The Dark Tower (series)

The Dark Tower is a series of books written by American author Stephen King, which incorporates themes from multiple genres, including dark fantasy, science fantasy, horror, and Western. It describes a "gunslinger" and his quest toward a tower, the nature of which is both physical and metaphorical. King has described the series as his magnum opus. In addition to the eight novels of the series proper that comprise 4,250 pages, many of King's other books relate to the story, introducing concepts and characters that come into play as the series progresses. A series of prequel comics followed the completion of the novels.

The series was chiefly inspired by the poem "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" by Robert Browning, whose full text was included in the final volume's appendix. In the preface to the revised 2003 edition of The Gunslinger, King also identifies The Lord of the Rings, Arthurian Legend, and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly as inspirations. He identifies Clint Eastwood's "Man with No Name" character as one of the major inspirations for the protagonist, Roland Deschain. King's style of location names in the series, such as Mid-World, and his development of a unique language abstract to our own (High Speech), are also influenced by J. R. R. Tolkien's work.

Toi

Toi or TOI may refer to:

Toi (song)

"Toi" (English translation: "You") was the Luxembourgish entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1975, performed in French by Irish singer Geraldine. The entry had a high pedigree, being penned by three authors/composers who had all written/composed previous Eurovision winners. Pierre Cour had been partly responsible for the 1960 winner "Tom Pillibi" and Bill Martin and Phil Coulter had created the 1967 winner "Puppet on a String".

The song is a ballad, with Geraldine telling her lover that "my life doesn't exist without you" and pledging her unending love to him. Geraldine recorded the song in two languages; French and her mother tongue English, the latter as "You".

Another singer with a similar name, Géraldine, represented Switzerland in the 1967 Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, finishing last with 'nul points', but as John Kennedy O'Connor's The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official History notes, despite the similarity in name, the two singers are unique. This Geraldine later married the song's composer, Phil Coulter.

Toi (name)

Toi is a fairly common man's name in Māori and other Polynesian languages.

The best known men named Toi are the following from Māori legendary history, who are sometimes confused with one another:

The descendants of Toi-kai-rākau are named Te Tini-a-Toi – the many descendants of Toi. In the part of the Bay of Plenty where the Mataatua canoe landed, these descendants were divided into at least 18 groups or hapu. Sometimes also the name Te Tini o Toi is used.