Can somebody tell me why a novel like The Stand is such a long novel? I haven't read/found it yet/had the money to even search for it realistically. I just was wondering what made the book (one version at least) almost 1200 pages. Was there a crap load of world/situation building, or what was it if not that?
King wrote the orginal version with many characters, and each one with long stretches of individual story development. The result was so long that he had to remove large portions of it to get it published. Since then, he became a writer of stature, so was able to restore the story to its original length. To some extent, King is guilty of self indulgence. The original shorter published version seemed quite adequate to me, and I'm not conviced that reloading all the original material made it a better book.
I tried several times to read that book. About fifty pages in was about all I could do. I've read a lot of King, but that was just to much. He tends to ramble a lot. I read Needful Things a few months ago and that was the last King book I'll read for awhile. Gah. Too much rambling...
The movie is, like, eight hours long. I rented it this summer, not knowing what it was about. Took me three nights to watch the whole thing. I haven't read the book, although I do like Stephen King. I think my favorite of his is Misery.
Haha, yeah. I didn't look at it too closely when I rented it. I lived across the street from a Blockbuster this summer, and ended up watching almost every movie in their Horror section. There are some really bad horror movies out there... Anyway, getting off topic. The Stand. Really freaking long. Yeah...
I read it when I was in 7th Grade and became obsessed with it. The character-driven storytelling, the moral background, the pure drama...I loved it. I would sneak-read it during LA class as my teacher would drone on and on about something or other. I couldn't wait to get home each day to read more. It took me about a week to get through it, but when I finished it, I felt as if I had just returned from a different world. My mind did not want to come back to my real life, and I actually fell into a bit of a depression after that. And to get back on topic...yeah, long book.
Is there a whole bunch of setting up the situation or is it pretty much primarily that it jumps right into getting to know the characters (if a little bit of a trying endeavor to get through, which I've actually heard before)?
I've not seen this new version of The Stand, but if I know Stephen King, the length comes from long, meandering thought-monologues triggered by every. damned. thing. a character sees, usually winding back and forth in time and revealing more than any sane person could ever want to know about the history, thoughts, and feelings of that character. Just a hunch.
