One important thing: It isn’t that I dislike Stephen King’s books, okay? If I didn’t like them, I wouldn’t be able to say that I’ve read six novels by him already. But while many people are just team “King is the King!”, I am sceptic about particular things in his universe. You’re given an impression that he’s a 10/10 writer. I’d say that sometimes he’s 8/10, and he’s a strong 6/10 most of the time. I’ve seen more problematic authors, really. But I’m also glad that many things have changed since the times King’s writing was default.
However, I’m going to write not only about social questions but about particular tropes and solutions on the level of narration.
So, what’s up with the plot? A super-flu kills off 99.9% of humanity and those who’ve survived begin to gather either in Boulder, Colorado (the good ones), or in Las Vegas (the bad ones). The good ones are lead by Mother Abagail, an elderly African-American, and the bad ones are led by Randall Flagg who may be the Devil himself. So, from a typical postapo the plot turns really manichean, and this isn’t necessarily a bad thing unless you consider the dichotomy: There are good and bad characters. Some are quite grey to “reform” themselves, and some appear to have good points but they turn Evil!; and some are plainly Decent Guys and Girls Next Door, and some are the Baddies.
I don’t like such easy definitions, but I can see why they work for King, and it isn’t a solution as cheesy as you may fear. However, it doesn’t pay off when you take his novel as a whole.
Let’s say he wrote about a Deaf boy who was kind and helpful and clever, and about a musician who was quite a jerk in his private life, but who saw his mistakes and really tried to get better, and in the end, he became quite a nice person. You’ve got also a widowed Nice Guy and a pregnant Girl Next Door. So, what does King do with such characters? He kills off the only Deaf person in his novel, and he also kills the guy who had a convincing redemption arc. The Nice Guy and the Girl Next Door, meanwhile, have their happily-ever-after. Ugh.
Honestly, I don’t like such solutions. What is the point of killing the only character with a convincing redemption arc? Or the only full-drawn person with disability? You just get a foreshadowing that the most basic characters in the novel have a plot armour and you don’t need to worry about them. They’ll survive everything, even witnessing the Nuclear Detonation Ex-Machina (which is another annoying plot device). Radiation, fallout… Nothing of this affects the ones who survived because of the wind. Yeah, the wind blows west, our cast is on the east. They’re saved. Hooray! Just remember not to visit California.
Nother idea which wasn’t thought out well is the concept of the bad side being mostly ex-prisoners and people with disorders. Looking deeper into this, it’s quite a toxic message, showing the Bad ones as, literally, maniacs and criminals. Especially if you know how the “justice” system in the US looks like, and how all throughout the world people facing issues with their mental health are treated.
So, is this already the social part of my almost-rambling-review? It is, feel welcomed!
Another thing which struck me about this novel is its approach to people of colour, especially to African-Americans. The Stand isn’t just overwhelmingly white: It is WASP-ishly white, deprived not only from Black or Latino people, but even from, let’s say, Greeks and Italians. But wait, we have Mother Abagail, don’t we? And here’s the problem of making your only Black character a spiritual leader and the source of inspiration. Does it mean that your character is better from any other ones? I’m afraid that it means something else: That Mother Abagail, through being put on a pedestal, is also alienated by stereotype of the Magical N*gro. She’s saintly, she’s pious. She isn’t like ordinary people. And thus she isn’t like the rest of the cast in the novel.
Another thing is how women in general are depicted here. Guys have their redemption or corruption arcs while gals remain mostly the same. If they are virgins (yeah, because that’s important for some reason) obsessed with serving the Dark Lord, they’ll be so to the end. If they are your Girl Next Door, they’ll be so to the end. And please remember that once the Girl Next Door finds a Decent Guy to care for her, she won’t take any action in this novel. She’ll just sit and wait while her boyfriend will have his big adventures including witnessing a nuclear detonation. Any other things to remember? Often King’s novels, and this one is no different, are more about men than about women on literal level. Men are simply more numeorus here and women fall into certain types. If they aren’t nice, they are maniacs or Mean Housewives, and maniacs and Mean Housewives have to be punished. With slapping, the best. And it isn’t funny. Always remember that it isn’t funny.
All these things I’ve mentioned aboce don’t mean that The Stand is a bad novel or that there aren’t any things there I genuinely enjoyed. As usual, though, I’d like to remind you that every popular author and every popular novel has their problems.
Left Hand of Fiction 