Did Jake know about the fall? How could he?

[Matt]

This has been bothering me so I decided to throw it out there.

Obviously, the Jake that was pulled through the door on Dutch Hill was not the same Jake at the Way Station. The Jake at Dutch Hill was never dropped.

Now I know they told him the story but I seem to remember Jake wondering if Roland would save him this time...this time?

What do you guys think?

[obscurejude]

Wow Matt. I'm going to need to think about it. Thanks for starting the thread.

[ManOfWesternesse]

That's ....... a good question.
I'm pretty sure you're right in saying Jake wondered about '...this time...'
If so, is it a slip-up on SK's part - or did he offer explaination for it?
Another thing to look out for next time round.

[Jean]

am I missing something again? about half the Waste Lands is about how Jake is fighting insanity brought about by the duality of his experience, one of the lines being the one where he is dropped.

[MonteGss]

I'm with Jean on this one. I thought it was the same Jake.

[Brice]

I absolutely agree and really can't even see how it could be another Jake.

[ATG]

I absolutely agree and really can't even see how it could be another Jake.

Totally. There are other worlds than these.

[Jean]

::nods fervently::

I thought it was the whole point?

[jayson]

I was always under the impression it was the same Jake, and that's why he was going crazy the same way Roland was, bc he was trapped in a paradox of time where he both did and didn't go to the Way Station. I thought the paradox ended at Dutch Hill, but I've always thought it was the same Jake, and I guess that answers the question of how he knew about the fall. There's all that stuff about getting back to Roland, "to his world" behind every door. He'd have to have been there to remember all of those things unless he really was going crazy and it was all in his imagination - in which case he wouldn't have made it thru Dutch Hill bc there wouldn't have been a Roland to go back to.

[Matt]

Remember, the reason Jake and Roland were going crazy is because he was never at the ways station.

"There was a boy, there was no boy"

I am absolutely certain there were three Jakes, the first one--the one throughout the story and then the one

Spoiler:

that was Eddies brother.

Unlimited worlds and possibilities of the Tower.

[jayson]

the reason they were going crazy was bc of the paradox that he both was AND wasn't at the way station. roland draws the two lines to show both realities but i think both of those realites are represented in only one Roland and only one Jake, otherwise there'd be no insanity in Jake bc there'd be no paradox in Jake, only in Roland. that Jake goes crazy too suggests to me that it is the same Jake. maybe not the jake toren, but i do think both jake chambers' are the same jake.

[Matt]

That makes some sense but what I am hearing is that there is no body of a young boy under the mountain?

Somehow at the bottom of the fall he returned? Or it never happened--I'm not sure.

However, on more reflection of the original question (because this thing about Jake poses all sorts), I do seem to remember that he "relived" it somehow. And I also seem to remember a place where he tells Roland..."you dropped me" right after they are reunited in this book.

I'm not totally sure how it could work either but I think the question about Jakes actual death under the mountain is somehow key.

[Candice Dionysus]

That makes some sense but what I am hearing is that there is no body of a young boy under the mountain?

Somehow at the bottom of the fall he returned? Or it never happened--I'm not sure.

However, on more reflection of the original question (because this thing about Jake poses all sorts), I do seem to remember that he "relived" it somehow. And I also seem to remember a place where he tells Roland..."you dropped me" right after they are reunited in this book.

I'm not totally sure how it could work either but I think the question about Jakes actual death under the mountain is somehow key.

Ok, I'm not sure if someone mentioned this or not, but the whole reason Jake and Roland were going crazy was because when Roland had to get the medicine to make him better, did he not take over the body of the guy who pushed Jake into traffic to begin with? And that being the case, he also prevented Jake from being pushed, which prevented him from ever ending up at the waystation, which created the paradox that plagued them both.

Jake was technically never with Roland, and so he never fell, which means that no, his body is not there in the mountains because Roland went back and stopped him from ever being a part of the story told in The Gunslinger in the first place. He changed history, took Jake right out of it. So even though we read it, when we read Roland going back and preventing Jake from getting hit by that car, he made everything we read about Jake in the first book false information, but both characters still remember the events, thus the paradox.

That being said, the fact that they were both going crazy means that they do both in fact remembered the events that Roland prevented from happening, because by all truth the events should have happened.

[Unfound One]

Jake was technically never with Roland, and so he never fell, which means that no, his body is not there in the mountains because Roland went back and stopped him from ever being a part of the story told in The Gunslinger in the first place. He changed history, took Jake right out of it. So even though we read it, when we read Roland going back and preventing Jake from getting hit by that car, he made everything we read about Jake in the first book false information, but both characters still remember the events, thus the paradox.

That being said, the fact that they were both going crazy means that they do both in fact remembered the events that Roland prevented from happening, because by all truth the events should have happened.

ahhh this makes a lot of sense.
i still don't want to believe that the events of book one NEVER HAPPENED.
i still see it as a chain of events, but i guess i need to change how i think about it?
it's so confusing!

[Letti]

Jake was technically never with Roland, and so he never fell, which means that no, his body is not there in the mountains because Roland went back and stopped him from ever being a part of the story told in The Gunslinger in the first place. He changed history, took Jake right out of it. So even though we read it, when we read Roland going back and preventing Jake from getting hit by that car, he made everything we read about Jake in the first book false information, but both characters still remember the events, thus the paradox.

That being said, the fact that they were both going crazy means that they do both in fact remembered the events that Roland prevented from happening, because by all truth the events should have happened.

ahhh this makes a lot of sense.
i still don't want to believe that the events of book one NEVER HAPPENED.
i still see it as a chain of events, but i guess i need to change how i think about it?
it's so confusing!

Just try to imagine how they felt if you yourself find it very confusing.

[Ves'Ka Gan]

That makes some sense but what I am hearing is that there is no body of a young boy under the mountain?

Somehow at the bottom of the fall he returned? Or it never happened--I'm not sure.

However, on more reflection of the original question (because this thing about Jake poses all sorts), I do seem to remember that he "relived" it somehow. And I also seem to remember a place where he tells Roland..."you dropped me" right after they are reunited in this book.

I'm not totally sure how it could work either but I think the question about Jakes actual death under the mountain is somehow key.

But when Roland goes through the third door, he saves Jake from being thrown in front of the Cadillac (in some way--we know that there was issues about it not being the "right" day, but we know he didn't die under the wheels of a car).

If he doesn't die in the streets of New York, he can't go to the Way Station, and Roland can't drop him. That's where the duality that causes Jake's insanity occurs. He remembers dying in New York and remembers all the events afterward, but his brain is arguing with him. Even in his "My Understanding of the Truth" poem, he says that Roland dropped him.

I believe that he did die when Roland dropped him...

[Brice]

I agree Jake both was and wasn't at the way station simultaneously. The situation is similar to the grandfather paradox creating a division in both Roland's and Jake's minds. With Jake's death in Roland's world he both existed and ceased to exist. The reentry of Jake into Roland's world allowed the reversal of this paradox.

[Storyslinger]

I think that as the time went on in Mid-World, after he was drawn through the doorway, the memories from the first/former Jake, reoccured to him. So near the end, yes he knew and remembered.

[jayson]

i guess another related question could be

Spoiler:

is it the same callahan in the calla as the one who jumped in chicago? his memory seems intact

i don't think it's the body that matters but the mind/sprirt/soul whatever you want to call it. callahan was the same, so was jake in my estimation, wherever the bodies may lie.

[Brice]

I think that as the time went on in Mid-World, after he was drawn through the doorway, the memories from the first/former Jake, reoccured to him. So near the end, yes he knew and remembered.

I on the otherhand don't think he forgot at all.

[Storyslinger]

I think that as the time went on in Mid-World, after he was drawn through the doorway, the memories from the first/former Jake, reoccured to him. So near the end, yes he knew and remembered.

I on the otherhand don't think he forgot at all.

With is more than just very possible. Its just to damn hard to know for sure.

[Míchéal]

i always thought it was the same Jake...

[Brice]

A point is though that IF as I suggested Jake simultaneously was at the way station and wasn't and then died and didn't in Roland's world he would have two distinct memory chains of the things that had happened in both possible pasts. This is where the mental confusion came in for him.

[jayson]

A point is though that IF as I suggested Jake simultaneously was at the way station and wasn't and then died and didn't in Roland's world he would have two distinct memory chains of the things that had happened in both possible pasts. This is where the mental confusion came in for him.

i think that is not only A point but THE point. King mentions that "paradox is ended and time is mended" meaning the paradox of jake both being and not being at the way station is the crucial element of that part of the story, and also strongly suggesting it must be the same Jake

[Matt]

I understand you guys and agree, I'm thinking Jake remembered the events.

But did it actually happen then? Roland stopped Jake from being killed...so in the present of this book, Jake was never at the way station.

So when he is pulled back through the door, he never actually went under the mountain right. Or did both?