The Dark Tower Q&A - Ask a question, get an answer! *spoilers*

[alinda]

Glad you have joined in... post away, its hard to use the search engine with out proper wording so good luck, I am sure there are symbol pics located somewhere.

[Letti]

Here are the ones I have on my computer:

[SLG]

Here are the ones I have on my computer:

Thanks!

[Letti]

my pleasure

[gsvec]

The Dark Tower Compendium store at Cafe Press also has some nice clear images. Here's a link.

[Kidd Ikarus]

Hahaha. I was wondering about this question through the entire read of The Wastelands. I'm glad I wasn't the only one.

[Kidd Ikarus]

Ok. I've been going over this again and again and come up with nothing. I was just reading the Eddie and Susannah thread and another question crossed my mind.

When Eddie is drawn into Mid-World, he is 23 and in his when it is 1987. Henry Dean is 8 years older than Eddie. Eddie was born in 1964 (I believe).

Now, I think Eddie has only been an addict for a few years and Henry was the one who got him into it. Henry became addicted in Viet Nam. Does it ever come up as to when Henry was actually sent to Viet Nam, what age and how long he was there? And are we to believe that Henry was addicted for nearly 12 years before Eddie's drawing?

If I'm incorrect or missing something, please correct me. This has been bothering me for some time now. Thanks.

[Letti]

Huh, sadly I am not a dictionary-headed person so I can be wrong but I don't think Henry became addicted in Viet Nam. Are you totally sure about that?

[alinda]

I never thought that much about all the math ( as time means so little to me
personally, or to the story in my view) but yeah Henry could have been a junkie
for many years, remember that Eddie was skin poppin for some time before he
took the plunge (bad pun not intended) Of course I never thought too much of
the differences in their ages. I saw them as being relatively close in age.

[Kidd Ikarus]

I'm not absolutely certain that he became addicted to it "in" Viet Nam. I remember that he had a serious wound that blew half of his knee off . . . It could possibly be that he became addicted to Morphine or such medicine during the treatment he received after the injury . . .

I don't know why, but for some reason when I first read through, I thought Eddie was drawn in the seventies, so the thought of Henry being in Viet Nam just seemed natural. When I paid more attention to it and realized that Eddie was drawn in the eighties (and not even '82 or '83, but '87!) the thought of Henry being in Viet Nam and only being 8 years older than Eddie has confused me a great deal.

Maybe I'm looking too deep into it. Thanks for the input though!

[alinda]

*shrug* thats what were here for

[Letti]

SK is not so very good at timelines... so everything is possible. Even mistakes.

[MonteGss]

Letti, I distinctly recall him taking the guns off the 2 cops and 'thinking' of bringing them for Eddie & Susannah. Then he actually used the guns outside the train station when faced with the other 2 cops (the ones he thought were pretty good - worthy of being possible Gunslingers of this world). So he used the guns (or one of them anyway) then threw them aside, rushed into the station and jumped in front of the train.
At least that's my recollection of events..... until the next re-read.

Correct.

[sleeplessdwarf]

I'm not absolutely certain that he became addicted to it "in" Viet Nam. I remember that he had a serious wound that blew half of his knee off . . . It could possibly be that he became addicted to Morphine or such medicine during the treatment he received after the injury . . .

I don't know why, but for some reason when I first read through, I thought Eddie was drawn in the seventies, so the thought of Henry being in Viet Nam just seemed natural. When I paid more attention to it and realized that Eddie was drawn in the eighties (and not even '82 or '83, but '87!) the thought of Henry being in Viet Nam and only being 8 years older than Eddie has confused me a great deal.

Maybe I'm looking too deep into it. Thanks for the input though!

I do remember that Henry did become addicted to the morphine after his knee injury. They took him off that using another drug, my guess is methadone. Eddie said he returned from the hospital with a huge monkey on his back. If they used methadone to get him off the morphine, then heroin would be the next step. Just my guess though as the timeline is not that clear to me.

[alinda]

Isn't it interesting that each of us have such varied (or in my case not) memories of his drug abuse. Makes me want to reread TDOTT right now!

[MonteGss]

I do remember that Henry did become addicted to the morphine after his knee injury. They took him off that using another drug, my guess is methadone. Eddie said he returned from the hospital with a huge monkey on his back. If they used methadone to get him off the morphine, then heroin would be the next step. Just my guess though as the timeline is not that clear to me.

This is correct. Heroin came after the war, not during it.

[Darkthoughts]

Merging with "Quick Q&A"

[Kidd Ikarus]

Ok. That's right. I do remember that. However, regardless of the heroin abuse . . . I was much more confused about the timeline of Henry going to Nam. I (personally) just couldn't figure the timeline.

[pixiedark76]

When it comes to time and time frames in the Dark Tower Series:

Just remember that time is funny! The beams are breaking and time can slow down or speed up.

[Kidd Ikarus]

No, I know. And I'm not being rude, I'm just saying in Our World, Eddie Dean's world, isn't time supposed to be as normal as it is to us?

If there is no explanation, there is none . . . If King never went into detail about this particular detail, then there is no helping it . . . I was just very confused (and for a long time) about the particulars of Henry Dean going to the Viet Nam War.

It's just something I've pondered for awhile. If it just is, so to say . . . It just is.

[Matt]

I got the impression Henry was many years older than Eddie...like...10.

Remember, they had a sister inbetween them.

[Jean]

I got the impression Henry was many years older than Eddie...like...10.

Remember, they had a sister inbetween them.

<...>That voice wasn't Henry's, but it was so much like Henry's when they had been just a couple of kids growing up in the Projects, Henry eight years older, the sister who had been between them now only a ghost of memory; Selina had been struck and killed by a car when Eddie was two and Henry ten. <...>
(DT 2)

I do remember that Henry did become addicted to the morphine after his knee injury. They took him off that using another drug, my guess is methadone. Eddie said he returned from the hospital with a huge monkey on his back. If they used methadone to get him off the morphine, then heroin would be the next step. Just my guess though as the timeline is not that clear to me.

This is correct. Heroin came after the war, not during it.

<...>and then Henry got drafted and then it was Viet Nam, where Henry got most of his knee blown off, and the pain was bad, and the drug they gave him for it had a heavy morphine base, and when he was better they weaned him from the drug, only they didn't do such a good job because when Henry got back to New York there was still a monkey on his back, a hungry monkey waiting to be fed, and after a month or two he had gone out to see a man, and it had been about four months later, less than a month after their mother died, when Eddie first saw his brother snorting some white powder off a mirror. Eddie assumed it was coke. Turned out it was heroin. <...>
(DT2)

[Letti]

Jean, thank you so much.

[Jean]

[ManOfWesternesse]

No, I know. And I'm not being rude, I'm just saying in Our World, Eddie Dean's world, isn't time supposed to be as normal as it is to us?

If there is no explanation, there is none . . . If King never went into detail about this particular detail, then there is no helping it . . . I was just very confused (and for a long time) about the particulars of Henry Dean going to the Viet Nam War.

It's just something I've pondered for awhile. If it just is, so to say . . . It just is.

You are perfectly correct. Yes King screwed up the timeline on this one - I remember some discussion on the old .NET site on it, and really there's no way out of the connundrum. It was a bit sloppy, and really should have been spotted in editing.