Stephen King is an American Author who writes many genres, such as horror, suspense, science fiction, and fantasy. He has written several highly rated and well known titles. Not only does King write books, but he also writes and produces movies such as It or The Shawshank Redemption. He won the The National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. Everybody knows who he is as an author, but who is he as a regular person? Stephen King was born on September 12, 1947 in his hometown of Portland, Maine. His parents got divorced as he was a young child and he lived with his mother in Durham, Maine. He went to grammar school in Durham and after that he moved on to go to Liston Falls High School. He graduated from …show more content…
in English and qualification to teach on a high school level. A year later, he married Tabitha and they go on to have three children, Naomi Rachel, Joe Hill, and Owen Phillip, along with four grandchildren. In the fall of 1971, King began teaching English classes at Hampden Academy. Even though most of his time was focused on teaching, he continued to write short stories and novels on weekends. When spring arrived in 1973, Doubleday & Co. accepted King’s novel Carrie for publication. That spring was also when he would be able to leave teaching altogether and start writing …show more content…
As a child, his friend that he was close to was playing on the train tracks, and King watched as he was struck and devoured by the train and he was killed instantly. People think that such a traumatizing event must have caused his feel for horror.
The King family was known to move often. In 1974 they moved to Colorado, and returned to Maine in 1975. The Shining was written in 1974 while he resided in Colorado, which most likely inspired the setting of the story. King also wrote a story called The Stand the same year, which is also set in Colorado. Then only two years after their return to Maine, King took a year-long trip to England with his family, but it was cut short by almost 9 months. After they returned from England, they moved into a new house in Bangor, Maine, which would be considered their final home. As surprising as it may be, King had a huge alcohol and drug problem in the 1980’s. According to him, he doesn’t recall writing one of his more popular novels, Cujo, at all. He also says that he wishes he did. His family found out when they found drugs and alcohol in his trash can, including Xanax, cocaine, beer cans, and Valium. After his family confronted him about it, he fixed the issue and has been sober ever