Profiles: Stephen King
Choose your worst nightmare-biological terror, terrible premonitions that come true, angry adolescents with superpowers, killer trucks, man-eating lawnmowers, alien invasions, jealous cars who consume their owners-whatever your fear, you can be sure that best-selling author Stephen King has not only written about it, but turned it into a movie as well.
King attributes most of his success to his wife, Tabitha, who rescued the discarded manuscript of Carrie, his first novel, from the trash and encouraged him to continue writing after he'd lost faith in it. Doubleday eventually bought the rights to the novel in 1973, and this initial success became the first of many, many bestellers King would pen: The Shining, The Stand, The Dead Zone, Cujo, It, Misery, Bag of Bones, Dreamcatcher-the list goes on and on.
Born in Portland, Maine, King first got a taste of writing when he and his older brother started their own newspaper in the town of Durham in 1959. He soon began writing short stories, selling his first one to a magazine before graduating high school. He became a schoolteacher by trade, but the publication of Carrie enabled him to devote himself full time to his craft.
Many of King's books are set in his home state, and he frequently writes about authors and their struggles with grief, writer's block, outraged fans and even pseudonyms come to life. All seem to deal-one way or another-with the supernatural.
King's not satisfied with just scaring the willy-nilly out of us, though; he also has hooked readers with serial novels such as The Green Mile and intrigued them á la J.R.R. Tolkien with the still-ongoing Dark Tower series. And now, he's the driving dark force behind the new "Kingdom Hospital" television series.
The 2003 recipient of The National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, King now divides his time between Florida and Maine, where he still writes the majority of his work.
His most recent book was Wolves of the Calla, an eagerly anticipated continuation of the Dark Tower series. To the delight of fans, that series should wrap up this year with the publication of Song of Susannah, out this month, and The Dark Tower, due in September, which will close out the adventures of gunslinger Roland's ka-tet of Jake, Eddie, Susannah and Oy.
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