Desperation (novel)
Desperation is a novel by the American writer Stephen King from the year 1996 . It was filmed under the same title .
Action in chronological order
The plot in the book is not structured chronologically, but begins today, but even here there are time shifts.
In 1859, many Chinese are employed in the mining town of Desperation to work in the mines. After a while they come across a strange hole in a cave. There are many disgusting little animal figures with demonic power lying around, from which a strange fascination emanates - they are the so-called "can tahs". The Chinese workers touch these figures, succumb to the influence of their evil creator Tak, and begin killing each other. Only two brothers can save themselves and manage to bring the tunnel to collapse. After fleeing into the desert, the two brothers finally succumb to the influence of Tak and return a week later after desperation. Here they are killed by the population.
In the action time of the book, i.e. our present, the cave is exposed again when it is blown up. It can be linked to the collapse of the tunnel in 1859 and the bones of Chinese workers are discovered. At the insistence of the boss Cary Ripton, who wants to savor the fame of the find alone, the others should not let the board know until the next day.
Cary Ripton returns to the mine in the evening and is attacked by the demon Tak - in a manner not described. In Ripton's body, Tak is distributing hundreds of can tahs all over town. It kills all people and their families who were there when it was discovered. Tak notices that Ripton's body has cancer, so the mining worker is falling into disrepair. It returns to the mine and calls Brad Josephson, a friend of Ripton's. He comes to the mine to take photos of the find. Tak takes him by surprise and locks him up. After it shoots all of the miners who came to work, it passes into Josephson's body.
After remaining in Josephson's body for two and a half days, it takes on its next host. This is the cop Collie Entragian who has just returned from a weekend out of town. After passing into this body, Tak begins killing the remaining population of Desperation. At the same time, it apparently attacks travelers on Route 50 at random in order to be able to lock up other hosts as “body supplies”.
The local vet Tom Billingsley got it first. This is followed by the Carver family, the Jacksons and finally the writer Johnny Marinville. After Tak kills the Carvers' daughter and Mary Jackson's husband in the policeman's body, mother Ellen Carver takes it with her to control her body. Little David Carver - who has often been in contact with God since the surprising healing of his unfortunate friend - managed to escape from prison during this period by forcing himself covered with soap through the bars. He frees the others, everyone arm themselves and flee.
In a second strand of the story, Marinville's agent Steve Ames, who was notified by a cell phone call, and Cynthia Smith, who was picked up as a hitchhiker, get into town and cannot escape because of a blocked road. Ames and Smith repeatedly come under the influence of "can tahs", but can ultimately resist. They discover the extent of the rampage and from their narrative perspective it becomes clearest that Tak can also control animals, especially rattlesnakes, spiders, coyotes and vultures, which appear again and again in an orderly manner and are responsible for many of the deaths in Desperation. On the way, they meet the surviving geologist Audrey Wyler, who joins them.
After a call from David using Marinville's phone, the three can team up with the larger group and, on the advice of the veterinarian, go to the old cinema. After some discussions, Tom Billingsley is killed here by a puma sent by Tak. With his last words, he draws the last survivors' attention to the fact that Audrey Wyler must have, in a way, like the cop Entragian, succumbed to Tak's influence, as both have grown. At this point, Audrey tries to murder little David. The others can save him, only Mary Jackson stays with Tom until Tom dies. While the others take care of David, Mary's absence is hardly noticed. Audrey, who has been under the influence of the animal characters, physically disintegrates and dies. Mary is kidnapped and imprisoned by Ellen Carver, whose body Tak now controls, to be used as the next host.
The rest of the group can reconstruct this fact and now tries to save Mary and defeat Tak. You disappear from the cinema and want to go up to the mine. However, Johnny Marinville leaves the group to flee the city alone, but can only escape to one of the buildings, where a wolf attacks him under Tak's influence. Meanwhile, Mary escapes from Tak's captivity and sets off for the city again, with Tak on her heels in Ellen Carver's dying body.
At the same time, David, with his abilities of divine inspiration, can recognize Mary's flight. He himself runs to Marinville to convince him to come back and sends the others off to help Mary.
Mary barely escapes Tak and ultimately the whole group is together again. You decide to seal the mine. They fetch explosives from the camp and go into the exposed tunnel. David's father, who wants to protect his son from an attack by Taks in the form of an eagle (another living being was not available to Tak when Ellen Carver died), is killed. Marinville ensures that David is held by the others, goes alone up to Tak's "home" and blows it up, sacrificing his own life.
Mary Jackson, Cynthia Smith, Steve Ames and David Carver are ultimately the only survivors and make their way home. After the cruelty of God was often discussed, especially in the last part, David finds a handwriting by Marinville in his pocket with the reference to 1 John 4: 8 (“God is love”).
People / pairings
Mary and Peter Jackson are a married couple who brought Peter's sister Deirdre's car to New York. They drive through the semi-desert of Nevada and are stopped on Highway 50 by Entragian because the rear license plate on their car is missing. He gets a reason to take them to the station when he discovers Deirdre's marijuana in the car. The whole thing seems very unusual to Mary and Peter, but they allow themselves to be led away and take them to Desperation. Both discovered strange things before or during the arrest, such as a dead cat on a sign or upturned vehicles. Arriving in Desperation, Entragian kills Peter Jackson for no apparent reason by shooting him four times in the stomach. After a short fight in the cell block, Mary is finally locked up by the police officer.
Ralph, Ellen, David and Kirsten Carver are on their way on vacation when their motorhome comes to a standstill in the desert with four blown tires. Immediately afterwards the policeman shows up and takes the family to the station, apparently for their safety. Here he pushes Kirsten, the seven-year-old Carvers girl, down the stairs and breaks her neck. He locks the other three in the cell block. After a while he takes his mother, Ellen Carver, with him. Apparently the demon needs a new body, so it passes from the police officer Collie Entragian to the mother Ellen Carver in a sequence not described here. The son David, who is very religious, can now free himself and the others. He often prays to God and with his help can create many small miracles, so he can free himself or cell phones suddenly work again. He represents the counterpart to the demon Tak and is partly the actual leader of the group. Ralph seems very weak and insecure throughout the novel. The loss of a daughter and wife intensifies these characteristics.
Johnny Marinville is an aged writer who pursues an idea from his ex-wife Terry and wants to write another book. To do this, he travels through America on a Harley. On Route 50 he is urinating in the desert when the policeman shows up. He smuggles Deirdre's marijuana into the writer's saddlebags, arrests him for it and takes him with him after Desperation. Johnny is a dry alcoholic. In the course of the novel he shows different facets of his character. In this way, he goes from being a self-satisfied egomaniac to a savior in times of need.
Steve Ames is the organizer of Johnny Marinville's tour. At the same time, he always stays about 75 miles behind him on his route in case something unexpected happens. Here he meets Cynthia Smith, a young punk, whom he hitchhikes. The two quickly become friends when Steve receives a call for help from Johnny on his cell phone. He and Cynthia go looking for him and end up in desperation. After some gruesome and macabre situations, they discover that all of the city's residents have been murdered and are ultimately able to join the rest of the group in the cinema. Steve and Cynthia are both different characters, but they are consistently good-hearted and friendly. A love affair between the two is suggested.
Tom Billingsley is the vet in Desperation. He was arrested by Entragian at the beginning of the rampage and was the first to be brought into the cell block. He is the one who leads the group into the locked cinema, because there he often indulged the old days with his friends and knows a secret entrance through the toilets. Tom is also an alcoholic. However, unlike Marinville, it is not dry. After consuming more and more alcohol, he goes back to the toilet alone, where the demon sets a puma on him, who kills Tom. The others can no longer save him.
Audrey Wyler is a scientist and, besides Billingsley, apparently the only survivor of the Collie Entragian rampage. She was the only one who witnessed the full extent of the rampage when she returned from a short vacation. She saw the policeman brutally murder many of the city's residents and was able to hide from him in the local laundry. When Cynthia and Steve are on their way to the cinema, she joins them. There it turns out, however, that Audrey is also under the influence of the demon and tries to kill David. Cynthia, Steve, Johnny and Ralph can stop them and save David's life. Audrey, who comes to and falls apart, drags herself to a very dilapidated gallery in the theater and throws herself down.
Tak is a kind of demon. It can pass into humans or animals. However, the bodies of its hosts gradually disintegrate, so that it has to find a new living being. At the beginning of the novel he is stuck in the police officer Collie Entragian, arrests a lot of people in this guise and kills almost all residents of his hometown. He can also establish a telepathic connection with animals, give them commands and speak in the language of the dead. After Entragian threatens to disintegrate, it passes into Ellen Carver's body. For much of the novel, the main opponent of the demon Tak is the devout David Carver. Tak can take over the abilities and memories of the respective host. In addition, the host's body expands in size and width by several centimeters. This makes it possible to recognize the demon earlier.
useful information
- The novel appeared at the same time as its counterpart Regulator , which was published under King's pseudonym Richard Bachman. In that novel, many people have the same names as in Desperation , even if they are not the same people (Ellen and Ralph are the parents of David and Kirsten in Desperation , in Regulator it's the other way around) and the plot of the two novels exist independently of one another . Both works, however, are about the same demon Tak. Such a “twin birth” had never happened before in the publishing industry.
- The Christian faith plays a big role in Desperation . David Carver is in direct contact with God and leads the group of survivors into battle. During the stay in the cinema there is a clear allusion to the feeding of the 5000 with fish and bread (Mt 14,15ff, Mk 6,35ff, Lk 9,12ff, Jh 6,5ff) in the form of sardines and crackers, which despite consumption don't get less.
- King drove to a little town called Ruth in 1991, which looked so deserted that King couldn't help but wonder who had wiped out the whole population. "The Deputy," he thought, and the idea for Desperation was born.
- For the novel, King invented his own language, which is spoken by Tak and which later appears in the novels about the Dark Tower .
Links with other works
- Tak is also the demon in Regulator .
- The term “can-toi” used by Tak is later used in The Dark Tower for the low men (see also Low men in yellow coats in Atlantis ).
- Cynthia Smith is first encountered at a Relief Society in Das Bild . She is the only person who appears outside of the "twin birth" desperation and regulator and is one of the few characters who do not change their appearance.
- Ellen Carver reads a novel by Paul Sheldon (from You ).
- Secluded cities like Desperation are repeatedly a motif in King's work: Rock and Roll Heaven in Damn Good Band they have here , Willow in rainy season , Crouch End (all three from Nightmares ), Gatlin in Children of Corn (from night shift ).
filming
In 2006 the material was filmed as a 3-hour TV miniseries Desperation . The memorable role of the Collie Entragian took on Ron Perlman ; Steven Weber plays Steve Ames - Weber was last seen in the remake of Shining . As John Edward Marinville, Tom Skerritt appeared, who also once could assert himself in a King film, namely Dead Zone .
References
Web links
- Detailed table of contents in KingWiki!