Questions tagged [stephen-king]
Questions about the works of Stephen King and his life as a writer. Stephen King is most famous for his works in horror, such as 'Carrie', 'It' and 'The Shining'.
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Why did Stephen King choose room number 217?
In The Shining, room 217 is the room that is focused on as having a dark history and being a haunted room due to the tragedy of Mrs. Massey. Danny is warned not to enter this room and anyone who ...
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What is the meaning of the bike hit on the road by Jack Torrance and Al Shockley? (The Shining)
In The Shining, there is a backstory of how Jack decided to go sober. While in the car with his friend Al Shockley, both drunk, they hit a bike. But they cannot find the person they hit. Terrified by ...
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How do I analyze the stress/unstress in this Stephen King based novel?
Many of the jinni lines follow a stressed/unstressed sound pattern
The author talks about this in the ending. What does this mean exactly?
Here are some sequential lines from the jinni I would like ...
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Is the stormy weather an element of Naturalism in The Shining by Stephen King?
In Stephen King's novel The Shining, there seems to me to be a correlation between the weather and the sanity of Jack Torrance.
Namely, as the Torrance family becomes more isolated (i.e. people from ...
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What edition of The Shrinking Man contains a foreword by Stephen King?
According to the Wikipedia article about Stephen King, one of the author's influences was Richard Matheson, author of I Am Legend, Hell House and other works. The article claims,
In a current edition ...
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Symbolism of Billy Nolan in Carrie
Billy Nolan is a resentful, vindictive and abusive teenager who supplies Chris Hargensen with Pig blood for a prank that occurs within Stephen King's story Carrie. In it, King writes several passages ...
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Who are the Corlies of Arizona?
In Part I of Carrie, Stephen King writes:
Like Flatlands Society, the Rosicrucians, or the Corlies of Arizona, who are positive that the atomic bomb does not work, these unfortunates are flying in ...
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What does this sentence from Carrie mean?
In Part I of Carrie, Stephen King writes:
And when she talks of Carrie White her face takes on an odd pinched look that is more like Lovecraft out of Arkham than Kerouac out of Southern Cal.
Other ...
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Is The Shawshank Redemption based on a Leo Tolstoy story?
This Wikipedia article says that Stephen King’s novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption “has been thought to be loosely based on Leo Tolstoy's 1872 short story "God Sees the Truth, But ...
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In "It", was Derry, Maine said to be named after Derry or Londonderry?
This might seem like a really obscure question, but it's somewhat significant, because whether the city in Northern Ireland is called "Derry" or "Londonderry" is a contentious political issue.
I re-...
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Where did Stephen King get the word "Shawshank" from?
I just watched "The Shawshank Redemption" for the first time. I was surprised that it took place in a U.S. prison because I had assumed for years based on my ignorance that "Shawshank" was derived ...
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Bowers and Huggins and Criss, oh my!
From the passage in the book where Bill gets into Derry and is riding a cab to meet Mike I believe, the phrase "Bowers and Huggins and Criss, oh my!" stood out to me:
As the cab moved ...
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Doctor Sleep and The Bone Clocks
These two novels came out a year apart. They share certain very noticeable similarities:
The Bone Clocks, by David Mitchell, was acclaimed by Stephen King, who wrote Doctor Sleep. (Both are high-...
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Why does Pennywise Kill Patrick Hockstetter?
In Stephen King's IT, we are introduced to some particularly evil characters such as Beverley's husband Tom Rogan, Henry Bowers, and most notably Patrick Hockstetter. King delves into this maniacal, ...
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Weird Timeline in ‘Salem’s Lot’
Describing the history of the Marsten House in the novel Salem’s Lot, Stephen King writes of the Marsten family:
He and his wife had retired wealthy to ‘salem’s Lot in 1929, and had lost a good ...
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What does "as hot as the hinges of hell" mean in "The Green Mile"?
From chapter 2 of The Green Mile by Stephen King:
It was still as hot as the hinges of hell, October or not. The door to the exercise yard opened, letting in a flood of brilliant light and the ...
Sai Kiran
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About Jake's fate in The Gunslinger
I've just finished reading The Gunslinger and I'm really sad about Jake and how Roland left him behind. I want to know at least if in the other books of the series there will be some mention that Jake ...
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In Stephen King's The Shining, what is the meaning of Jack's conversation with Grady?
In chapter 44 of The Shining, why does Grady claim not to have murdered his wife and daughters and have no recollection of Mr Ullman while talking to Jack at Derwent's party, but later says he "...
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Is the Crimson King's first attack on Stephen King based on a real experience from the author's childhood?
In The Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah Eddie and Roland pay a visit to Stephen King in 1977, after learning that he apparently wrote about Pere Callahan's story. In order to learn what is really going ...
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Has there been any criticism of Bryan Smith's depiction in The Dark Tower series?
At some point during The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower Roland's ka-tet has to save Stephen King, who ultimately seems to be a representation of one of the tower's beams, from getting hit by a car ...
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Why is It afraid of birds?
In IT (1986), Stan Uris is attacked near Derry light house by Pennywise. He is able to survive this attack by just speaking the names of several birds and It is just taken aback. For some reason ...
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Who was (were?) the inspiration for Carrie?
The Wikipedia article on Stephen King's Carrie says that Carrie is based on two girls in King's schools. It has this quote, with a "citation needed" attached:
She was a very peculiar girl ...
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Why does Stanley Uris react so gruesomely to It returning?
Stephen King's novel IT concerns a group of children who confronted an evil entity haunting their town -- and their reunion twenty-five years later to face the being again for the final time.
Early ...
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What are the Stephen King connections in The Dark Tower series?
There's plenty of connections to King's other works in The Dark Tower. Most notably Salem's Lot.
What other connections are there, no matter how big or small?
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