Stephen King

[Quite Life]

Steven King is sort of low culture. I enjoy P.J. Woldhouse, P.J. O'Rourke, Harper Lee, ect...

[i_like_lectric_motors]

[quote][i]Originally posted by Quite Life[/i]
<br>Steven King is sort of low culture. I enjoy P.J. Woldhouse, P.J. O'Rourke, Harper Lee, ect...
[/quote]

Woldhouse???

Yeah, us Stephen King fans sure are stupid.

[Quite Life]

Wodehouse

and I didn't say SK fans are stupid. I just think his pop novels are just low culture. there is better reading out there.

[hexicon]

Hmmm, I am intrigued by our orthographically impaired friend's interest in contrasting high and low culture. (P.J. O'Rourke? Funny as hell: yes. Deathless prose: not so much.)

Here is what Stephen King himself had to say on the topic. http://www.nationalbook.org/nbaacceptspeech_sking.html

I like all kinds of culture, high, low, and no. There's a lot of good reading everywhere.

[manekineko]

Kinda off topic: I recently drove past King's house in Bangor, Maine. He lives in a normal city neighborhood in, appropriately enough, a restored gothic Victorian with an iron fence that has winged gargoyles for finials. To residents of Bangor, he's just a normal local guy.

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v706/maneki_neko_kawaii/manekineko4_2.gif" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>

[IWantMyMTV]

[quote][i]Originally posted by manekineko[/i]
<br>Kinda off topic: I recently drove past King's house in Bangor, Maine. He lives in a normal city neighborhood in, appropriately enough, a restored gothic Victorian with an iron fence that has winged gargoyles for finials. To residents of Bangor, he's just a normal local guy.

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v706/maneki_neko_kawaii/manekineko4_2.gif" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>
[/quote]I've seen his house on TV, it looks pretty cool. Is it pretty impressive in person?

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a197/cdmaniac/we_two_are_one1copy.jpg" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>

[manekineko]

[quote][i]Originally posted by IWantMyMTV[/i]
<br>[/quote]I've seen his house on TV, it looks pretty cool. Is it pretty impressive in person?

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a197/cdmaniac/we_two_are_one1copy.jpg" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>
[/quote]

Impressive, yes, but not ostentatious. It's large and very well kept, maroon with cream trim, and nicely landscaped. But it still looks pretty normal, and doesn't stand out among the other houses. You'd never know a world famous author lives there.

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v706/maneki_neko_kawaii/manekineko4_2.gif" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>

[phillyidol]

But aren't the ghosts a dead give away?

[medication881]

My favorite author!!!

I've been hooked on King for as long as I can remember. While he has had some stinkers (Bag of Bones, Dolores Claiborne, the whole Dark Tower series, It) most of his work in my opinion is quite excellent. My personal favorite is The Stand, which was made into a great movie as well with Gary Sinise, Molly Ringwald and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the "monster-shouter". Other great stuff:

Sometimes They Come Back - originally a short story, was made into a pretty good tv movie on CBS in the early 90's.

Rita Hayworth and The Shawshank Redemption - A novella from Different Seasons (along with Apt Pupil). Great story, even greater movie. One of the most popular movies of all time as a matter of fact.

The Body - Short story that became Stand By Me for the big screen...another classic.

Misery - Kathy Bates' defining moment (academy award!) James Caan was pretty good too.

Pet Semetary - I liked the book better, but the movie was ok. I really liked Fred Gwynne as Jud.

Green Mile - Who ever thought Tom Hanks would ever be in a King movie?

Desperation - This book scared the hell out of me. Did anyone see the movie on ABC a few weeks ago? I hope they put it out on DVD, definitely worth seeing again!

The Mist - I hope they eventually do a movie on this one...hopefully for the big screen though. I think the mutant spiders and octopi would need a decent special effects budget.

Firestarter - One of the few times a book made me cry. The way the government treats Charlie is terrible, and it probably happens more often than you think... WAY better than the movie.

The Tommyknockers - KYYX is right...the movie was terrible. the book was a million times better. Jimmy Smits, Marg Helgenberger, Traci Lords? Puh-Leeze! Must have read the book at least 10 times though. My second favorite behind the Stand.

Whew! Thanks for making me remember all that stuff! I need to get the Cell book when it comes out in paperback...[:)]

[medication881]

Wow, how could I forget The Running Man! That was in the Bachman books, 4 stories he wrote as Richard Bachman in the early 70's. Another great story in there was The Long Walk...I would LOVE to see a movie made out of that one! Anybody remember that one? It's about the biggest sporting event in America a couple hundred years in the future...The Long Walk. The rules are you can't be over 18, and you have to maintain a minimum 4 mile an hour pace. They start with 100 kids on the Maine-Canada border and they just start walking. The catch is that if you fall below 4 miles an hour more than 3 times, 2 guys following the walkers in an army vehicle blow your head off. The last person standing wins whatever he wants for the rest of his life. Needless to say, the walk goes on for 5 days before ending. No rest breaks or anything. Gripping book.

[i_like_lectric_motors]

Oh yeah ... The Long Walk was intense.

[KYYX4ever]

Oh! Just remembered another he wrote as Bachman--the one with the pie and the Gypsies...what was that one called ? I love that one !

Another Oh! One of my other faves of his was [i]Dead Zone[/i], but I thought the movie actually was pretty OK. It was the first time I saw Christopher Walken act. (and I immediately liked Walken, one of my fave actors!) That novel was great; really unique at the time.

Doh! Now I remember the haunted-pie-that-was-alive & the Gypsies story.(see, Philly, you were right![:p]) [i]THINNER[/i] creeeeepy!

[KYYX4ever]

*off topic*
geez, how many exclamation points did I type up there ?[:0][:I] embarrassing.

[birdmadgirl]

How could I forget "Rita Hayworth and The Shawshank Redemption"?!?!?! Excellent story and the only work of SK's that was turned into a movie that wasn't a stinker, IMO. I watch the movie everytime it's on TBS, which is like once a week [;)]

><((((º>·. ¸¸. ·´¯`·.¸¸><((((º>><((((º>
`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º>¸.·´¯`·.¸. , . .·´¯`·.. ><((((º>
`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º>

[medication881]

The Dead Zone!!! Duh...Christopher Walken and Martin Sheen were great in that movie! The one about the gypsy and pie is Thinner. Another great book, and his last as Bachman.