Stephen King's the Stand

¶ … Stand, by Stephen King [...] personal response to the novel. "The Stand" is a disturbing book that recounts the story of survivorship, new worlds, and man's inhumanity. THE STAND Stephen King's "The Stand" is a chilling story about a virulent flu virus that is especially chilling today as the SARS virus makes headlines around the world. Stephen King is a noted horror writer who has written numerous books. This novel was first published in 1991, and has been made into a mini-series.

King's books are wildly popular, and this book was no exception. It ranks as the 2,697 most sold book on the Amazon.com web site, and had been released in numerous hard and soft cover editions, including a "complete and uncut" version that numbers 1168 pages. The original version was published in 1978, and numbered 823 pages, so clearly the newer version contains much more material, making it more popular with die hard King fans. Most book reviews were favorable about the book, despite its large size.

King's main theme for this book is the end of the world, supplanted by pure good and evil. As one critic noted, "King presupposes a world in ruin which makes it possible to achieve a world cleansed of evil and destruction" (Bloom 9). King wants the world to be recreated as a better place after the virus kills off 99.44% of all humankind, and he continues this theme throughout the book, as two different cities are recreated from the ashes of civilization.

"Because I do believe that all the new societies which arise...will have technology as their cornerstone...They won't remember...the corner we pained ourselves into. The dirty rivers, the hole in the ozone layer, the atomic bomb, the atmospheric pollution" (King 336). One city is centered in Las Vegas, and this is the evil empire, while the other city is centered in Boulder, Colorado.

Continually throughout the novel, the good citizens of Boulder must struggle against the evil in Las Vegas, and their battle culminates in nuclear weapons destroying the evil city. As the evil leader Randall Flagg notes, "The place where you made your stand never mattered. Only that you were there...and still on your feet" (King 1138). Thus, both groups make their "stand," and only one can triumph.

The good are represented by characters like Mother Abigail, who leads her "disciples" to Boulder, and people like Ralph Brentner: "He was a simple soul, but canny...he was a good sort to have around when things weren't going just right..." (King 669). Each character clearly represents good or evil, but the plot also moves along the theme of the novel as the people settle down under their chosen leader and begin to recreate their lives.

One of Flagg's followers sums up their ultimate evil this way: "It is said that the two great human sins are pride and hate. Are they? I elect to think of them as the two great virtues. To give away pride and hate is to say you will change for the good of the world. To vent them is more noble; that is to say the world must change for the good of you" (King 857).

These themes course through the novel and each character is responsible for the constant evidence of the theme, and the people's responses. The purpose in the central core of the novel, and the reader cannot help but feel it throughout the pages. Each character embodies the purpose, whether they are good or evil, and each moment in the plot moves the purpose along to the ultimate and only conclusion. As King says at the end of the novel, "Life.