Books - The Green Mile

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	Books - The Green Mile

The Green Mile (1996) is a serial novel by Stephen King, later republished with all six volumes in a trade paperback.

More or less as a challenge, Stephen King published this story as a serial in six parts. Just as in Charles Dickens' time, the story was crafted while the book was already in production. In keeping with the serial concept, the first edition consists of six thin cheap paperbacks.

Since it first appeared, The Green Mile has been republished as a single volume. The first edition contains a section where the narrator speaks directly to the reader; the later edition contains an additional foreword. The novel was left otherwise untouched, though King did change one passage where a character in a straitjacket wipes his brow (a mistake that initially slipped past both him and his editor).

The novel was adapted by Frank Darabont for the screenplay of a feature film of the same name in 1999, directed by Darabont, starring Tom Hanks as Paul Edgecombe and Michael Clarke Duncan as John Coffey.

The main characters are three people on death row and their warders. The book has a clear narrative voice belonging to the captain of the guard, Paul Edgecombe. "The Green Mile" is the corridor from the cells where the prisoners live to the execution room beyond Edgecombe's office. Similar corridors leading to execution rooms at other prisons are called the "last mile". The linoleum flooring of this corridor is green, hence "Green Mile". The story takes place in the 1930s (the book in 1932 and the film in 1934), but there is also a framing plot where Paul is shown as an old man in a nursing home, trying to exorcise the ghosts of his past through writing.

The three prisoners come to the prison at about the same time. The story centers on John Coffey, a seven-foot black man who is convicted of raping and killing two small girls. He is notable because of his size and also for his strange behaviour — he is very quiet and prefers to keep to himself, he weeps almost constantly, and is afraid of the dark. Coffey is described as "know his own name and not much else", and lacks the ability to so much as tie a knot, yet he is convicted of luring the girls away from their home while eluding the watchdog, requiring careful planning and abilities he would not be expected to have. He's also one of the calmest and mildest prisoners the warders have ever seen. Besides John Coffey, there are two other prisoners on the cell block during the period the book focuses on. One of them, Eduard Delacroix, a convicted arsonist, rapist, and murderer, is small and cowardly (the actions which led to his conviction being described as "the only crime he had in him"). The other, William Wharton, is tough and boasting, claiming to be a modern Billy the Kid.

The story also features Mr. Jingles, a small and unnaturally intelligent mouse who befriends Delacroix. The mouse learns various tricks and appears to follow commands; Delacroix insists that the mouse whispers things in his ear.

Over time, the warders realize that there is something else special about John Coffey, as he is revealed to possess mystical healing abilities.

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