Stephen King "Reading to Write"

Stephen King

Reading To Write

Stephen King was born in 1947 in Portland, Maine, and raised in Maine, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Connecticut. He was authored dozens of novels of horror, suspense, science fiction, nine collections’ worth of short stories, and five books of nonfiction; many of his novels and stories have been made into films, including Carrie (1976) The Shining (1980) Stand By Me (1986) Misery (1990), The Shawshank Redemption (1994) and The Green Mile (1999). While often thought of as a genre writer--- someone who writes the kinds of popular stories (like horror or science fiction, in his case) that are not quite considered literary fiction---his work has increasingly been met with critical praise. “ Reading to Write” is taken from King’s book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft (2000). In it, this amazingly prolific writer gives advice about writing that ends up being as much about how to use one’s time as it is about specific recommended activities. As you read, see if you can extract an underlying philosophy of life from King’s essay.

If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: Read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I’m aware of, no shortcut.

I’m a slow reader, but I usually get through seventy or eighty books a year, mostly fiction. I don’t read in order to study the craft; I read because I like to read. It’s what I do at night, kicked back in my blue chair. Similarly, I don’t read fiction to study the art of fiction, but simply because I like stories. Yet there is a learning process going on. Every book you pick up has its own lesson or lessons, and quite often the bad books have more to teach than the good ones.

When I was in the eighth grade, I happened upon a paperback novel by Murray Leinster, a science fiction pulp writer who did most of his work during the forties and fifties, when magazines like Amazing Stories paid a penny a word. I had read other books by Mr. Leinster, enough to know that the quality of his writing was uneven. This particular tale, which was about mining in the asteroid belt, was one of his less successful efforts. Only that’s too kind. It was terrible, actually, a story populated by paper-thin characters and driven by outlandish plot developments. Worst of all (or so it seemed to me at the time). Leinster had fallen in love with the word zestful. “Characters watched the approach of overbearing asteroids with zestful smiles.” “ Characters sat down to supper abroad their mining ship with zestful anticipation.” Near the end of the book, “the hero swept the large-breasted, blonde heroine into a zestful embrace .” For me, it was the literary equivalent of a smallpox vaccination: I have never, so far as I know, used the word zestful in a novel or a story. God willing I never will

Asteroid Miners (which wasn’t the title, but that’s close enough) was an important book in my life as a reader. Almost everyone can remember losing his or her virginity, and most writers can remember the first book he/she put down thinking; I can do better than this, Hell, I am doing better than this! What can be more encouraging to the struggling writer than to realize his/her work is unquestionably better than that of someone who actually got paid for his/her stuff?

One learns most clearly what not to do by reading bad prose--- one novel like Asteroid Miners ( or Valley of the Dolls, Flowers in the Attic, and The Bridges of Madison County,to name just a few) is worth a semester at a good writing school, even with the superstar guest lecturers thrown in.

Good writing, on the other hand, teaches the learning writer about style, graceful narration, plot development, the creation of believable characters, and truth-telling. A novel like The Grapes of Wrath may fill a new writer with feelings of despair and good old-fashioned jealousy--- “ I’ll never be able to write anything that good,not if I live to be a thousand”--- but such feelings can also serve as a spur, goading the writer to work harder and aim higher. Being swept away by a combination of great story and great writing--- of being flattened, in fact--- is part of every writer’s necessary formations,You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.

So we read to experience the mediocre and the outright rotten; such experience helps us to recognize those things when they begin to creep into our our own work, and to steer clear of them. We also read in order to measure ourselves against the good and the great,to get a sense of all that can be done.. And we read in order to experience different styles.

You may find yourself adopting a style you find particularly exciting, and there’s nothing wrong with that. When I read Ray Bradbury as a kid,I wrote like Ray Bradbury--- everything green and wondrous and seen through a lens smeared with the grease of nostalgia. When I read James M. Cain, everything I wrote came out clipped and stripped and hard-boiled.When I read Lovecraft; my prose became luxurious and Byzantine. I wrote stories in my teenage years where all these styles merged, creating a kind of hilarious stew. This sort of stylistic blending is a necessary part of developing one’s own style, but it doesn’t occur in a vacuum. You have to read widely, constantly refining (and redefining) your own work as you do so. It’s hard for me to believe that people who read very little (or not at all in some cases) should presume to write and expect people to like what they have written, but I know it’s true. If I had for every nickel for every person who ever told me he/she wanted to become a writer but “ didn’t have the time to read,” you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.

Reading is the creative center of a writer's’ life. I take a book with me everywhere I go, and find there are all sorts of opportunity to dip in. The trick is to teach yourself to read in small sips as well as in long swallows. Waiting rooms were made for books--- of course! But so are theater lobbies before the show, long and boring checkout lines, and everyone favorite, the john. You can even read while you’re driving, thanks to audiobook revolution. Of the books I read each year, anywhere from six to a dozen are on tape. As for all the wonderful radio you will be missing, come on-- how many times can you listen to Deep Purple sing “ Highway Star”?

Reading at meals is considered rude in polite society, but if you expect to succeed as a writer,rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects. If you intended to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway.

Where else can you read? There’s always the treadmill, or whatever you use down at the local health club to get aerobic, I try to spend an hour doing that every day, and I think I’d go mad without a good novel to keep me company. Most exercise facilities (at home as well as outside it) are now equipped with Tv’s but TV-- while working out or anywhere else-- really is about the last thing an aspiring writer needs. If you feel you must have the news analyst blowhards on CNN while you exercise, or the stock market blowhards on MSNBC, or the sports blowhards on ESPN, it’s time for you to question how serious you really are about becoming a writer. You must be prepared to do some serious turning inward toward the life of the imagination, and that means, I’m afraid Geraldo,Keith Olbermann,and Jay Leno must go. Reading takes time, and the glass teat takes too much of it.

Once weaned from ephemeral craving for Tv, most people will find they enjoy the time they spend reading. I’d like to suggest that turning off that endlessly quacking box is apt to improve the quality of your life as well as the quality of your writing. And how much of a sacrifice are we talking about here? How many Frasier and ER reruns does it take to make one American life complete? How many Richard Simmons infomercials? How many whiteboy/fatboy Beltway insiders on CNN? Oh man, don’t get me started. Jerry-Springer-Dr.-Dre-Judge-Judy-Jerry-Farewell-Donny-and-Marie, I rest my case.

When my son Owen was seven or so, he fell in love with Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, particularly with Clarence Clemons, the band’s burly sax player. Owen decided he wanted to learn to play like Clarence. My wife and I were amused and delighted by this ambition. We were also hopeful, as any parent would be, that our kid would turn out to be talented, perhaps even some sort of prodigy. We got Owen a tenor saxophone for Christmas and lessons with Gordon Bowie,one of the Local music men. Then we crossed our fingers and hoped for the best.

Seven months later I suggested to my wife that it was time to use discontinue the sax lessons, if Owen concurred. Owen did, and with palpable relief--he hadn’t wanted to say it himself,especially not after asking for the sax in the first place,but seven months had been long enough for him to realize that, while he might love Clarence Clemon’s big sound,the saxophone was simply not for him---God had not given him that particular talent.

I knew not because Owen stopped practicing, but because he was practicing only during the periods Mr. Bowie had set for him: half an hour after school four days a week, plus an hour on the weekends, Owen mastered the scales and the notes--nothing wrong with his memory,his lungs, or his eye-hand coordination---but we never heard him taking off,surprising himself with something new, blissing himself out. And as soon as his practice time was over, it was back into the case with the horn, and there it stayed until the next lesson or practice time. What this suggested to me was that when it came to the sax and my son, there was never going to e any real playtime; it was all going to be rehearsal. That’s no good. There’s no joy in it, it’s just no good. It’s best to go on some other area, where the deposits of talent may be richer and the fun quotient higher.

Talent renders the whole idea of rehearsal meaningless: when you find something at which you are talented, you do it (whatever it is) until your fingers bleed or your eyes are ready to fall out of your head. Even when no one is listening (or reading, or watching), every outing is a bravura performance., because you as the creator are happy. Perhaps even ecstatic. That goes for reading and writing as well as for playing a musical instrument,hitting a baseball, or running the four-forty. The sort of strenuous reading and writing program I advocate --- four to six hours a day, every day-- will not seem strenuous if you really enjoy doing these things and have an aptitude for them; in fact, you may be following such a program already. If you feel you need permission to do all the reading and writing your little heart desires, however,consider it hereby granted by yours truly.

The real importance of reading is that it creates an ease and intimacy with the process of writing; one comes to the country of the writer with one's papers and identification pretty much in order. Constant reading will pull you into a place (a mind-set, if you like the phrase) where you can write eagerly and without self-consciousness. It also offers you a constantly growing knowledge of what has been done and what hasn’t, what is trite and what is fresh, what works and what just lies there dying (or dead) on the page. The more you read, the less apt you are to make a fool of yourself with your pen or word processor.

The Question:

Write a response to Stephen King essay “ Reading to Write” In a response, be sure to explain why you believe King advises serious writers to do a lot of both reading and writing and whether or not you agree with him. In your response, include your own reading and writing interests as well as how often you do either. Lastly, be sure to state and explain your own beliefs on what it takes to be a serious writer.

My Response

July 14th

I believe Stephen King advices serious writers to do both reading and writing because it gives you more ideas and creates skills when you write. I believe Stephen King is right.

I agree with his response because the more you read the more lessons you would learn of what not to do. Like he explained repeating the same word over and over again. This is a technique that would make your audience bored. My mother; who has helped me Edit my essays for school,has explained to me the exact same thing. Serious writers find synonyms and other words to make the work more interesting.

I also agree with the idea that the more you read the more writing style and creativity you’ll come up with. For the last five years I have been reading a book series called Lunar Chronicles and because the writer is really complex. Her name is Marissa Meyer. She uses fairy-tale stories and retells them in anyway that’s her own. She has taught me how to use stories and remix them. In order to make them full of twist and turns. I have seen approval in myself on how to have one scene with love and romance. Then in the next war and blood scattered all over the place. I’ve also learned how to put active and descriptional words in my text to make the audience more in depth with the story. Marissa Meyer, at times- because she has good writing has made the book a movie; because of the drama, action, romance, science-fiction and scene description. Me as a writer I to use these skills and want the audience to feel like my stories are a movie.

Me personally, I read as much as I write. As of right now, I’m reading the last book from Marissa Meyer called Winter. I am writing my own story called Empathy and I am developing short story ideas in the Creative Writing Program. Then every now and again I type out philosophy qoutes and poems in my phone. I do this because I am a constant thinker and I highly believe that reading develops better writing. I have created my own ideas for writing by what other writers have done and accomplished.

Since I have started writing, which was when I was in the 5th grade. Overtime I’ve developed this idea that writing is a skill. When Stephen King said; “ If you don’t have time to read; you don’t have time or the tools to write.” I don’t agree because writing is an art not meant for everybody; because it stresses patience and self-reflection on what you know to do and who you are. For example, reading is a patience thing for me because it takes a long time for me to read. People who often don’t like to read; don’t like to read because it takes to long. When you write it’s all about self-reflection. On how you feel? What you imagine? How you put everything that you see in your head on the paper? Then how to make it make sense? In order to that you have to keep rewriting, rewriting, and rewriting. Then your hand is crapping. Then you have to start all over. So for people to not like reading and writing are people who don’t have mental patience. But that’s okay, because the process frustrating. Not that you don’t like writing or you can’t write or you don't have the time to write. It’s just the individual needs to develop and get into the habit of reading and writing at a pace. They need to understand that the skill is a process

The again when you develop a voice as a writer, you understand the writer that you are, and the books you are most attracted to reading. Me personally I got this idea that the world you live in. Plus our own thinking; reflects the way we write. The way we write is the key to how we think and how we see the world. This is called perspective. Not to mention experiences. Writing is the key to the mind and the heart. Rather it’s fiction or nonfiction you wouldn’t write something if you don’t care about what’s on your mind and your heart. The one thing that I’ve noticed is that many people can write about the same story or topic and still have a different opinion or taste to what their writing. For example, if someone were to write about their experience in the Holocaust and witnessing the Holocaust. Every author would have a different take on it or style in which they want the audience to receive the message. Due to the knowledge of how it impacted them as an individual or what they know about the event that affected the way they feel. This idea of perspective and society and when you understand the Author’s story and experiences you as the audience would understand why they gravitate toward fiction or nonfiction, Poetry or Memoir. Me as an audience and a writer. I’ve witnessed these changes and patterns and the more I read the more I understand how vulnerable someone is, when they put their thoughts, feelings, and imagery onto a page; and to be very frank it’s pretty amazing witnessing it happen.