On 'On Writing'

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My father-in-law sent me ‘On Writing’ by Stephen King early this summer. I told him I would read it right away. Unfortunately, I lied. To be perfectly honest, I was intimidated by Stephen King and still am. He is a legend in the writing community. Heck, I still remember a Saturday Night Live skit where they were interviewing him (Jon Lovitz playing him) and during the interview he was typing away at a typewriter! It is still funny to watch, and still intimidating.

I finally got to reading it this month. What can I say except I am still intimidated. My favorite part of this book has to be the first part called CV. That stands for curriculum vitae or as we lay people like to say, resume. This was the autobiographical part of the book and gives us a view into his childhood and early adulthood. One of the few things Stephen King and I have in common is that we both have a hard time remembering childhood. His did sound a lot rougher than mine, growing up with a single mother. This seemed to toughen him up and give him perspective. Some thing different between us is he knew he wanted to be a writer from an early age. I was in my mid-thirties before I decided to take a crack at it.  Some of his stories and advice about submitting to magazines as a stepping stone to getting published seems quaint and outdated.  The past five years has brought a strange new publishing world, and we are in the wild west still finding out what works for publishing.  One nice thing is he does not say anything about marketing, and he never will have to say anything about that, his name sells the books.

The second section is called the Toolbox. It talks about the tools writers need to write well. These are useful tools, such as grammar, usage, less is usually more, tell your version of the truth, and read. This last piece of advice is the easiest for me to follow. I love reading, it is the easiest part of this job! Less is more means being conservative with your writing, add too much and you will bore the reader.  Being truthful in my writing is also easy for me because I am a painfully truthful person.  My writing friend, Chris Godsoe, recently wrote a blog about lying to your readers.  Yes, in writing fiction you lie, but you need to do it truthfully or the readers will not buy the story.  

The third section is called On Writing. This was the hardest section to get through. It would be great if I could do all the things he suggests. Some of these are having a writing room where I could shut the door when I am working on a first draft or write two thousand (or ten pages) a day, even on holidays and birthdays. It is just not possible right now. If that makes me a lightweight, so be it.

I do have to say that the second half of this book feels uneven. That can easily be forgiven after reading the last section called On Living. During the writing of this book Mr. King was run over by a van driven by a complete idiot, a person who should not have the privilege of driving. He probably is still terrorizing the roads of Maine today. It is a miracle that Mr. King was not killed, and that he can walk now after this horrible accident.  He often displays candor but never as much as when he says “...it occurs to me that I have nearly been killed by a character right out of one of my own novels.  It’s almost funny.”

I cannot help but call him Stephen “the” King.  Like J.K. Rowling, he had done what many of us would like to do.  He is living the dream.  After that accident, he could have retired and not written another word and he would still be a legend.  But he healed and has since then written a ton according to his bibliography.  That probably does not include the things that he is still knocking around in his head.  

When I was a teenager, I read a lot of his work:  The Shining, The Dead Zone, Firestarter, Cujo, Misery, and The Stand, just to name a few.  But his first published novel, Carrie, really resonated with me.  He really captured teenage anxiety and anger very well.  While I was not made fun of in high school, I was ignored, I still could relate to Carrie’s life.  Characters you can relate to (especially as a teenager) can get you into a lifetime of reading.  

Lastly, I should say that he gives the best and most unusual description of what good writing is...”Telepathy, of course.” If it is done well, writing communicates what the writer is thinking to the brain of the reader.  There is some translation, but that gives the reader the chance to flex their imagination and with good writing you give them a universe to visualize your story.