On Writing Blog One

Prior to my reading On Writing's CV, I had a clear image of the person I thought Stephon King was, and that person happened to be a mentally ill, middle aged man who got a kick out of writing horrific -albeit best selling- novels. I am pleased to say, however, that my views on King quickly morphed as I progressed throughout the CV. I generally only read non-fiction books, so I welcomed the departure On Writing was from King's namesake scientific horror thrillers. The no filler, to-the-point stories of Stephen King's life were as intriguing as they were sparse; they were precise enought to keep my attention but lofty enough to tell his whole story. In King's psuedo-autobiography, I learned that he is actually a rather typical person dispute his seemingly psychotic demeanor (although I did begin to retract my newly discovered appreciation for the author on page 59 when King expresses his desire to make a necklace out of human teeth); King had a challenging childhood but a supporting mother dispute his father's deserting him when he was an infant (page 15). He believes that television is ruining our generation (page 22). He believes that a writer should recognize good ideas instead of searching for them (page 25), and he shows us how he did just that by mentally fusing the image of his mother's green tongue and the concept of counterfeiting Green Stamps in his book, Happy Stamps. King also states that, "having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference", (page 64); this statement really came into play earlier on in his careetheir ring the early seventies.
Stephen King also toutches on the several hardships he faced. By the winter of 1973, King was living in a double wide trailer in what he called, "the armpit of the world", the town of Hermon (page 63). His teaching job, while certainly more profitable than his prior stint at the laundry mat, was not enough to make ends meet. After his novel Carrie became a success, King got drunk for the first of what would turn out to be numerous times, blind to the consequences this would have for him in the future. Eventually, he added a drug addiction to his severe alchohaulisn (page 87). He continued down this "ugly downward spiral" until his wife stepped in. She helped him to become sober, bettering his family life and his writing career in the process. Throughout his experience, Stephen King grew as a person too. As highlighted in the desk story, we went from a dominance seeking alcohaulic to a family man in his sobriety. The CV documented King's life in good times and bad, leaving no stone unturned in his journey to be a writer and have the career he dreamed of.