Neesy
#1 fan (Annie Wilkes cousin) 1st cousin Mom's side
Welcome to the SKMB! It's stout, Neese.
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Welcome to the SKMB! It's stout, Neese.
I think the creature in It is an allegory for age.
The whole book is about the transition from youth to adulthood.
What are adults but children who have shape-shifted into monstrosities of their former perfect selves?
Ok, maybe we're both right. Or both wrong. Or both just silly stout beer drinkers.
To put this in context, the monstrosities of Lovecraft are dwarfed by the Deadlights. (...) Mighty Cthulhu who towers like Godzilla is still but a mote in the eye of the Deadlights.
The various monsters of Lovecraft were aliens, most often from outer space. This means they are still from our reality however horrific. (...) Pennywise (or It) for lack of a better name is a physical manifestation of the real monster, and in that physical incarnation it certainly can be compared to the horrific monsters of Lovecraft's imagination, things so horrific that madness seems to follow perception of them. But once you are beyond the physical and get down to brass tacks we are really talking about something else, the mother lode of "outside evil," the source so to speak.
The "Deadlights" don't seem to be just one creature but rather an amalgam of all that is wrong and "outside" reality. The real entity, better known as the Deadlights, exists far beyond our reality where it is barred from entering in its true, maniac lack of form. It is the unmaking for a lack of a better word. It reaches out and into our world through pinholes in the barrier which keeps it "outside" and these fingers take on physical form and a semblance of sentience beyond the hate and insanity.
beer!
It's stout, Neese.
And that means that George Denbrough (among others) has been killed by nothing. Nothing actually happened. It's not just that the characters forget what happened because it was too horrible, just like IT readers tend to forget parts of the novel. It is that after whatever happened happened, it turns out that strictly nothing happened, and this is why the ink in Mike's index notebook does fade and disappear.
Well, first things first. I'm not entirely convinced that the "my monster is bigger than yours" approach is the most relevant one, yet it seems to be the one you chose:
Secondly, when Stephen King goes into a concise discussion of the movie X: The Man With the X-Ray Eyes (Danse Macabre, chapter 6, 10), he writes: "the movie becomes lovecraftian in a different, and purer, fashion than in Alien" (sorry for this inexact quote, my edition of the book is in French, and I couldn't find the original sentence over the Net; I underline the adjective).
Hum. I am no Lovecraft specialist, but this is what I understood. In Lovecraft, you find some repulsive "monsters" that do belong to our universe (such as the Elder Things, their Shoggoths or the Mi-Go). But you also find entities (Yog-Sothoth or Azathoth) whose nature is unclear, possibly material but also, very possibly, from another dimension or another universe with different space-time laws. And by the way, it seems to me that the Turtle is very much physical (IT, chapter 22, 2) - and It was somehow fabricated by the Turtle, if I got it right. Also, It comes to Earth in something that our minds interpret as a spaceship (chapter 15, 5). But if It was a non-physical entity, why come to Earth "in" anything, spaceship or what have you? Why not simply surge into our reality, or blend with it?
In other words, my point is that maybe the Lovecraftian entities known as the Great Old Ones are not as physical as they seem, notwithstanding their material aspect; and reciprocally, maybe It is not as non-physical as it would seem.
And let's try to get a little deeper into metaphysics here. There's our world in which there are some very materialistic horrors (car accidents, for instance). There could be horrible unknown species in our world. There could be horrible life forms from other worlds in this universe (your standard Mi-Go for instance). There could be other universes with different physical laws that would be still "compatible" with our own (possibly the insects, birds etc. in The Mist). And there could be a strange yet natural aspect of reality that would be entirely non-material (ergo without any "physical laws" of any kind) but which could enter into our physical reality. Now. If It is from such an "aspect" of reality, as you seem to believe, then...
Then it would explain a lot. First, if It is real and natural, that settles the debate whether It is some kind of natural cycle (it is). It also settles the question Mike asks himself, about what It actually feeds on (some real and natural part of ourselves - meat or emotion, who cares?). It also explains why It is in fact female and breeding (if It is a non-physical entity, this gruesome business described in chapter 22, 9, doesn't make any sense). All of these are not just hallucinations, as they would be if It were purely a non-physical being.
Second, and way more interestingly I think, it explains why It appears to each person under the guise of this person's worst fears: It simply adapts to the physical laws of our world, in which we have eyes, and nerves, and muscles, and brains, although all these organs may be as abstract concepts to It as the deadlights are an abstract concept to us. Thirdly, it would mean that Its shapeshifting "body" as Pennywise or the Spider is not the vessel "inside" which one finds Its "intelligence", but that these bodies are rather like Its door towards our material reality. The so-called "Kill" (chapter 23, 2) would be better called "The Closing of The Door" (but that would be way less heroic, I guess)... and this would imply that even if the Spider is dead, well... the deadlights still glow somewhere beyond our universe, looking for another door (and that would explain why "Pennywise lives", ha-ha).
And third, for the worse part, dear friends and good neighbours (to quote Tom Rogan). Both non-material yet natural and real... This, in metaphysics, is called the non-being. And that means that George Denbrough (among others) has been killed by nothing. Nothing actually happened. It's not just that the characters forget what happened because it was too horrible, just like IT readers tend to forget parts of the novel. It is that after whatever happened happened, it turns out that strictly nothing happened, and this is why the ink in Mike's index notebook does fade and disappear. Pretty much like after you've crossed a stream by using two rocks which you alternatively move around and stand upon: in the end, both rocks are on the other side of the stream next to you, and yet no trace remains of your crossing. None whatsoever.
Let's conclude: if Robert Gray's explanation is correct, then it implies that Derry residents are extremely wise when they display their "special way of looking the other way" - because in fact nothing happens in Derry.
or maybe we are both "stout" (perish the thought!) I plan on doing a lot of walking while up in Baker Lake this coming week. Do you think I should indulge myself and read "Mr. Mercedes" up there? (or save it for when I get back?) - it is not like there is much to do up there in terms of tourist attractions.Ok, maybe we're both right. Or both wrong. Or both just silly stout beer drinkers.
I am not a fellow and how did you know my name was Porter?It's porter, fellows!
Boy howdy... reading Robert Gray's and PanLoki's posts are like reading an annotated version of IT. Y'all have really studied this novel!
No way, I fully enjoyed that latest exchange and think I now have a better understanding of the most confusing part (for me) of this story. Thanks...I can't speak for PanLoki, but I just have a very good memory (particularly for books I enjoy) and have read this particular tale many times. Hopefully, we don't come off as dry and uninteresting.
I am not a fellow and how did you know my name was Porter?
I can't speak for PanLoki, but I just have a very good memory (particularly for books I enjoy) and have read this particular tale many times. Hopefully, we don't come off as dry and uninteresting.
...Porter Fellows?????...ain't he the one win the spangly leisure suit what sang with Dolly Pardons??????....I am not a fellow and how did you know my name was Porter?