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Literary Analysis of Stephen Kings the Stand EssayPeople behave strangely when more(prenominal) than ninety-nine percent of the population is dead. They behave even more strangely when theyre the prize of a cosmic struggle. In Stephen Kings fantasy/horror, The Stand, a plague created by the military decimates the modern world. The public that survived the plague atomic number 18 now the commodity of the personifications of heavy and demonic, the troops in an epic whollyy proportioned conflict. The book begins with the circularise and origin of the plague and the toll it takes on civilization and the population. Its spread through the nation, and then throughout the world, brings chaos in martial law, with horrible atrocities universe committed by many of those still alive and in power. force brutality is rampant, and all(prenominal) human rights are being ignored or even deliberately violated civilization and society are disintegrating in the compositors case of mass de ath. Meanwhile, the survivors are struggling to endure the psychological burden of being alone and tending to the dead and dying. They begin to find each other, but are plagued by horrible nightmares, the embodiment of their worst fears come to haunt them in their dreamland.These begin to be counterbalanced by dreams of a benevolent old woman, and all of the living and still-functioning coalesce around these two figures. A society forms around each one of death, in Las Vegas around Flagg, and one of life, in Boulder, Colorado, around yield Abagail. As powers converge and events unfold, the future fate of humanity is decided. The Walkin Dude the dark man the man with no face him Randall Flagg. The purest embodiment of evil, not solitary(prenominal) is he privy to an occasional demonic countenance, he is even sometimes allegorically referenced to the Devil.He is depicted as sowing death and discord with his very presence, present them to be integral parts of his nature when he grin s, birds shine dead off telephone lines. The grass yellows up and dies where he spits. . . . . His name is Legion. . . . . He back end call the wolves and live in the crows. Hes the king of nowhere (939). The dark man is terror personified, and even those that are loyal to him feel a primeval fear and animal loathing of him. However, evil is a relative thing, and can however be named as such if there is a impede to it. In this case, it is Mother Abagail.She is the safety and comfort of a mothers arms, the warmth and love of a good home she is human in a way Flagg is not and therefore subject to the weakness of humanity. Wise and kind though she may be, she is understandably bitter about her fate to go away(predicate) with strangers from all the things you love best and die in a strange land with the work not yet finished (607). Eventually, she offends God with the sin of Pride, and must(prenominal) go on a pilgr two-baser out into the desert (a very appropriate biblical paral lel) to get right with God (940), a pursuit which, in the end, results in her demise.However, the divine wisdom she gained on this pilgrimage, she put to use in her ordering of the journey of the four to the West, resulting in the end of Flaggs reign and liberty for the hoi polloi of the aptly-named Free Zone. One-hundred-and-eight years old, Mother Abagail is both an icon of vitality and frailty she represents the dual, paradoxical, and precarious nature of good present in both people and civilization as a whole.Mother Abagails final action was to send a quest she began the group of people at her deathbed namely Stu Redman, Glen Bateman, Ralph Brentner, and Larry undergrowth on a perilous journey West, to destroy Flagg. Of these four characters (though they are obviously the primary focus of the end part of the novel) Ralph is probably the least important, him and Glen being fairly minor characters that rarely if ever are given voice by King. Stu, however, is the leader of bot h this group and the entire Free Zone, and also the early major character we are introduced to and the storys primary protagonist.Through his eyes, we see the progenitor of the disease weave his car into a gas carry and open Pandoras Box to the world, the struggle of a dying government to contain what is already far beyond its reach, and the eventual convergence of people and regrouping of society. He is the sturdy, masculine, and conventionally established image of modern strength and hope arising from tragedy. Throughout the story, he serves as a voice of reason and calm diplomacy he is a man who understands the world and people of it. Often, Stu is characterized as a man who doesnt talk much (598) r a man of few words (402), and as being extremely perceptive and intelligent he is quite skillful at inferring peoples thoughts through his distinctive silent observation. He is a stoic, strong character that embodies the spirit necessary to thrive and survive in this strange new wo rld. Glen Bateman is a sociologist, an invaluable asset to the construction of a new society. Though in and of himself a rather minor main character, he plays a hugely important role throughout the novel as the watercraft of Stephen King.When a point is to be made about the ramifications of the superflu or ensuing human behaviors, it is almost always done through Glen. Though often cynical (if you want to short-circuit the democratic process, just ask a sociologist) (749), he provides analyses such as these Man may have been made in the image of God, but human society was made in the image of His opposite number and is always trying to get back home (458) ones that are implausibly valuable and insightful, and provide a unique but accurate viewpoint on the big picture.Glen provides an opportunity for King to force-feed readers the main ideas they may not have unders as well asd or picked up on for themselves. Larry is a tortured soul. A rising musician in the West, he gets involved with hot drugs, loses the means to pay for them, and so flees to the East, joining his mother in New York. He is constantly haunted by the condemnations of a woman he slept with and ramshackle You aint no nice guy (106) and the words of a friend of his from back West theres something in you thats like blistering on tinfoil (817).Without fail, these two phrases always accompany a Larry Underwood attack of conscience, most heavily when those he considers to be under his care tackle an unfortunate fate. A defining moment for him occurs when the woman he has been traveling with dies of pill overdose, and he is left alone he traverses the northeast U. S. on foot, too terrified by the thought of wrecking with nobody to help him to use the motorcycle he had been before. As he fights the terror and psychological torment of solitude, belatedly unraveling, he meets others along the way, and begins to find the strength and good within himself to lead and help and heal.After he has grudg ingly taken on and essentially begun to well a group of twenty or so people, Judge Farris, an extremely intelligent old man that is traveling with him, calls him all the things the civics books tell us the good citizens should be . . . . They make the best leaders in a democracy because they are unlikely to fall in love with power (728). Larry is the redemption that only comes through great suffering and turmoil. The Stand mostly takes place in a desolate, dead America of the 1990s. Its a place that is both lustrous in its opportunity and foreboding in its vast emptiness.As the resultant of a non-cataclysmic apocalypse, there is very little damage to the infrastructure of the nation all in all the machinery is just sitting there, waiting for someone to come along . . . and start it up again (406). Several characters note consistently the dangers inherent in having all the old tools lying around the temptation to resurrect the old, destructive ways is greatly increased by the she er ease with which it could be done. The empty, devoid-of-life landscape, coupled with the only temporarily dormant tools adds a new dimension of danger to the already unpleasant situation of those that survived the plague.King prefers to make his characters the masters of their own fates. Each is presented with his or her own choice, where, in that one and usually only instant, they are completely aware of the ramifications of their actions, which power they are aligning themselves with, and the consequences of doing so. Some manage to abstain from the temptingness of evil, while others succumb to it hopelessly For just a moment part of his mind cried Harold Stop so strongly that he was shaken to his heels . . . . For that moment it seemed he could put the bitter drink away, pour it out of the cup, and refill it with whatever there was for him in this world. . . . but maybe it was already too late (663). Typically, those that fall are those that are particularly sad or lonely or felt themselves to be outcasts in the now-dead world. The pain nurtures a destructive hate in their hearts, a pain that the dark man can speak to and win over. Evil is innately destructive, while good is naturally an assembling force. King describes evil as only capable of destroying, and therefore only able to cannibalize itself nothing constructed by one of evil will endure things fall apart, the meaning does not hold.Good being the complement to evil, it of course has a congruously opposite structure though the edges may tatter and fray, the center is strong because it is based on the people and what they wish to uphold in their deepest selves. Stephen Kings Stand is an all-encompassing work it contains elements of social and religious commentary, supernatural creatures, romance, murder, insanity, loneliness, family, etc. These elements comprise a work detailing the human experience, viewed through the distorted lens of group and individual psychological shock.