Reading this book now, I still find myself relating to Jake, but for very different reasons. He is going through the same thing as Roland, but where the schism in Roland’s mind has only split his memories in two, Jake’s divided Ka is playing out in his present. He walks around holding two concurrent timelines in his mind: the reality that was supposed to happen and the reality that he’s actually living in. Can you think of a more perfect metaphor for the predicament in which we all find ourselves this year?
Tag Archives: Roland Deschain
Ka Is An Election Cycle
When I read this week’s pages and reflected on what I wanted to write about, my thoughts were immediately sucked into the election’s beam, like a compass needle distracted by a magnet. I felt as though everything happening to Roland, Eddie, and O/Detta was commenting on what’s happening in this country.
Never Trust A Speaking Demon
Since when do we trust anything the Man in Black says? Why does Roland trust him? Why does he trust the oracle? He knows to “never trust a junkie” but he doesn’t know not to trust a sex-crazed, demon? This trip to the tower (and this is the book I’ve read the most times), I finally see that the oracle’s prediction is what Eddie would call ‘bullshit’. Three is not the magic number of this book, and it isn’t nineteen either; the magic number of book two is, well, two.
A Blessing In Disguise: How Having Your Fingers Bitten Off By A Venomous Lobster Can Change Your Life.
The lobstrosity cripples Roland when it eats his fingers, but the bite is even more severe than that, and I’m not just referring to the infection that came with it. Over the course of these first hundred pages, the gunslinger has not only been physically maimed, he’s been psychologically wounded as well.
Church of the Cosmic Turtle 