Something’s going to happen. And they know it.
The birds passed, presumably alighting somewhere en masse farther south. Another animal crashed by then... and another. Then there was a silence except for the steady rumble of the Kenduskeag. The silence had a waiting quality about it, a pregnant quality Richie didn’t like. He felt the hairs shifting and trying to stand up on the back of his neck and he groped for Mike’s hand... Mike’s hand tightened on his and he realized that now the silence had been broken. There was a steady low vibration- he could feel it more than hear it, working against the tight flesh of his eardrums, buzzing the tiny bones that conducted the sound. It grew steadily. It had no tone, it simply was a tuneless, soulless sound. He groped for the tree they stood near and as his hand touched it, cupped the curve of the bole, he could feel the vibration caught inside. At the same moment he realized he could feel it in his feet, a steady tingling that went up his ankles and calves to his knees, turning his tendons into tuning forks.
It grew. And grew.
It was coming out of the sky... the sun was a molten coin burning a circle in the low-hanging overcast, sourrounded by a fairy-ring of moisture. Below it, the verdant green slash that was the Barrens lay utterly still. Richie thought he understood what this vision was: they were about to see the coming of It...
It! He screamed at Mike, in an ecstasy of terror now- never in his life, before or after, would he feel any emotion so deeply, be so overwhelmed by feeling. It! It! It!” (King, 766-768).
This scene is being described by a narrator who is neutral and uninvolved in the story; this means that it’s an unbiased description or the events taking place in this part of the book. The primary focus of this section is on Mike Hanlon and Richie Tozier, two of the main characters, as well as IT itself. Mike is a black man living in Derry, Maine. He was the member of the “losers club” (Mike, Richie, Stan, Beverly, Bill, Ben and Eddie) to recognize that IT was back, and one of the first losers to see IT in person (IT appeared to him as a giant bird as a child, which ties into the purpose of birds appearing in this scene). It’s fitting that he is such a pivotal part of this scene in which IT arises. Richie is a famous radio show host who fled from Derry and forgot about the whole incident almost immediately after the losers fought IT in the 50’s. It makes sense for him to be witnessing the rise of IT, however, because he was the only loser who did not believe that IT was real. Richie thought he was going crazy, until the fear he feels in this scene makes him realize how painfully serious the situation was. The vocabulary in this scene is the strongest builder of pathos; a specific example of this is the use of the word “pregnant”. It seems like a normal descriptor upon first glance, but King’s repeated use of this term in the most disquieting scenes in the book builds an extreme sense of discomfort in the reader every time the word is used. In particular, the connotations King builds with this word tie back to the chapter “Stanley Uris Takes A Bath”, in which Stan commits Suicide upon hearing the news that IT has returned. The chapter begins by describing Stan and Patty’s difficulty conceiving a child, and ends with Patty’s discovery of her husband’s dead body. In this scene, one of the most disturbing lines is, “The gashes glared red-purple in the harsh white light. She thought the exposed tendons and ligaments looked like cuts of cheap beef. A drop of water gathered at the lip of the shiny chromium faucet. It grew far. Grew pregnant.” It also ties, later in the book, to the literal pregnancy of IT. “Whatever It is beyond what we can see, this representation is at least symbolically correct: It’s female, and It’s pregnant... It was pregnant then and none of us knew except Stan, oh Jesus Christ YES, it was Stan, Stan, not Mike, Stan who understood...” (King, 1065). This scene towards the end of the book ties the other two scenes described together and releases the building sense of discomfort; in my eyes, these three scenes are the most critical in the building of King’s appeal to pathos throughout this novel. All three spark fear and discomfort and uphold them throughout the entirety of the book. This is what ultimately makes the book so scary; it’s cyclical, everything is interwoven in a rhetorical manner that consistently overwhelms the reader with fear.
*EDIT 9/15: I just realized that I hit save instead of publish! My bad!
This scene is being described by a narrator who is neutral and uninvolved in the story; this means that it’s an unbiased description or the events taking place in this part of the book. The primary focus of this section is on Mike Hanlon and Richie Tozier, two of the main characters, as well as IT itself. Mike is a black man living in Derry, Maine. He was the member of the “losers club” (Mike, Richie, Stan, Beverly, Bill, Ben and Eddie) to recognize that IT was back, and one of the first losers to see IT in person (IT appeared to him as a giant bird as a child, which ties into the purpose of birds appearing in this scene). It’s fitting that he is such a pivotal part of this scene in which IT arises. Richie is a famous radio show host who fled from Derry and forgot about the whole incident almost immediately after the losers fought IT in the 50’s. It makes sense for him to be witnessing the rise of IT, however, because he was the only loser who did not believe that IT was real. Richie thought he was going crazy, until the fear he feels in this scene makes him realize how painfully serious the situation was. The vocabulary in this scene is the strongest builder of pathos; a specific example of this is the use of the word “pregnant”. It seems like a normal descriptor upon first glance, but King’s repeated use of this term in the most disquieting scenes in the book builds an extreme sense of discomfort in the reader every time the word is used. In particular, the connotations King builds with this word tie back to the chapter “Stanley Uris Takes A Bath”, in which Stan commits Suicide upon hearing the news that IT has returned. The chapter begins by describing Stan and Patty’s difficulty conceiving a child, and ends with Patty’s discovery of her husband’s dead body. In this scene, one of the most disturbing lines is, “The gashes glared red-purple in the harsh white light. She thought the exposed tendons and ligaments looked like cuts of cheap beef. A drop of water gathered at the lip of the shiny chromium faucet. It grew far. Grew pregnant.” It also ties, later in the book, to the literal pregnancy of IT. “Whatever It is beyond what we can see, this representation is at least symbolically correct: It’s female, and It’s pregnant... It was pregnant then and none of us knew except Stan, oh Jesus Christ YES, it was Stan, Stan, not Mike, Stan who understood...” (King, 1065). This scene towards the end of the book ties the other two scenes described together and releases the building sense of discomfort; in my eyes, these three scenes are the most critical in the building of King’s appeal to pathos throughout this novel. All three spark fear and discomfort and uphold them throughout the entirety of the book. This is what ultimately makes the book so scary; it’s cyclical, everything is interwoven in a rhetorical manner that consistently overwhelms the reader with fear.
*EDIT 9/15: I just realized that I hit save instead of publish! My bad!
No comments:
Post a Comment