Why the blue hell did Roland cry out the name of the cook, Hax at the Tower? He cried out his friends' his mates' and his loves' names... why was Hax there?
Why the blue hell did Roland cry out the name of the cook, Hax at the Tower? He cried out his friends' his mates' and his loves' names... why was Hax there?
Roland would have understood.
I never could understand how that list was made (I started a thread on that at .net, and there have been a few theories, none of them 100% satisfactory). One thing I can say for Hax is that he was definitely one of those who died on Roland's way to the Tower.
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm pretty rusty on my DT, but wasn't Hax's death a big milestone for Roland, loss-of-innocence type thing? That might default him onto the VIP list.
My answer to Mordred is that he sucked. If some cannibalistic demon-spider offspring came at me and my friends, I'd be like "Screw that guy."
People said I was dumb, but I proved them.
I think maybe in some ways Hax set him on his path at least in his mind. Plus he did seem to have some fondness for him despite the need to turn him in for his betrayal.
I think this was in many ways Roland's first real step towards the Tower. Hax was the first person Roland "killed" for he knew what end would come of his telling. At that young age, Roland chose to actively participate in the wars of his father(s). The crying I think showed that despite this adult choice, he was still very much a boy.
I agree, perhaps he felt a bit guilty for squealing on Hax even after all those years.
Also interesting about that is Roland must call Hax's name every time he gets there because the event is so early in his ultimate quest.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
"It's his eyes, Roland thought. They were wide and terrible, the eyes of a dragon in human form" - Roland seeing the Crimson King for the first time.
"When the King comes and the Tower falls, sai, all such pretty things as yours will be broken. Then there will be darkness and nothing but the howl of Discordia and the cries of the can toi" - From Song of Susannah
Or maybe when he was there - at the Dark Tower - he was a little bit like a child in his soul... it was his dream all in his life and in the poem we can read: "Childe Roland To The Dark Tower Came"
And the child or childe soul of Roland still loved Hax.
Just a thought...
Roland would have understood.
it's a good thought, but I'm afraid "childe" means just a descendant of noble family, as (another example) in Byron's Childe Harold. They had that "Childe" before their proper name until they at last inherited the title, or before being knighted, or before something else happened, I forget now which - it didn't depend on their actual age anyway.
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You must be right, Jean - you know much more than me but as I have read altought childe doesn't mean a child it does mean a young man.
Roland would have understood.
yes, you're right as usual
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But a young man is not a child... so thank you, Jean for the correction.
Roland would have understood.
I have to admit that it annoys me greatly that Roland should sing the name of Hax at the Tower, and sing it in the company of all those names deserving of being sung there.
The young, un-tried, Roland liked the cook for simple childish reasons at one time, but the Roland who reached the Tower knew him for the traitor he was. He always made a great deal about the fact that he would sing names at the Tower "... there I will sing their names..." , that it seems an insult to them to sing Hax's name in their midst - never mind the insult to those who's names are not sung, but might have been...
I have wondered if this was just an oversight by king, but it seems unlikely - so it would be interesting to hear his reasoning on it...
I still think it is Roland not honoring Hax the person, but his own decision to turn in Hax as the "official" beginning of his road to the Tower. I don't think Roland was equating Hax with the others who helped him on his road, but just naming Hax as his first kill on this road.
I do see your point R_of_G, and had seen your post before I posted above, but (cry-yer-pardon) I just don't agree.
What was Hax? - an employee of the Court in Gilead who turned traitor for The Good Man. He was to be a link in a delivery chain that would have brought poisoned meat to be eaten by free men,women and children of ... where was it... not Gilead itself but a nearby village??
OK he was 'significant' to Roland because of the act of turning him in for certain hanging, and we get an insight into that by the way Steven Deschain reacts to Roland's decision to report him, and his desire to know Roland's reasons...
... but why would any of this make him so significant on Rolands path to the Tower that he should sing his name before the Tower? (I take this singing of names before the Tower very seriously - in case it had escaped yer attention )
...maybe I'm missing a point somewhere...?
Like I said, I tend to think Roland sees Hax as the first real step on his path. As the first death Roland was responsible for causing, I think he knows that in many ways his childhood ended that day, not the day he bested Cort, or the day he rode for Mejis. That day he became more the son of Stephen Deschain than he could just by being an apprentice gunslinger. By turning in Hax, Roland declared his fathers' enemies his own and began his lieflong quest. I think the crying of Hax's name is Roland acknowledging his first kill in the name of the Tower.
Either that or he was so tired when he got there that he forgot who was who but he once knew someone named Hax so out the name came... lol
Seriously though, because it disturbed me at first that Hax' name was spoken along with the others so I did a lot of thinking on why Roland says it. The above is the most plausible theory I've come up with. Surely Roland didn't forgive Hax and equate him with the others because if he did I wonder if the Tower door ever would have opened to him.
Or if maybe it would have opened putting him at the beginning of another loop, maybe?
I think he called the names of the people he felt like he "ran over" to get to the Tower and somewhere in his mind he felt that way about Hax.
I mean, Roland told on him and they hung his ass. That is got to stay with you no matter how bad a guy Hax was.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
I dunno - it still does'nt hang well with me.
It does not fit with the same logic as the other names he sings there (I'd have to go look at the book to see them all - but I'm pretty sure Hax is the odd-one-out by a country mile!)
there's hardly any "same logic" that would cover all of those names
I agree with Matt; moreover, for me Hax is one of the most prominent victims of the events. He is epitomy of betrayal - which something that will always accompany Roland on his way towards the Dark Tower - but he is also someone who, like so many, will fall under the axe wielded by the forces too big for him to comprehend (Roland, by the way, being one of those forces, although he can hardly comprehend them at that moment). No, I don't really know why Hax was there, but I always felt it was right; it just rang true to me.
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!