Stephen King

About Stephen King

Stephen Edwin King was born on September 21, 1947, in Portland, Maine. His father abandoned the family when King was two years old, and his mother raised him and his older brother David under financial strain, moving from relative to relative across several states before settling in Durham, Maine. King attended the University of Maine at Orono on a scholarship, graduating in 1970 with a bachelor's degree in English. While there he wrote for the student newspaper and participated in a writing workshop run by professor Burton Hatlen, where he met Tabitha Spruce, whom he married in 1971.

After graduating, King was unable to find a teaching position immediately and sold short stories to magazines such as Cavalier while working in a laundry. In 1971, he was hired to teach English at Hampden Academy in Hampden, Maine. He continued to write fiction in his spare time, completing a short story about a telekinetic high school girl that he nearly discarded before his wife retrieved it from the trash and urged him to finish it. That story became Carrie, published in 1974—his debut novel and the first step in a career that would make him one of the best-selling authors in history. He and Tabitha live in Bangor, Maine, and have three children, including the novelists Joe Hill and Owen King.

His Most Challenged Works

King's work has been challenged in schools and libraries for decades on grounds of violence, sexual content, and profanity. Carrie, It, Cujo, The Shining, and Pet Sematary are among the most frequently cited. His short-story collection Night Shift and novella collection Different Seasons—which includes the stories that became the films Stand by Me and The Shawshank Redemption—have also faced challenges. The sheer volume of his titles in circulation means that attempted removals appear in school districts across the country with regularity. King has long been a vocal critic of censorship, writing and speaking in support of libraries and the freedom to read.

Awards and Recognition

King has won the Bram Stoker Award multiple times, including for Misery (1987), The Green Mile (1996), and Bag of Bones (1998). He received the O. Henry Award for his short story "The Man in the Black Suit" in 1996, the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award in 2007, and the Edgar Award for Best Novel for Mr. Mercedes in 2015. In 2003, the National Book Foundation honored him with its Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, and in 2014, President Obama awarded him the National Medal of Arts. His memoir and craft manual On Writing (2000) is widely regarded as one of the best books ever written about the practice of fiction.