Stephen King and Tolkien

[aranelcharis]

Stephen King has this to say of Tolkien:

I think novelists come in two types, and that includes the sort of fledgling novelist I was by 1970. Those who are bound for the more literary or "serious" side of the job examine every possible subject in the light of this question: What would writing this sort of story mean to me? Those whose destiny (or

Comments

[scarlet_pencil]

.... Why am I thinking that King identifies with what he calls the "serious" novelists? *snorts*

I would like to insert a third type of novelist: the novelist who wants to read a good story, even if he has to write it himself. Different from the so called "popular" novelist because he doesn't care what other people think about the story. And unlike King's "serious" novelist, not trying to find any silly answers.

Yeah. But then again, I've never liked King, so that's probably half my problem right there. XD;

[platysseus]

Ah, yes. I am this third type. All the books I've written I've wanted to read myself... at the time of writing them. ;) It's true, I don't care what people think of my current story. I might once I get it published, but by then it's too late. :D

*has never read King*
*has only seen one King-based film... and that's only because it had Johnny Depp* ;)

[aranelcharis]

that's the only King movie I've seen too, and it was for the same reason you saw it. :)

[neytaritook]

The original stage Sweeney Todd plays the police chief guy in that movie.

[wellinghall]

(A) The serious novelist
(B) The popular novelist

(1) JRR Tolkien
(2) Stephen King

Match the two ...

[aranelcharis]

That's an easy match. You made it very simple. :D

[colinbj]

I've always thought that Stephen King and Tolkien exemplify extreme opposite ends of a different axis.

For King, the question 'what happened next?' (after the story ended) is meaningless. He was annoyed even when as a child he told ghost stories to his fellow children, and they asked this. To him the story was no more than a story, questions about what happened next or previously - questions about its world - were meaningless.

For Tolkien, of course, the imagined world was everything, every detail fascinating, the published text of LoTR no more than the visible tip of a vast iceberg.

This is what distinguishes true SF and fantasy writers from hacks. King can never be more than a highly skilled hack. BTW his two worthwhile works are 'The Stand' and 'Stand By Me'; the latter he claims as autobiographical, and uniquely he _did_ try to find out 'what happened next' - what had happened to his childhood friends after they grew up.

[aranelcharis]

Exactly. I fully agree with you. King even said in the forward to this fantasy book of his I'm reading (hey, English books are scarce here, you have to take what you can get) that he didn't know what was going to happen next, but was just writing his way into it. Sounds a bit like the Lord of the Rings, but whereas LoTR had a plot, King had none throughout the whole first book (of a 7 book series...good lord I'm not going to read them all).

[neytaritook]

King has been slowely losing his mind...I mean, he loves Harry Potter and considers it an example of great writing even though Jo breaks pretty much all of his rules on the subject. And now this. Good lord, I think I liked him better when he was a drunk?