Stephen King’s books have sold more than 400 million copies worldwide, giving him a net worth of more than Shs1.8 trillion.
King’s horrors, supernatural fiction, suspense, and fantasy novels have been adapted into feature films, television movies, and comic books. King has published 65 novels/novellas, including seven under the pen name Richard Bachman, and five nonfiction books.
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft thus gives us an idea how King became King, so to speak.
It is a book which will help you hone your skills as a storyteller.
Written as every bit an autobiography as it is a writing guide, King’s rich advice is rooted in his past.
As he gives us memories of his childhood, he also reminds us that kings are not always born; but are often made. We see this lesson play out in the locust years of his early career as a writer. The slim pickings he got from writing those days tested his mettle to reveal how great artists are often great sufferers.
Speaking of suffering, King was hospitalised after being hit by the driver of a van in a near-fatal accident in 1999. He almost never made it to the 21st Century, but he saw the humour in his experience.
“It occurs to me that I have nearly been killed by a character out of one of my own novels. It’s almost funny,” he said.
It was his passion for writing and his almost morbid levity when it came to facing his mortality that pulled King back from the brink.
There is indeed so much here that will inspire any aspiring or established writer.
The book is divided into three parts. Part I is on King’s life. Part II is about the craft of writing as expressed by King. Part III talks about King’s life after his tragic car accident. As an instructional guide, this book will leave you with several lessons:
1. Write Regularly:
King reminds us that writing is a discipline. One must have consistency when it comes to writing. After all, practice makes perfect. King shows how this truism works by discussing his writing routine and how he writes around 2000 words (or six full pages) every workday.
2. Read A Lot:
King is an chronic reader. He reads deeply and widely. That is how he manages to read 80 books a year. A true bibliophile, King believes that reading aplenty is key to good writing. That is because if the writer’s knowledge is limited, eventually the writing will be too.
3. Write for Yourself:
King says that for a writer to be authentic and widely read, they must “write for themselves”. They should never write to identify who, whom or what their audience will be. They should write to express themselves. King adds here that writers should write what they love in order to enjoy the process of writing.
4. Develop Your Own Voice:
Finding your unique writing voice is crucial. King advises writers never to copy other writers who seem more florid in expression.
King says, “One of the really bad things you can do to your writing is dress up the vocabulary, looking for long words, because you’re maybe a little bit ashamed of the short ones. It’s like dressing up a household pet in evening clothes. The pet is embarrassed, and the person who committed this act of premeditated cuteness should be even more embarrassed.”
5. Revise Relentlessly:
Writing is re-writing. So a writer should know that their first draft is just that: a first draft. So they must have as many drafts as necessary for them to reach that final draft.
6. Understand Grammar and Style:
Good grammar leads to clear and coherent sentences. Bad grammar leads to bad sentences, says King. Also, style is something every writer must find for themselves. Nobody will give it to them.
7. Persevere Through Rejection:
King was rejected by 30 publishers. He pinned every single rejection letter he had received to his wall with a nail, “By the time I was 14, the nail in my wall would no longer support the weight of the rejection slips impaled upon it. I replaced the nail with a spike and went on writing.”
Title: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
Author: Stephen King
Published: 2010
Pages: 288
Availability: Amazon
Price: Shs80,000
