Unearth the Horror: Carrie Book Review & Analysis
The novel is not long, but after I finished reading it, my hands could not stop shaking. I do not know why either. The novel takes school bullying and female revenge as its themes. Under the setting of “psychic actuation” superpowers, Carrie completes her rebellion against her mother and revenge against her glamorous and stupid classmates. The entire town of Chamberlain is almost destroyed by fire, Water flow, and current.
While reading the novel, I couldn’t help but think about how shocking the movie scenes must be. The multi-angle narration technique makes people know from the beginning that this story will lead to an irreversible ending of destruction, but the delicate psychological description makes people unable to help but follow Carrie, who has been depressed and bullied for many years, to hope for the moment before the explosion. A brief moment of anxious yet sweet tranquility.
The word “blood” throughout the text has multiple symbolic meanings.
The opening chapter shows Carrie having menstruation without knowing it, and all her female classmates watch and laugh at her menstrual blood flowing out in the shower room. That was the first time she realized her own changes and power — in her mother’s view, it was an evil lust, an uncontrolled devil, and an existence that offended the holiness of God. This was not the first time that Carrie rebelled against her mother. In the process, she gradually realized that she had the ability to “telekinesis” and could control objects with her thoughts. I have written several times about my mother’s hysteria and almost crazy religious beliefs, which always seem to be accompanied by the presence of “blood” — the blood that soaked the sheets during childbirth, the blood that scratched my cheeks in anger, the paintings of the crucifixion of Jesus on the wall… ….
Carrie and Tommy were elected queen and king at the dance. She almost thought that the disturbing pranks she predicted would not happen to her again. She almost felt that the boundaries between her and other classmates were gradually getting closer. Melted, she was even able to chat and laugh with people at this dreamy campus spring dance. But the moment still came. The pig’s blood splashed all over her and Tommy, and Tommy might have died on the spot, or he might have just been knocked unconscious — in any case, he died.
Jeers rippled through the gym. Carrie felt the thick, warm pig blood flowing down her thighs. The shower room on the day of menarche appeared in her mind, and she turned on the fire hose to let them have a good wash — and turned on the stage power — letting the current swim around like a poisonous snake with a metallic luster and lick the chaos. The horrified classmates looked at their twisted and stiff bodies…
Oh, there was another fire… The fire razed the entire campus to the ground, causing explosions in gas stations and downtown areas one after another. Carrie was covered in blood. There was the pig’s blood that was poured out in the prank, and there was her own blood.
Before attending the dance, Carrie had another quarrel with her mother, and her mother scratched her face. But now, she wants to go home.
Go kill her.
She didn’t want to go back to the ordained life and live a long and difficult life in guilt and numbness. The mother also sharpened her knife in fear and twisted firm belief, waiting for Carrie’s arrival, and then destroying the witch. Mother was determined, just as she had been when Carrie was born and had her first menstrual period, only this time she was not wavering.
Carrie’s “telekinesis” ability awakened during menarche, exploded when her body was covered in sticky pig blood, and died with her life when she was lying on the ground covered in dried blood.
Stephen King is really a genius in psychological description. He actually grasped the subtle psychological changes of adolescent boys and girls so accurately. The complex and multifaceted nature of human nature, the struggle between the collective desire for evil and conscience, the suspicion of one’s own hypocritical face, the fear of being disgusted with the mediocre life in the future…except for the witch Carrie and her perverted mother, I The one who impressed me the most was Su, that kind-hearted girl. She survived, but she also paid a heavy price. She witnessed the demise of the monstrous rage that swept the world and was pierced by probing eyes, feeling shocked, hurt, and regretful.
The only dissatisfaction with the novel is that the strong translation accent makes the wonderful dialogues and subtle psychological changes less vivid. When I really can’t bear it anymore, I will mentally restore their conversations and mental activities, which makes it feel much more normal. But when it comes to describing the scene, I will forget the discomfort caused by the translation accent and be completely immersed in that world.
If you don’t break out in silence, you will perish in silence. Carrie, Carrie, I don’t know if you are lucky or unlucky to have such superpowers.
