“The Boogeyman” is a short story written by Stephen King. The short story can be found in his horror story collection “Night Shift.” The main character in this story is a man called Lester Billings, a young man from Waterbury, Connecticut. He works at an industrial firm in New York, he is divorced and a father of three de-ceased children. He decides to see a psychiatrist, because he cannot talk to anyone else, about how his children died. Lester Billings is married to his wife, Rita, who is being quite oppressed by him. Lester Billings is a man of very old-fashioned ways, and he does not think, that it is the woman, who should make the decisions. He describes himself as ‘brighter’ than her. He claims that children tie a man down and makes the man committed to his wife. He has a more traditional way of thinking about relationships and parenting. Stephen King is using an indirect way to describe Lester Billings. He does not say exactly how he is. The readers have to figure it out themselves, based on the actions of the persons in this story. He is a very stereotypic, old-fashioned and patriotic, American man. He sees himself as superior and has some violent tendencies when it comes to parenting: “And if he …show more content…
It is used to make the story become more real, and easier for the reader to place himself in the story, and feel the same way as the characters. Stephen King is using the terror effect throughout the whole story. He is making the feeling of dread and anticipation the main factors in the horrifying experience. He also uses the horror effect, when he is writing about The Boogeyman, but he leaves out the gross out part. Edgar Allan Poe is in the same way using both terror and horror to give the reader the most horrifying experience. In The Tell-Tale Heart he does not completely let out the gross out part, but gives us some details about the murder of the old