open the Unfound Door, they all expect that it will open onto New York City in 1999, and then onto Stoneham, Maine, in 1977. Eddie and Roland are supposed to follow Susannah into the Big Apple, and Jake and Callahan are supposed to pursue Calvin Tower in Maine. What goes wrong? What series of unexpected events takes place? In your opinion, who or what is behind this change of plan?

6. What is Susannah’s can-tah? How do you think it came to Susannah? With what force is it aligned? Have you ever encountered a similar type of object
in any of King’s other fiction? (Hint: Take a look at the novel
Desperation.
) If so, how does it differ from Susannah’s can-tah? What does this say about the forces of the White and the Outer Dark in the Stephen King universe?

7. What is Susannah’s Dogan? What part does it play in
Song of Susannah
? How does it link this novel with
Wolves of the Calla
? Is Susannah’s Dogan completely imaginary? Is the machinery within it completely under Susannah’s control? Why or why not?

8. What are Demon Elementals? What role do they play in our
tet
’s adventures? Why do you think that King waited until
Song of Susannah
to tell us about them? How do they affect your view of the Guardians? How do they affect your vision of Roland’s world?

9. What role does John Cullum play in
Song of Susannah
? Do you think that his appearance is linked to
ka
? If so, what part does
ka
play in the battle between the White and the Outer Dark? Does it always play the same role?

10. Unlike most novels,
Song of Susannah
is divided not into chapters but into stanzas, a term we usually associate with songs and poems. Does this name change affect how we read the novel? Does it affect our expectations? At the end of each chapter/stanza, King includes a short rhymed section containing a stave and a response. What do these terms mean, both in and of themselves and in the context of the novel?

11. What is the significance of Susannah’s dream at the beginning of the tenth stanza? What visions does she have? What future do they foretell? Can this future be altered, even though the visions show future events in the Keystone World?

12. In stanza eleven, Roland says that Stephen King is the twin of the Rose. Earlier in the Dark Tower series, we were told that the Rose is the twin of the Dark Tower. How do you explain the relationship between King, the Rose, and the Tower?

13. What is the nature of the black shadow that Eddie Dean sees hovering around
sai
King? What is its possible significance, both in terms of King’s life and our
tet
’s quest?

14. Why—according to
sai
King—did he stop writing the Dark Tower series? What about Roland, in particular, disturbed him? Do you agree or disagree with his assessment of our gunslinger? In your opinion, has Roland changed since King first started writing about him? Were there any other forces that contributed to King’s ceasing work on the Dark Tower series?

15. In stanza eleven, King describes his writing process. Does this description surprise you? Why or why not?

16. At the end of
Song of Susannah,
Stephen King includes a section entitled “Coda: Pages from a Writer’s Journal.” According to the
Oxford English Reference Dictionary,
a coda is a concluding event or series of events. More specifically, it tends to refer to the concluding passage of a piece of music (or of a movement within a piece of music), usually one that acts as an addition to the basic structure. In ballet, the term
coda
refers to the concluding section of a dance. Why do you think King chose to call this section a coda? What does this say about the structure of
Song of Susannah
? What specific event in
Wolves of the Calla
is King consciously echoing?

1. Of all the books in the Dark Tower series,
The Dark Tower
is probably the most action-packed. What are the major crisis points within the novel? How does King create this dramatic tension? How do you think King goes about planning such a plot? Does the story line just evolve naturally from the characters he imagines?

2. What do Jake and Callahan find in the Dixie Pig? In what ways do the forces of the Outer Dark mock the White? Since the Crimson King is also descended from Arthur Eld, is there some hidden significance in this mockery? If so, what does this say about the nature of the White? What about the nature of the Tower?

3. How does Pere Callahan’s death, at the beginning of
The Dark Tower,
refer back to his experiences in
’Salem’s Lot
? What does this say about Callahan’s
ka
?

4. What is an
aven kal
? How is it similar to, or different from,
todash
?

5. What kind of “walk-in” do Eddie and Roland meet along Route 7 in Lovell? How did this creature enter our world? What connection does King make between walk-ins, the Prim, and the creative imagination?

6. What is the difference between a magical door, which links worlds, and a mechanical one? Where do the different types come from? Is one aligned with the White and one with the Outer Dark? Can such simple labels be put on them? Why?

7. The Breaker prison in Thunderclap is known as the Devar-Toi to the prisoners and Algul Siento to the
can-toi
and
taheen
guards. How do these two names express different perspectives on the duties being performed there?

8. The three Breakers who initially aid Roland, Eddie, Susannah, and Jake all come from other places in King’s fiction—either from earlier parts of the Dark Tower series or from other stories or novels. Where do these characters come from? Why does King choose these characters? What does this say about the Dark Tower itself, and about the interconnectedness of the “Stephen King Universe”?

9. To describe Pimli Prentiss, Master of the Devar-Toi, Stephen King compares him to Jim Jones, the leader of the People’s Temple in Guyana, who convinced his followers to commit mass suicide. What effect does this have upon us? Is King making a wider social statement when he draws this comparison?

10. What is
ka-shume
? How does this force manifest in the
ka
of our
ka-tet
? Can a person escape
ka-shume
?

11. Although it has its own stark beauty, Roland’s world has been devastated by mutations, plagues, and ruinous technology. Now that you’ve finished the series, how do you think Mid-World relates to our world? Does the company North Central Positronics have any symbolic significance? Is King commenting on contemporary culture? If so, what is he saying? Is his vision completely positive, completely negative, or something in between?

12. In the final two books of the Dark Tower series, King enters the tale directly. In fact, at one point King calls himself the deus ex machina, or the “god out of a machine.” What is your reaction to King’s appearance in the Dark Tower series? What place does the fictional Stephen King have in the Dark Tower universe? What about the real Stephen King?

13. According to the people of the Tet Corporation, there is a direct link between the Dark Tower series and King’s other fiction. What is it? Do you view King’s various novels as pieces of a giant jigsaw puzzle, with the Dark Tower novels at the center? Why or why not? If you don’t see King’s fiction in this way (or if you haven’t read many of King’s other books), think about any King films you’ve seen, or any episodes of his various TV series. Are there any themes that seem to repeat?