The Long Walk

Hello beautiful people,

Okay, we're back.  Here at Whiskey Before Breakfast, Zach and I took a brief hiatus from our weekly postings to acknowledge our final exams.  Thank you for your patience.  And your thunderous applause. 

When Stephen King was a freshman at the University of Maine in 1966-67, he wrote his first novella, entitled The Long Walk.  He published this story in 1979 under the pseudonym Richard Bachman (among several other stories, called the "Bachman Books").

The Long Walk takes place in the not-too-distant future (for all you dystopian lovers).  The U.S. is now a totalitarian police state, and each year on May 1st, the government randomly selects one hundred teenage boys to participate in The Long Walk.  The rules are simple: you must stay on the road and maintain a constant speed of four miles per hour.  If you fall below that speed for thirty seconds, you receive a warning.  If you exceed three warnings, you will be shot (the characters call it "getting your ticket").  The last man standing receives The Prize: anything and everything he wants for the rest of his life.

The narrative is told through the eyes of sixteen year-old Ray Garraty, Contestant Number 47.  We know little of Ray's past except that his father was taken away (and presumably killed) by the government, and that he was raised by his mother.  He has a girlfriend named Jan, about whom he daydreams and fantasizes.  Ray does not know why he is a part of The Long Walk; he just knows that he didn't back out when he had the chance.  With each step, he becomes more unsure of his sense of place and purpose. 

I hardly know where to begin with this story.  This isn't a thriller about clowns or monsters or Mockingjays.  The Long Walk is raw and gritty and in-your-face from start to finish.  We watch Ray's optimism in the beginning of the story spiral downward into the torturous, hellish experience of the final chapters.  Stephen King brilliantly captures the Walkers' excruciating physical pain as well as their deep spiritual contemplation; as Ray becomes physically depleted and exhausted, his mind descends into insanity, and he questions the purpose of life and the value of human relationships.  He befriends several of his fellow Walkers, and their camaraderie in the face of certain death is incredibly complex and powerful. 

I think The Long Walk can be seen as a metaphor for the Vietnam War (or maybe any war): the lottery-type draft on TV, the horror of watching young friends die without dignity, and the sheer meaninglessness of "victory"--because even if you win, you lose everything.  

As always, Stephen King tells the truth.  I don't think there is any higher praise for a storyteller.  The Long Walk will haunt you; it will strike a chord deep inside you, and you might hate it.  That being said, this story will teach you what it is to be human, and what it means to be alive. 

"But of course it had hurt.  It had hurt before, in the worst, rupturing way, knowing that there would be no more you but the universe would roll on just the same, unharmed and unhampered." 

--Spence