Quote Originally Posted by Woofer View Post
Thanks for the bump, Ryan.

I find the observation on King's portrayal of protestant verses Catholic characters very interesting. I would say, however, that it's a particular brand of protestantism that comes off bad - the evangelical protestants. Mother Abigail, for example, was certainly a sympathetic character. Perhaps he leans toward and/or appears to favor Catholicism more because of the penance/forgiveness aspect of the faith.

Originally Posted by R_of_G
Great questions Ryan. My thoughts are... assuming the Tower as the physical embodiment of Gan, Roland isn't necessarily "saving" Gan, more than he maintaining order and balance. White can't entirely replace Red, nor vice versa, but if one gets the upper hand and "controls" the Tower than things are out of balance. As the World Axis, the Tower must remain equidistant between polar opposites [white and red as order and chaos in this case]. You can't have one without the other, but neither should be allowed to dominate. By "saving" the Tower I mean banishing the CK and Mordred from getting control of it this time through the loop. It's my belief that Roland represents the White in this necessarily constant struggle and that is why he loops, bc balance is attained but needs to be constantly maintained. It is not permanent.
Interesting. Of course if this is an eternal struggle, the next natural question is who or what was keeping the balance before Roland was born? Was it even in peril before Roland's birth? Was there another called to save the Tower? We don’t see or hear evidence of this in Roland’s story, but is that by design? As another asked earlier: will there be another White pawn (for he does seem to be a pawn in this interpretation) after Roland achieves salvation?

Since we know the Tower is saved when Blue Heaven falls, Roland’s continuing to the Tower and dogged determination to climb it, to reach Gan (or his placing the reaching of the Tower above human life), could be compared to the builders of the Tower of Babel and their attempt to reach God (or their placing the building of their great tower above human life). Thus, Roland being cast back into a loop at the end could be paralleled to the splitting of tongues the Babel builders received.

I hope that made sense. It's just my early morning first cup of coffee thoughts*.

*I don’t often get a chance to give these things the thought they need for good replies.
there has been others that have taken this quest. If you read the last book TWTTK it states that Tim Ross, a boy that becomes a gunslinger that is not from Gilead takes the journey to The Dark Tower. Although it does not say what he goes through he is one of the earlier ones to take the trip.