Stephen Edwin King (b.1947) is a prolific and internationally famous American author of horror fiction. His best-selling novels bring together elements of the traditional gothic stories with those of the modern psychological thriller, detective, and science fiction genres.
Born in Portland, Maine, King began writing short stories at an early age. He struggled for years after graduating from college. He and his writer-wife Tabitha King grappled financially and lived in a trailer home. He worked hard at building a career as a writer and developed ideas for many novels. He sold short stories to men’s magazines and worked small jobs to make a living.
When working as a janitor in a school locker room, King was inspired to write the novel Carrie. Set in a girls’ locker room, Carrie features a schoolgirl who exercises her newly-discovered telekinetic powers to exact revenge on her bullies. Carrie turned into King’s first published novel and lent him his big break.
King is one of the most successful writers of the twentieth century. He has published a book a year, nearly all bestsellers, many of which have been made into movies. His most notable works include Carrie (1974; film 1976,) The Shining (1977; film 1980,) The Green Mile (1996; film 1999,) The Plant (2000,) and Cell (2006.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Stephen King
If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot…reading is the creative center of a writer’s life…you cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.
—Stephen King
Topics: Reading, Writers
No one can tell what goes on in between the person you were and the person you become. No one can chart that blue and lonely section of hell. There are no maps of the change. You just… come out the other side. Or you don’t.
—Stephen King
Topics: Change
When a man has died, he wants you to know about it.
—Stephen King
Topics: Death
Love didn’t grow very well in place where there was only fear, just as plants didn’t grow very well in a place where it was always dark.
—Stephen King
Topics: Growth
You can’t deny laughter; when it comes, it plops down in your favorite chair and stays as long as it wants.
—Stephen King
Topics: Laughter
Fault always lies in the same place: with him weak enough to lay blame.
—Stephen King
Fiction is the truth inside the lie.
—Stephen King
Topics: Authors & Writing, Fiction
We make up horrors to cope with real ones.
—Stephen King
His heart had been broken. And now all these years later, it seemed to him that the most horrible fact of human existance was that broken hearts mended.
—Stephen King
Topics: Heart
His was the face you could never quite see, his the hands which dealt all the spades from a dead deck, his the eyes beyond the flames, his the grin from beyond the grave of the world.
—Stephen King
Topics: Death
The beauty of religious mania is that it has the power to explain everything. Once God (or Satan) is accepted as the first cause of everything which happens in the mortal world, nothing is left to chance…logic can be happily tossed out the window.
—Stephen King
Topics: Atheism
A product is something made in a factory; a brand is something that is bought by the customer. A product can be copied by a competitor; a brand is unique. A product can be quickly outdated; a successful brand is timeless.
—Stephen King
Because the hardest boss a man can ever have is himself.
—Stephen King
Only enemies speak the truth; friends and lovers lie endlessly, caught in the web of duty.
—Stephen King
Topics: Enemies, Duty, Enemy
I’m a salami writer. I try to write good salami, but salami is salami.
—Stephen King
Topics: Work, Awareness, Self-Knowledge, Talents, Abilities
You couldn’t get hold of the things you’d done and turn them right again. Such a power might be given to the gods, but it was not given to women and men, and that was probably a good thing. Had it been otherwise, people would probably die of old age still trying to rewrite their teens.
—Stephen King
Topics: Experience
Remember, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.
—Stephen King
Topics: Hope
Good books don’t give up all their secrets at once.
—Stephen King
Topics: Books
The rope by which the great blocks of taxes are attached to any citizenry is simple loyalty.
—Stephen King
Topics: Taxes, Taxation
Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work.
—Stephen King
Topics: Success, Preparation, Work, Talent
Hurt’s a reason to change, but all the hurt in the world don’t change facts.
—Stephen King
Topics: Pain
Get busy living, or get busy dying.
—Stephen King
Topics: How to Live
The most important things are the hardest to say, because words diminish them.
—Stephen King
Topics: Communication, Words
You can’t deny laughter; when it comes, it plops down in your favorite chair and stays as long as it wants.
—Stephen King
Topics: Laughter
Love: it’s the only thing which allows men and women to stand in a world where gravity always seems to want to pull them down… bring them low… and make them crawl.
—Stephen King
Topics: Love
It didn’t occur to me until later that there’s another truth, very simple: greed in a good cause is still greed.
—Stephen King
French is the language that turns dirt into romance.
—Stephen King
Topics: Romance, Language
The goodbyes we speak and the goodbyes we hear are the good byes that tell us we’re still alive.
—Stephen King
No good friends, no bad friends; only people you want, need to be with. People who build their houses in your heart
—Stephen King
I looked at the ceiling and wished this life was over. This unhappy life that had started out so confidently. I thought I would sleep no more that night but eventually I did. In the end we always wear out our worries.That’s what Wireman says.
—Stephen King
Topics: Worry
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