do we have stephen king fans here in DU?

[Bhaisahab]

i love king's fiction. nobody taught me more about america than king. but u know what, in one of his books (forget which one) he mentions that he listens to rush limbaugh often. it made me a bit wary, and since then i've been trying to find out what King's political views are. i always thought he'd be anti-bush, but can't find any article by him on the chimp. i'm sure he would light a fire under bush's ass with his words. but is he on our side? anyone have an idea?

[La_Serpiente]

1. LOL...

Stephen King is a great writer, but I don't know if he is the political type. PM MaineMary. He lives in Maine, so she may know his political leanings.

True, he could light a fire under * ass, but he doesn't seem like the activist type. He has been having some medical problems the past few years. For example, he got in a car accident a few years back and was just released from the hospital last year for pneumonia.

He probably would prefer writing much more than politics.

[Bhaisahab]

2. yea that car accident...

shook him bad. he talks about it in the fantastic "On Writing". Which reminds me, budding writers *must* read king's "On Writing." You won't regret it.

[RebelOne]

3. He's the best.

I have read just about every book he has ever written. I just haven't been able to get into the Dark Tower series, though.

It wasn't exactly a car accident. He was run down by a van while he was walking down the road. It laid him up for quite a while. What's strange is that the guy who hit him died not too long after the incident. Don't mess around with the King.

[SpaceCatMeetsMars]

4. He took part in an anti-war protest in Florida last spring.

He has a house down in Orlando as well as in Maine. There was a great picture of him at the protest. Everyone here in Maine loves him and his wife because they give money to women's shelters and groups like that.

I have read a lot of his books and before I ever knew anything about him, I always had the sense that he loves and understands women and is a truly compassionate person. I also suspect that he is close to someone who was abused as a child. He seems to understand the psychology of that as few writers do.

I wnated to add, they are very popular here because they are so down to earth. I saw a biography of him and it said that they started out with no money and lived in a trailer while he taught high school and he wrote "Carrie" at night, which became his first big book.

[Enraged_Ape]

5. Pet Sematary and earlier, no one could touch Stephen King

He was like a sick, twisted, brilliant God to me. I'll come right out and say that Night Shift is probably the greatest collection of short stories ever written--right up there with Flannery O'Connor's works.

But around IT, I think King kind of lost his touch. The preteen gangbang in that book really put me off. I really haven't been into his stuff since, although I did read "Hearts in Atlantis" and it was interesting, if nothing to write home about.