IT VS The Green Mile

[Aaron]

Which book would you rather re-read: IT or The Green Mile?

This is the third and final round of our Constant Reader Awards. The top ten books advancing from the first two rounds will be competing in a series of polls against each other, based on re-readability. Every book will face-off with each of the other nine books in the top ten. Polls will last one week.

The winner of each poll will have 0.1 points added to its overall score. At the end of the round the scores will be compiled, giving us our true top ten listing and the winning title for the Best Stephen King Book Ever Published.

Please be sure to vote solely based on which book you would rather re-read in each face/off. If you have not read one or both of the titles, please select he "Never Read" option.

[Jean]

It!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Daghain]

Sorry Jean, we're going to cancel each other out.

The Green Mile.

[Jean]

Gr gr gr?

Gr gr gr!

[Daghain]

[mae]

If I'd read It I'd probably still vote for TGM, just because it's always picked on

[jayson]

Easiest decision ever.

I'd rather not read at all than re-read The Green Mile, so It is a no-brainer here.

[Jean]

I'd rather not read at all than re-read The Green Mile, so It is a no-brainer here.

Thus dissipate the last doubts of your ursinity (if there ever were such).

[jayson]

Well if disliking The Green Mile makes me a bear then get me some honey.

[Jean]

Well if disliking The Green Mile makes me a bear then get me some honey.

Not only that, there's been a lot of other unmistakable signs.

Most honey can be found in the Palaver Castle and the Melons thread.

[mae]

Most honey can be found in the Palaver Castle and the Melons thread.

Mmm, honeydews...

[mia/susannah]

I have read The Green Mile, twice so far. I have not read IT completely through as of yet. So I cannot really pick one over the other.

[ManOfWesternesse]

It

[razz]

i hate you. i hate you so much. forcing such a choice.

[William50]

Green Mile. But this was the hardest choice ever.

[Sam]

The Green Mile.

Sorry Jean, but this title really hits me deeply.

[Jean]

Deeper than It?

[Melike]

It...

[Jon]

"It" just never did "it" for me. Then they made it a movie and trashed any admiration I had of the book.

[BROWNINGS CHILDE]

Tough choice, I said It (the infinately better book)
But almost picked Green Mile because I have never reread this very good book, though I have reread It many times.

[Sam]

Deeper than It?

Deeper than It my friend. I spent eight years of my life working inside a prison as an officer and know how great chunks of the public here feel toward correctional officers. Works like King's The Green Mile give correctional officers a humanity that our wonderful public would rather forget about. For me, TGM transcends the page. It was a great story but remains, for me, just a story.

[Jean]

Deeper than It?

Deeper than It my friend. I sopent eight years of my life working inside a prison as an officer and know how great chunks of the public here feel toward correctional officers. Works like King's The Green Mile give correctional officers a humanity that our wonderful public would rather forget about. For me, TGM transcends the page. It was a great story but remains, for me, just a story.

I knew about your working experience before I asked the question - you told about it before, and it impressed me greatly. I perfectly see what you mean; if I had a similar experience, I might have been reading TGM with entirely different eyes - but the question I asked still existed for me, you see: I, like everybody else, have been a kid of eleven once... and It touches me greatly, deeply, on many a personal level. (another thing is that Russian tradition of literature seems to be very different - we have lots of literature concerning both the prisoners and the officers, treating either side with sympathy and understanding...)

[Sam]

Most of the literature I have read, as well as the media, villify correctional officers as corrupt, out of shape (admittedly, I am out of shape), hateful, spiteful, power hungry, and abusive. I have yet to read a tale written by an american author that portrayed my former profession, nay my former life, in a positive light besides King's.

That aside, I also really liked the imagery and idea behind the story. Clearly, John Coffey was a Christ substitution in the story, and the question of how many times has Christ returned only to be executed for something he did not do by the same people he came to save is a very powerful question. The Green Mile had me thinking even before I entered that livelihood.

IT was the ultimate Boogeyman story. The story dealt with the Boogeyman in every form from the childhood fear of it to the bullies that torment us to the hate and racisim that follows into adulthood. IT deals with the horror of living and how we face that horror. It's a very powerful story and one of King's finest, there is no question in my mind about that. IT will stand the test of time and will be one of the classics 100 years from now alongside Frankenstein and Dracula.

BUT, I can't say that IT really touched me beyond the page like The Green Mile did. I was horribly tormented as a child, but my horror wasn't something so insubstantial as the Boogeyman. I wish it had been, but it is our experiences that bring us to where we are. IT never touched any kind of nerve with me and was never anything more than a damn fine read, say sorry.

Having said that, this was still one of the toughest votes for me in the heads up thus far, and I wonder if I made the right choice.

[Jean]

I never felt the book was about Boogeyman, not really. To me it was rather about the kids learning - to use another book's wording - to be a ka-tet, to stand and be true, while the Boogeyman seemed rather a secondary prop (though, of course, not without big merits of his own) enabling the real story to develop.

[samantha]

It still gives me chills.
And no one writes better about coming of age than Stephen King.