Free Example of Stephen King Essay

Stephen King is the world renowned American author, of many horror, fantasy, and science fiction novels and short stories. He is known for including his personal occurrences into his works.

Stephen Edward King was born 21 September 1947, in Portland, Maine. He was the second son of Donald and Nellie Ruth Pillsbury King.

Following his parents’ separation, Stephen King lived with his mother and spent his childhood in Fort Wayne, Indiana and Durham, Maine.

Stephen King went to a grammar school, in Durham and studied at Lisbon Falls High School, where he graduated in 1966. He had his college education at the University of Maine. Here he used to write a weekly column for his college newspaper, The Maine Campus.He graduated from the university in 1970. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English.

After college, King had difficulty finding work and had to work as a janitor and write articles for a few magazines to make the ends meet till he was hired to teach at Hampden Academy. Even after becoming a teacher, Stephen King continued to write for the magazines and work on his novels. His first novel, Carrie was publishedaround this time.

His first novel Carrie was accepted for publishing by Doubleday & Co. in 1973, he was paid $2500 as an advance for the novel, which was not a big amount during those days for novels. It was here, he learned from his editor that, a major paperback sale could give him enough financial support to stop teaching and work full time as a writer.

Carrie was followed by The Second Coming or Jerusalem’s Lot, The Shining, The Stand, The Dead Zone, and many others.

Stephen King soon became a well established author and his name became closely related to horror fiction genre in writing. He used to write under the pen name Richard Bachman.

More than 360 million copies of his novels and short stories have been sold till date, many of them being adapted to films, television and other forms of media.

Putting some of his college dramatic society experiences to work, King is also seen making cameo appearances in various film adaptations of his works.