I found it hard to get into until I got to Roland telling the story of the town Tull. Then I was totally hooked.
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I found it hard to get into until I got to Roland telling the story of the town Tull. Then I was totally hooked.
I read the gunslinger in one sitting when I was thirteen and like R of G it changed everything. I am now twenty five with an undergrad degree in English/Philosophy and am currently pursuing an MA in English. I have yet to read anything that has enthralled me to the extent of the Dark Tower. I don't know...its magical. I have gone back to it so many times over the years just to remember the pure joy of narrative. I have known many people who have started, and never finished...it is beyond me. More could be said but is is 3:30 in the morning.
So far I'm the only one who chose the first option.
I found it incredibly hard, and the language has nothing to do with it. As I mentioned elsewhere, I would never have finished it if I hadn't been in hospital, - with no choice and no place to run - and I don't think would have picked the next volume if it hadn't come with the first.
It wasn't anything I expected from King. It was not even a story, it was a poem in prose, and it's something I hate; then, it was a pure, undiluted Fantasy, and the genre bores me immensely. Then, it had some overtones of Western, and it's another thing I'm, at best, indifferent to.
It became better when Jake appeared, with his New York reminiscences... and then it was worse again. Rhythmic prose, with all those poetic embellishments the genre requires... like exotic landscape and artefacts, or short but profound dialogs... I was so disappointed I nearly wept (weakened by the disease, you understand) - I wanted King, with characters and dialog and the crazy twist of common every-day life and abyss in the mind and soul of common every-day people and natural unstrained philosophy of a great story... and what I got instead was a lenghty poetic vision of something I couldn't care less about, with dialogs walking on stilts and all characters made up.
I am talkling about the first read now. It was better after I finished the series. Everything clicked into place. But that's another story for another day.
I loved The Gunslinger from the first time I read it - & every time since.
I would not have thought us such total opposites Jean, but.....
[1] I absolutely love Fantasy - from Tolkien on down.....
[2] I cut my reading-teeth on Westerns (my Grandfathers Louis L'Amour books) & have always retained a fondness for them
.. so The Gunslinger - A Fantasy/Science Fiction based Western! - Heaven! :lol:
When it comes to the people that I lent the book to that were unable to finish it, I have to admit that it made me re-evaluate the way I think of them. I didn't write them off or anything like that, but whenever one of them reccommends a book to someone in my presence I always take it with a grain of salt. I mean how much can I value an opinion about a book from someone who didn't "get" The Gunslinger? It's the same way with tv. I have an innate distrust for people who don't get the Simpsons.
Worthy of death is what it comes down to. Or even better, being castSpoiler: 01-07-2008 07:00 AMjaysoni'm not so sure i'd put them to death, though the one who lost my original copy, the copy I first read at 17, the copy that i taped the spine together more times than i can count... he i could have killed. 01-07-2008 07:05 AMJeanyou understand, of course, that it is logically incorrect? It would be ok (only to a degree, though) if you took it "with a grain of salt" if they criticized a book, not recommended it - then it would be at least possible to surmise the book might be like The Gunslinger, and that is why they didn't like it while you would; even this case leaves a lot of books that are not like The Gunslinger at all and, thus, you might both like it. On the other hand, doubting the value of the book they recommend is just logically unsound, it's like rejecting a candy from someone you disagree with on the question of smoked salmon.
It's not even that it makes me feel sorry that my (or anybody else's who's had the misfortune of not liking this particular book) opinion doesn't matter - it's that it would be sad if you missed something good on such a feeble basis, wouldn't it? 01-07-2008 07:12 AMWuducynnDamn it Jean, stop being so logical!! :angry: 01-07-2008 07:14 AMJeanit's my secret sin and guilty pleasure... we bears revel in it 01-07-2008 07:26 AMjaysonLogic never entered into the calculus. I don't doubt the value of the book at all, just the value of their personal review of it. I'm not even saying I dismiss their views entirely because of it, but that there inability to finish the Gunslinger causes me to consider their views in a different light. It may not be logical or fair, but it's an honest appraisal of the way I view it. 01-07-2008 07:29 AMJeanyes, that's the difference between bears and humans, I know... especially the primarily logical-verbal bears and visual-imaginative humans... http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k2.../0134-bear.gif 01-07-2008 07:43 AMBriceI'd have to agree that although admittedly illogical (and logic being something I generally love) someone disliking DT calls into question anything they do value or devalue. They are aesthetic lepers. 01-07-2008 07:55 AMJeanoh, come on, you don't really mean that, do you? I mean... it's all very fine to get together and to love each other on the grounds of common taste (like we do here), but rate/judge/blame those who don't share it? It's like there's nothing wrong in a merry national traditional festival... until in the middle of having their innocent fun the merry nation starts thinking they are better than others. 01-07-2008 07:58 AMBriceI was kinda' kidding Jean. 01-07-2008 07:59 AMjayson 01-07-2008 08:05 AMJeanI kinda know. It's just that there are things that I can't help reacting to, even though I suspect they must be jokes. I lived too long in a society where people too often were forced to like some things and to dislike others, and to have a taste different from the rest was really dangerous (subversive, can you believe it?). That's why I, like an old battlehorse, prick my ears whenever I hear anything resembling an attempt to turn taste into ideology. http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k2.../0134-bear.gifhttp://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k2.../0134-bear.gifhttp://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k2.../0134-bear.gifhttp://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k2.../0134-bear.gif 01-07-2008 08:25 AMLettiFor my part I would be incredibly surprised if any of my friends could read the Gunslinger and they liked it. That's why I don't lend it. I am really happy that I have so many people out there who loved it but for me it's that type of book that can't touch most of the people (but it's just a feeling I can be wrong). 01-07-2008 08:29 AMWuducynnMost folk I've known who have tried reading The Dark Tower series have a problem with The Gunslinger for some reason. I visit them once a year out in the woods where I've lovingly buried whats left of their corpses. 01-07-2008 08:36 AMBrice 01-07-2008 08:40 AMjaysonAgreed, and that's why I don't try to get just anyone to read it. Typically the friends I have reccommended it too either (a) like other books in similar genres, and/or (b) like King but haven't read DT. That is why I wind up surprised when they don't like it or can't finish it.
Since I found this site, I am less and less likely to try anymore to get anyone else to read it, now that I have plenty of other intelligent folks who have read and do love it to discuss the series with. You guys rule! 01-07-2008 08:45 AMLettiFor my part I am sure there are many good books out there I couldn't read or finish.
There is LoR. I couldn't finish it... but one day I will. That damn mountain can't win. :D 01-07-2008 09:19 AMJean 01-07-2008 10:37 AMjhanicI first read the stories when they were initially published in F&SF and enjoyed them. I then got the Grant edition and REALLY enjoyed rereading them. I read the revised Viking edition and liked it, but I still like the originals better.
John