• Embed Doc
  • Copy Link
  • Readcast
  • Collections
  • CommentGo Back
Download
 
Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American writer of contemporary horror fiction, science fiction, fantasy literature, and screenplays. More than 350 million copies[2] of King's novels and short story collections have been sold, and many of his stories have been adapted for film,television, and other media. King has written a number of books using the penname Richard Bachman, and one short story, "The Fifth Quarter", as JohnSwithen.In 2003 the National Book Foundation awarded King the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters.
Biography
Early life
Stephen King was born in Portland, Maine. When King was two years old, hisfather, who was a merchant seaman, left the family under the pretense of "going to buy a pack of cigarettes", leaving his mother to raise King and hisadopted older brother David by herself, sometimes under great financial strain.The family moved to De Pere, Wisconsin; Fort Wayne, Indiana; and Stratford,Connecticut. When King was eleven years old, the family returned to Durham,Maine, where Ruth King cared for her parents until their deaths. She thenbecame a caterer in a local residential facility for the mentally challenged.[3] As a child, King apparently witnessed one of his friends being struck and killed by a train, though he has no memory of the event. His family told him that after leaving home to play with the boy, King returned, speechless and seemingly in shock. Only later did the family learn of the friend's death. Somecommentators have suggested that this event may have psychologically inspired some of King's darker works[4], but King himself has dismissed theidea.[5]King's primary inspiration for writing horror fiction was related in detail in his1981 non-fiction Danse Macabre, in a chapter titled "An Annoying Autobiographical Pause". King makes a comparison of his uncle successfully dowsing for water using the bough of an apple branch with the suddenrealization of what he wanted to do for a living. While browsing through anattic with his elder brother, King uncovered a paperback version of an H. P.Lovecraft collection of short stories that had belonged to his father. The cover art—an illustration of a monster hiding within the recesses of a hell-like cavernbeneath a tombstone—was, he writes,“the moment of my life when the dowsing rod suddenly went down hard ... asfar as I was concerned, I was on my way.” 
 
Education and early creativity
King attended Durham Elementary School and graduated from Lisbon FallsHigh School in Lisbon Falls, Maine. He displayed an early interest in horror asan avid reader of EC's horror comics, including Tales from the Crypt (he later  paid tribute to the comics in his screenplay for Creepshow). He began writingfor fun while still in school, contributing articles to Dave's Rag, the newspaper that his brother published with a mimeograph machine and later began sellingstories to his friends which were based on movies he had seen (though whendiscovered by his teachers, he was forced to return the profits). The first of hisstories to be independently published was "I Was a Teenage Grave Robber",serialized over three published and one unpublished issue of a fanzine, ComicsReview, in 1965.[6] That story was published the following year in a revised form as "In a Half-World of Terror" in another fanzine, Stories of Suspense,edited by Marv Wolfman.[7]From 1966, King studied English at the University of Maine, where hegraduated in 1970 with a Bachelor of Science in English. He wrote a column for the student newspaper, The Maine Campus, titled "Steve King's GarbageTruck", took part in a writing workshop organized by Burton Hatlen,[1] and took odd jobs to pay for his studies, including one at an industrial laundry. Hesold his first professional short story, "The Glass Floor", to Startling Mystery Stories in 1967.[3] The Fogler Library at UMaine now holds many of King's papers. After leaving the university, King gained a certificate to teach high school but,being unable to find a teaching post immediately, initially supplemented hislaboring wage by selling short stories to men's magazines such as Cavalier.Many of these early stories have been published in the collection "Night Shift".In 1971, King married Tabitha Spruce, a fellow student at the University of Maine whom he had met at the University's Fogler Library after one of Professor Hatlen's workshops.[1] That fall, King was hired as a teacher at Hampden Academy in Hampden, Maine. He continued to contribute short stories to magazines and worked on ideas for novels.[3] It was during thistime that King developed a drinking problem, which stayed with him for morethan a decade.
Success with
Carrie
On Mother's Day, 1973, King's novel Carrie was accepted by publishing houseDoubleday. King has written how he became so discouraged when trying todevelop the idea of a girl with psychic powers into a novel that he threw anearly draft in the trash because he thought it was childish, but his wife,Tabitha, rescued it and encouraged him to finish it.[8] He received a $2,500advance (not large for a novel, even at that time) but the paperback rightseventually earned $400,000, with half going to the publisher. King and hisfamily relocated to southern Maine because of his mother's failing health. At this time, he began writing a book titled Second Coming, later titled  Jerusalem's Lot, before finally changing the title to 'Salem's Lot (published 1975). Soon after the release of Carrie in 1974, his mother died of uterinecancer. His Aunt Emrine read the novel to her before she died. King has
 
written of his severe drinking problem at this time, stating that he was drunk the night before delivering the eulogy at his mother's funeral.[5] After his mother's death, King and his family had moved to Boulder, Colorado,where King wrote The Shining (published 1977). The family returned towestern Maine in 1975, where King completed his fourth novel, The Stand (published 1978). In 1977, the family traveled briefly to England, returning toMaine that fall where King began teaching creative writing at the University of Maine. King has kept his primary residence in Maine ever since.
The Dark Tower books
Main article: The Dark Tower (series)In the late 1970s, King began a series of interconnected stories about a lonegunslinger, Roland, who pursues the "Man in Black" in an alternate-reality universe that is a cross between J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth and the American wild west as depicted by Clint Eastwood and Sergio Leone in their "spaghetti westerns". They were first published in five installments by TheMagazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction under the editorship of Edward L.Ferman, beginning in 1977 and the last in 1981. It would be continued as alarge 7-book epic called The Dark Tower which would be written and published infrequently over four decades, from the 1970s to the 2000s.In 1982, the fantasy small-press Donald M. Grant (known for publishing theentire canon of Robert E. Howard) printed these stories for the first timetogether in hardcover form with color and black-and-white illustrations by thenup-and-coming fantasy artist Michael Whelan, as The Dark Tower: TheGunslinger. Each chapter was named for the story previously published inmagazine form. King dedicated the hardcover edition to his editor at F&SF, Ed Ferman, who "took a chance on these stories." The original print-run was only 10,000 copies, which was, even by this time, a comparatively low run for afirst printing of a King novel in hardcover. His 1980 novel, Firestarter, had aninitial print-run in trade hardcover at 100,000 copies, and his 1983 novel,Christine, had a trade hardcover print-run of 250,000 copies, both by themuch larger publisher Viking. The Gunslinger's initial release was not highly  publicized, and only specialty science-fiction and related bookstores carried it on their shelves. The book was generally not available in the larger chainstores, except by special order. Rumors spread among avid fans that therewas a King book out that few readers knew about, let alone had actually read.When the initial 10,000 copies sold out, Grant printed another 10,000 copies in1984, but these runs were still far short of the growing demand among fansfor this book. The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger was the beginning of hismagnum opus fantasy epic. Both the first and second printings of TheGunslinger garner premium prices on the collectible book market, notably among avid readers and collectors of Stephen King, horror literature, fantasy literature, and even American western literature. And it is also desirableamong avid fans of the artwork of Michael Whelan.In 1987, King released the second installment, The Dark Tower II: TheDrawing of the Three, in which Roland draws three people from 20th-century United States into his world through magical doors. Grant published The
of 00

Leave a Comment

You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...
You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...