After having read the entirety of the Dark Tower series as well as Misery for good Measure, Stephen King now basically has an unassaible lead in both pages read and books read for this group. It wasn't something that exactly happened on purpose.
I think Stephen King also played a role in my development of as a reader, I still remember reading The Green Mile with my mom and quite liking int. Now I think I don't ever need or particularly want to read a Stephen King book again.
I think it's pretty fair to say that the protagonist in Misery is quite based on Stephen King, I mean Stephen King literally wrote himself into the Dark Tower series. To that end I pulled out the most illiuminating quotes:
"There are a lot of guys out there who write a better prose line than I do... there are lots of things I can't do... But if you want me to take you away, to scare you or to involve you or to make you cry or grin, yeah, I can."
"He didn't need a psychiatrist to point out that writing had an autoerotic side - you beat a typewriter instead of your meat"
"The increasing dismissal of his work in the critical press as that of a 'popular writer' (which was, as he understood it, one step - a small one - above that of a 'hack') had hurt him quite badly."
"The reason authors almost always put a dedication on a book... is because their selfishness even horrifies themselves in the end."
Anyways, I think that about sums up what you're getting into when you pick up a Stephen King book. A guy who can tell a story that can grab your attention. Full spoilers here, but the ending was pretty wild, but I think that the lengths that television violence and shows like Game of Thrones can go to, desensitize a bit from the awful violence of this kind of a book too.
But there's always a little something missing from his books, and even if the ending here was a bit wild, and way better than how the Dark Tower ened, it wasn't something that makes you think after. He can grab your attention, but it's in a passing way, not in a way that asks for serious reflection. Sometimes that good enough, but it's easy to agree with him that there is something plainly autoerotic about it.
I think Stephen King also played a role in my development of as a reader, I still remember reading The Green Mile with my mom and quite liking int. Now I think I don't ever need or particularly want to read a Stephen King book again.
I think it's pretty fair to say that the protagonist in Misery is quite based on Stephen King, I mean Stephen King literally wrote himself into the Dark Tower series. To that end I pulled out the most illiuminating quotes:
"There are a lot of guys out there who write a better prose line than I do... there are lots of things I can't do... But if you want me to take you away, to scare you or to involve you or to make you cry or grin, yeah, I can."
"He didn't need a psychiatrist to point out that writing had an autoerotic side - you beat a typewriter instead of your meat"
"The increasing dismissal of his work in the critical press as that of a 'popular writer' (which was, as he understood it, one step - a small one - above that of a 'hack') had hurt him quite badly."
"The reason authors almost always put a dedication on a book... is because their selfishness even horrifies themselves in the end."
Anyways, I think that about sums up what you're getting into when you pick up a Stephen King book. A guy who can tell a story that can grab your attention. Full spoilers here, but the ending was pretty wild, but I think that the lengths that television violence and shows like Game of Thrones can go to, desensitize a bit from the awful violence of this kind of a book too.
But there's always a little something missing from his books, and even if the ending here was a bit wild, and way better than how the Dark Tower ened, it wasn't something that makes you think after. He can grab your attention, but it's in a passing way, not in a way that asks for serious reflection. Sometimes that good enough, but it's easy to agree with him that there is something plainly autoerotic about it.