The Stand Essay, Research Paper

By Stephen King

Stephen King’s The Stand is a thrilling novel that portrays

the forces of good against evil. In the year 1991, a plague

strikes America, leaving only a few thousand people alive who are

“immune” to the epidemic. Of the survivors, those who serve G-d

instinctively join in Boulder, Colorado, while those who worship

the “Dark Man” are drawn to Las Vegas, Nevada. The two groups

separately re-build society, until one must destroy the other.

Franni Goldsmith comes very close to killing herself. She

thinks she can not deal with her parents’ deaths, being unwed and

pregnant, and having the only other survivor in her hometown of

Ogunquit, Main be her recently deceased best friend’s weird brother

Harold Lauder. Fran puts aside her personal feelings for Harold

aside, and goes with him to the place in her dreams, to Boulder,

Colorado.

On their way, they meet up with six people from various states

in the United States who joined them on their journey. Fran is

disturbed by her dreams, as all of them are by their own. She

dreams of an old lady named Abigail, in Colorado. This lady is

kind and loving and promises to protect them from the evil. In the

dreams there is also a “Dark Man”. He is always there lurking,

waiting to attack.

Harold admits to himself that he is in love with Fran and goes

crazy when he realizes how serious Fran has become with Stuart

Redman, one of the newcomers to their traveling group. Harold

becomes insanely jealous and plots to separate them, even if it

means murder.

Harold doesn’t admit it to any of them, but his dreams are

different from theirs. In his dreams the “Dark Man” offers Harold

power and respect, something Harold could never imagine in the

past. Harold knows his destiny is to go to Las Vegas.

The group arrives in Boulder, and soon after are joined by

over one thousand others who dreamt of Abigail and this place.

They inevitably form a society where they settled and has meetings

to decide what they would do about the “Dark Man”. Abigail tells

the people that three of them, including Stuart, must be sent to

destroy the “Dark Man”. Meanwhile Harold secretly leaves with the

“Dark Man’s” bride-to-be, Nadine, to Las Vegas. Harold is ready to

kill Stuart, but is killed instead by “the will of G-d”. Nadine

makes it safely to Las Vegas before Stuart and his two companions

are about to be hanged. Out of the sky “the hand of G-d” comes and

destroys the “Dark Man” sparing the three men. After much

hardship, Stuart returns to Fran and her newborn son and together

they plant the seeds of a new society.

The Stand is a book about human nature. It shows people’s

inclination toward good or evil. Mostly, it shows how it is in

man’s nature to build society and to fight for his beliefs. I

found this book to be extremely entertaining because it was well

written and somewhat realistic, despite it’s supernatural aspects.

I would recommend this book for anyone who enjoys roller coasters,

horror movies, or a good old fashioned suspense novel.