The Stand and LotR: Part One

I had a full day of teaching and so I didn't get to read any Lovecraft. But, I wrote a rather lengthy comparison of The Stand and The Lord of the Rings last spring. So, I've got your literary analysis covered. Enjoy part one, in which Stephen King explains why the Fellowship didn't just throw the One Ring away:



I recently finished listening to The Stand by Stephen King. During the time I was listening to the book, I also put to rest my great literary shame: I read The Lord of the Rings. When I started on this literary adventure, I did not know how much LoTR had influenced The Stand. I didn’t know this until I was looking up information on Stephen King’s novel about the superflu. King was inspired by Tolkien. He wanted to write a novel with the same scope of The Lord of the Rings, but set in America. His Mordor was set in Las Vegas. He gave his evil character an all-seeing eye. He had the good guys rally around an old person with a knack for speaking cryptically and for disappearing. There are nods to Middle-Earth all over The Stand, but I want to focus this analysis on two main points: the notion of weapons lying around, and how ordinary people, good people even, can be twisted by fear. I think it would be a futile exercise to try and do a one-to-one comparison of the works. For instance, while Stu Redman may be seen as a Frodo, there are differences between the characters as well. The major similarities in these novels does not come in the small details, but rather in the two themes I mentioned above. King throws in just enough details to keep your mind on Tolkien’s work, while still creating one that stands on its own (no pun intended).

To begin with, we need to address one of the elephants in the room that comes with any dissection of Lord of the Rings, and that is its allusion to (or not) of World War II and the atomic bomb. Tolkien was adamant that his works were not allegory. He professed to dislike allegory. And, if you ignore all of the Christian allegory in The Lord of the Rings, maybe you can believe him. As for World War II and the atomic bomb, Tolkien’s insistence gets a little leeway. After all, Middle Earth and the One Ring were designed before World War II came about. Writing in the book took place between 1937 and 1949. The atomic bomb was not used in war until 1945. Save a massive rewrite to accommodate current events, it is safe to assume that the One Ring is not the atomic bomb.

That said, we could go the Death of the Author route here, and basically say that whatever Tolkien has to say about his own work doesn’t really matter, and we can read whatever we want into it, as long as we can support it with evidence. And while Tolkien may not have known about the atomic bomb, he may have conceived of a weapon of mass destruction, something the world had never seen before, and he could have written that, in theory, such a weapon should not be allowed to exist, and if it did exist, it should be destroyed.

We can also say that while Tolkien did not intend for the One Ring to be used as an allegory of the atomic bomb, plenty of modern readers do. It’s quite possible that Stephen King is one of them. But, King doesn’t need a stand in for the atomic bomb. He doesn’t need to create a weapon of mass destruction (though he does with the Captain Trips virus). He has the atomic bomb right there.

One of the things that is said repeatedly in The Stand is that the old world is still there, just waiting for someone to pick it up. While this covers things like generators, cars, infrastructure and the like, it also means weapons. One of the first things anybody does in the book after surviving Captain Trips (I didn’t really care for the term ‘superflu’ as it seemed unimaginative. I’m sticking with Captain Trips) is they grab a gun. They grab lots of guns. I’m pretty sure the only person not carrying a weapon is Mother Abigail. Again, these things are just waiting around. So says Glenn Bateman:

 "If I were being psychoanalyzed, I suppose the shrink would say the dream expresses my unconscious fear of some leader or leaders who will start the whole thing going again. Maybe a fear of technology in general. Because I do believe that all the new societies which arise, at least in the Western world, will have technology as their cornerstone. It's a pity, and it needn't be, but it will be, because we are hooked. They won't remember-or won't choose to remember-the corner we had painted ourselves into. The dirty rivers, the hole in the ozone layer, the atomic bomb, the atmospheric pollution. All they'll remember is that once upon a time they could keep warm at night without expending much effort to do it. I'm a Luddite on top of my other failings, you see." 

While Glenn is worried about a lot of things, it is no coincidence that King has Bateman include the atomic bomb in his warnings. Bateman, King, and now the reader, know that there is real danger just lying around in the world. And a lot of it is picked up by the Trashcan Man:

His Eye could not follow the Trashcan Man, and in some ways Flagg thought that Trash was stranger than he was himself, a kind of human bloodhound who sniffed cordite and napalm and gelignite with deadly radar accuracy. 

 And, of course, Trashcan Man eventually finds an atomic bomb as well. It’s just waiting to be picked up.

Trashcan Man had found what he wanted. He came along a hallway deep underground, a hallway as dark as a mine pit. In his left hand he held a flashlight. In his right hand he held a gun, because it was spooky down here. He was riding an electric tram that rolled almost silently along the wide corridor. The only sound it made was a low, almost subaural hum. The tram consisted of a seat for the driver and a large carry space. Resting in the carry space was an atomic warhead. 

When it comes to The Lord of the Rings, some people ask why Gandalf and company don’t just throw the ring away. Cast it into the sea, or bury it. These people skipped over the Council of Elrond, where exactly that question is brought up.

“Then,” said Glorfindel, “let us cast it into the deeps, and so make the lies of Saruman come true. For it is clear now that even at the Council his feet were already on a crooked path. He knew that the Ring was not lost for ever, but wished us to think so; for he began to lust for it for himself. Yet oft in lies truth is hidden: in the Sea it would be safe.” “Not safe for ever,” said Gandalf. “There are many things in the deep waters; and seas and lands may change. And it is not our part here to take thought for only a season, or a few lives of Men, or for a passing age of the world. We should seek a final end of this menace, even if we do not hope to make one.”

To paraphrase Gandalf the Gray, if you just throw the Ring away, it will be lying there, just waiting to be picked up. Gandalf is saying that even if our lives end, this evil thing will still be there, and then the people who come after us, they’ll be the ones in trouble.

Taken in this light, King might be making a call for a reduction, if not outright elimination, of nuclear weapons. No one should possess a weapon like this. No one side should have that power. Ironically, even Randall Flagg seems to know this, as his reaction to Trashcan Man’s final offering is not one of joy. He seems to be horrified at the fact that Trashcan Man has shown up with a nuclear warhead. Considering he was about to tear two people apart, Flagg doesn’t have the moral high ground, nor does he strike me as the type of person (for lack of a better word) that cares if his people get radiation poisoning or not. How evil is the atomic bomb? So evil, that even The Walkin’ Dude wants nothing to do with it. Lloyd jokes that the Trashcan Man will bring one back, but Flagg doesn’t seem to like it.

 Another indication to just how bad the atomic bomb is? The literal hand of God comes down and detonates it. It seems as if bringing the bomb in was the final crossing of the line. It wasn’t crucifying people, it wasn’t planning an all out assault on an innocent, peaceful people. It was the inclusion of the atomic bomb.

For King, it isn’t a matter of some far off generation finding these dangerous toys. It’s about the current one, and what do we do with it. The real horror of The Stand isn’t Flagg tearing a man to pieces, it isn’t what Larry Underwood goes through in the Lincoln Tunnel, and it isn’t the horrifying realization that Larry and Ralph are going to be torn to pieces. The real horror is that it’s the United States that is developing Captain Trips. That man’s own hubris is going to unleash itself on the world. (And not to go all tinfoil on you, but would anyone be truly surprised if the government wasn’t working on something like this?) The real horror is that we’re our own worst enemy. The only good news is, we’re still here. We could do something about all these dangerous toys that are lying around. 

In The Stand, the survivors don’t really have that option. There aren’t enough of them to do so. Stu thinks the best thing to do is to teach. At the end of the book, Stu reflects on his decision to leave the Free Zone:

 What happens after you give guns to the deputies? he asked himself. What's the logical progression? And it seemed that it was the scholarly, slightly dry voice of Glen Bateman that spoke in answer. You give them bigger guns. And police cars. And when you discover a Free Zone community down in Chile or maybe up in Canada, you make Hugh Petrella the Minister of Defense just in case, and maybe you start sending out search parties, because after all That stuff is lying around, just waiting to be picked up. 

 He asks Fran if she thinks man ever learns anything. She says, “I don’t know.” King is dropping a not so subtle hint here that it’s on us to make sure these things aren’t just lying around, or able to be used on other people. He doesn’t think we’ll pick it up, and in case you thought King was remotely optimistic, he follows Frannie’s declaration of, “I don’t know” with a chapter in which Randall Flag shows up on a beach somewhere and has natives worshiping him as a god.

 Which brings me to the second item, the corruptibility of ordinary people through fear. But, that’s enough for this one post, and I’ll write that up at a later date.