Stephen King’s “The Gunslinger The Dark Tower I” An Epic Futuristic Western

Reviewed by Evan La Honta

A universe made up of many worlds including all space and time connected by six beams of energy. In the center of the universe there is a Dark Tower, a medieval castle being destroyed by evil forces. One man good, a Gunslinger, Roland  Deschain. One evil magician, The Man In Black. He must be stopped before he destroys The Beams, The Dark Tower and all of the Worlds that make up our universe.

The Gunslinger Dark Tower I, released originally in 1982, is influenced by westerns, Arthurian legends and Tolkien’s Lord Of The Rings. It is specifically inspired by a Robert Browning poem, “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”. King is known for his brilliant storytelling and calls this series his Magnum Opus, his greatest work.

To be honest , I am not a reader. Books are not my thing. I can’t figure out what it is, but, I am hooked on The Gunslinger and it’s world. Maybe I like stories of good against evil that save the world. Maybe I like books that take you so deep into their world you read page after page before you look up. Maybe I like characters described with so much detail you think they could be real and I am not going to lie, I wish I was with and doing the same things. The Gunslinger is that good, it made a reader out of me.

“Thanks to Mr.Tolkien, the twentieth century had all the elves and wizards it needed”(King,Forward,X). The Lord Of The Rings was an inspiration for this series. Stephen King read them in 1967 and wished to create his own world like Middle Earth. He waited for the big ideas to make it different and better. One day, in the  early 1970’s King saw “The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly” and he knew that his world would be as big as Tolkien’s Middle Earth but be like a western. Roland Deschain is born .

Roland is a loner. All his friends and family are dead. Memories of his life keep him company with his campfire and smokes as he follows his destiny to save the world. Roland is a gunslinger. A vicious, skilled killer. His weapons are the guns of his Father, won in a battle and training. The Gunslinger is the story of Roland’s great quest to save our worlds and how it changes him.

The Gunslinger has loved people, but it ends in betrayal. Either he has betrayed someone or the other way around. His mother and his Girlfriend, the only women he has loved, are examples. Roland always acts without any remorse and keeps going. In The Lord Of The Rings series, The FellowShip Of the Ring is the group who helps frodo destroy the ring and save their world. Roland meets Jake, a 10 year old boy, who joins Roland on his quest to kill The Man in The Dark Tower to save their worlds. Roland grows to love jake like a son. Unfortunately, There is a prophecy that Roland leaves jake to pursue The Man In Black alone. Roland feels something different about betraying jake. “he sat stiffly in the darkness, stunned with horror and terrified ( for the first time in his existence) of the self-loathing that might come afterward’(King, 243).

It has been hard to understand Stephen king’s world of The Dark Tower. People speak differently and time passes by differently , but, it does get easier the more time you spend there. Even though the story is hard to follow sometimes, the way King describes the emotions his characters feel isn’t. “He Felt like a performer placed on center stage minutes the rise of the curtains; settled in position with his first line held securely in his mind, he heard the unseen audience rattling programs and settling in their chairs…”(King,216) In conclusion The Gunslinger Dark Tower I is now my favorite book. I went and bought the second book today to see how it continues. If you like with people in strange situations that after you finish reading don’t feel so so strange anymore, this is your book. If you like Stories that make you want to go on their adventure along their side, this is your book. If you like stories that make you want to read more, this is your book.

King, Stephen. The Gunslinger part I. New York: New American library, 1989.