06 Who Is Stephen King?

Stephen King is one of the world's most famous writers. He has sold more books than any other American writer. His most popular works are horror,or scary, stories. But it isn't only his books that are popular. People all over the world line up to see the movies made from his books, movies like Carrie, The Shining, and The Dead Zone.

Stephen King was born in 1947 in Portland, Maine. When he was two, his father abandoned the family. His mother had to take care of Stephen and his older brother alone. They moved from place to place because it was hard for his mother to find work. It was a difficult time, and they had little money. In the evenings, Stephen's mother read to him. His favorite story was The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde. Later, Stephen read the book himself. He wanted to write a story like it, but he wanted his story to be scarier. Stephen started to write his own stories when he was about seven. His mother always encouraged him and sent his stories to publishers. By age eighteen, Stephen published his first story.

Stephen graduated from high school in 1966 and went straight to college. He studied very hard and always worked in his free time to make extra money. King graduated in 1970. He wanted to be a teacher, but he couldn't find work right away. He had to work at a gas station, then at a laundry service. King finally got a job teaching English at a private high school in Maine. That year Stephen married Tabitha Spruce, his college girlfriend. Tabitha was also a writer. They were happy, but they didn't have much money. They didn't even have a telephone!

King wrote a novel titled Carrie, but he thought no one would like it. This made him sad and angry, so he threw the book away. Tabitha saw him throw away all the pages and was also angry. She took the pages from the trash. She liked the story very much and thought other people would like it, too. She persuaded him to send his book to a publisher. Later, King got a telegram from the publisher. He read it and was shocked. They wanted to publish Carrie!

At first, bookstores sold only 13,000 copies of the book. Stephen and Tabitha were happy with that, but other people had bigger ideas. A company wanted to make a movie from the book, and Stephen agreed. After the movie, the book sold 3.5 million copies. The publisher told King he would earn $400,000. King couldn't believe it.

King immediately wanted to buy his wife a fancy present.He went to many stores on the way home, but everything was closed except the drugstore. He went in and looked for something nice to give Tabitha, but the drugstore didn't have fancy gifts. He wanted to bring her something, so he bought her a hair dryer.

Now that they had money from the book, Stephen and Tabitha didn't have to keep their jobs. They were both going to be full-time writers. Stephen King soon published more books and became rich and famous. He bought a big house in Maine for his wife and three children. It was a house that his wife always liked, but they couldn't afford it before his books became popular. It's an old house with twenty-three bedrooms. Today they live in the same house, and Stephen still works extremely hard. He works every day of the year except three: Christmas, the Fourth of July, and his birthday. He always writes six pages a day, and he usually works on two different books at the same time.

In June of 1999, King was in a bad accident. As he was walking along the road near his house,a van hit him.King had to have three operations on his legs and hips. People thought he might have to stop writing. It took a long time, but King recovered and continued with his work as usual. Does he ever think he will stop writing? He says he will stop when he can't find more stories—but Stephen King always finds more stories.