matter if they read them both. There’s not a secret in Desperation that can only be unlocked if you
read The Regulators, and there’s not a secret in The Regulators that you could only unlock if you
read Desperation. But still, the two books illuminate each other in a strange way. They really are like
identical twins.’
King deals briefly with the inspiration for Desperation—he drove through a deserted town in
Oregon wondering what happened to all the people (he eventually set the book in a small Nevada
desert town). He also claims his editor Chuck Verrill sent him Richard Bachman’s manuscript for
The Regulators; his reaction: ‘I don’t know if it’s a good novel or not. But the most interesting thing
about The Regulators is that he and I must have been on exactly the same psychic wavelength. It’s
almost as though we were twins, in a funny way...nasty man, though he was, and I’m glad that he’s
dead.’
He also leaves hope we might yet see another work published under the Bachman name,
claiming the widow, Claudia Inez Bachman204, had found more manuscripts: ‘I really haven’t looked
through them, so I don’t know how good they are or how bad they are. I see that one of them is a novel
about a sexual vampire, actually, which looks sort of interesting. But I got a lot to read so I haven’t
been up to Bachman’s stuff yet. The Regulators is an interesting book though.’
This entertaining post appeared on an official Penguin Putnam promotional web site in Summer
1997. The actual title of this piece may be King’s Comments but, for now, this cannot be confirmed.
The chances of obtaining a copy depend largely on knowing someone in the King community who can
provide a copy, as it is no longer online.
Alan D. Williams: An Appreciation (July 1998)
This piece is King’s short obituary for Alan D. Williams, who edited seven of King’s books for
Viking (including Different Seasons, The Dead Zone and Christine). He says Williams was ‘a
writer’s editor, the rare sort who can make himself a vessel for whatever sort of work his current
author is best able to do. He didn’t want me or any other writer to do different work: he wanted the
writer’s book, but written to Alan’s own high standards, which were always expressed gently but
clearly and insistently.’
King talks of Williams as a person and specifically of their working relationship: ‘I missed him
when he left Viking, and I miss him more now that he has died. It was good to have worked with a
man of such wit and intelligence and unfailing cheer. Damn, but I liked him. And in our professional
relationship, what I liked best was his good sense. If something was bad but necessary, he figured out
how to fix it. If something was bad and unnecessary, he told you to throw it out. And if it was working
—if the kids would, in his judgment, understand—he helped it to grow. He never touched his pencil
to anything of mine that wasn’t better for the touch. And I feel the same about having known him.’
This piece appeared in the July 1998 edition of Locus magazine. While some libraries may
archive this publication, the best way to obtain copies is through used magazine sources.
Secrets, Lies, and‘Bag of Bones’(Fall 1998)
King opens with a definition of community: ‘Community interests us, I think, in fiction, in
movies, and on the stage because it interests us in our lives. Community interests us because it’s part
of an organization that we belong to. That’s true whether you live in a city or whether you’re in the
country. I don’t mean to wax sociological about this, but if you live in an apartment building in New
York City, that’s a community.’
Community, especially in small town Maine, plays an important role in King’s novel Bag of
Bones (and the majority of his other works). King writes of the small town mindset, especially
feelings about outsiders: ‘I think that the smaller the community, the more tight-knit the community.
And the more the community is isolated from the wider world, the more the tendency is to say, “We
take care of our own. We look after our own. When things go wrong, that’s our business, that’s not
your business if you’re from the outside.”’
This article, deserving of wider circulation, appeared in an e-mail sent to Amazon.com Delivers
subscribers in the Fall of 1998. Copies sometimes circulate in the King community.
Leaf-Peepers (December 28, 1998—January 4, 1999)
King uses the term ‘leaf-peepers’ in this short but important essay as descriptor for the tourists
who go up to New England (and more specifically, Maine) in the month of October to check out the
beautiful foliage. He claims they reappear in January as ‘ski bums’ and goes on to describe the beauty
of winter in his part of Maine.
He closes with perhaps some of the most poignant writing of his entire career: ‘Romantics
compare the cycle of the seasons to the cycle of human life, a comparison I have never really trusted.
And yet now, at the age of fifty-one, I find something in it, after all. Sooner or later, life takes in its
breath, pauses, and then tilts toward winter. I sense that tilt approaching. When the idea threatens to
become oppressive, I think of the woods in New England tilting into winter—how you can see the
whole expanse of the lake, not just the occasional wink through the trees, and hear every movement on
the land that slopes down to the water. You can hear every living thing, no matter how cunning, before
snow comes to muffle the world.’
This piece appeared in the December 28, 1998-January 4, 1999 issue of The New Yorker. Many
libraries will archive this iconic magazine, which has carried quite a lot of King’s short fiction; older
issues are easy to secure online. It was reprinted in The Stephen King Desk Calendar 2006, an item
that appears for sale regularly on eBay.
From the Desk of Stephen King (1998)
This is a one-page letter to members of The Book-of-the-Month Club’s Stephen King Library.
King opens this very short (three paragraphs) letter, ‘One of the best things about The Stephen King
Library, besides getting all the terror you need, is the guarantee that you’ll never get a book you don’t
want.’ Referencing this buying method, in which the reader chooses the books they want from a list,
King closes, ‘The choice is yours...if you dare!’
This letter was distributed when members joined The Stephen King Library, a series of the
author’s books available through The Book-of-the-Month Club. It was used in both 1998 and 2005.
The chances of obtaining a copy are slim, excepting through another member of the King community.
A Word From Stephen King replaced it in 2000 (see below), as indeed this had replaced an earlier
version—see A Note From Stephen King above.
Untitled (March 1999)
This is a cover letter to readers and reviewers about King’s The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon.
He opens with the genesis of this short novel: ‘If books were babies, I’d call The Girl Who Loved
Tom Gordon the result of an unplanned pregnancy. I got the idea—during a game at Fenway Park,
naturally—last July, resisted it for six weeks or so, and finally gave up. The story wanted to be
written, that was all. I knew it was going to take up most of the R & R I’d been looking forward to
after two years of almost nonstop writing (Bag of Bones, Hearts in Atlantis), and I knew it would be
a difficult journey, but none of that mattered to the story. It never does. Stories want only one thing: to
be born. If that’s inconvenient, too bad.’
The battle between good and evil has been a constant theme in King’s work. More specifically,
the subjects of faith and God appear from time to time: ‘I have been writing about God—the
possibility of God and the consequences for humans if God does exist—for twenty years now, ever
since The Stand. I have no interest in preaching or in organized religion, and no patience with zealots
who claim to have the one true pipeline to the Big Guy...but it seems to me that a little girl lost in the
millions of square acres of forest west of Augusta would need someone or something to come in and
at least try to get the save on her behalf. Hence the story that you will soon be reading.’
The letter was distributed with review copies of The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon; and also as
part of an e-mail to subscribers of Simon & Schuster’s Stephen King mailing list; both in March
1999. Copies circulate in the King community.
Ghoulies, Ghosties, and Girls (June 28, 1999)
This very short piece retells the near mythical story of how King had written two pages of a
short story he regarded as a failure and then threw away. His wife, Tabitha, dug them out, and urged
him to continue. He began working again and, at that point, thought that he might be able to sell the
story to Cavalier magazine. But it quickly outgrew the short story form and eventually became his
first published novel, Carrie.
Closing, King writes: ‘I sold the book to Doubleday for $2,500. They thought it [might be a
sleeper like] “The Parallax View,” a novel they had published a year or two previous. The book’s
reception floored everyone, I think, except my wife. Looking back on it, I’d have to say that Carrie
White was the original riot grrrl.’
This piece was published in the June 28, 1999 issue of Newsweek. As an important magazine,
any significant library will have back copies available. For those looking for an original, copies
appear at used magazine and King resellers from time to time.
Untitled / Letter From King (June 1999)
This four-page note to readers concerns King’s then forthcoming book Hearts in Atlantis. He
begins, ‘Dear Constant Reader, I hope Bag of Bones gave you at least one sleepless night. Sorry ‘bout
that; it’s just the way I am. It gave me one or two, and ever since writing it I’m nervous about going
down cellar—part of me keeps expecting the door to slam, the lights to go out, and the knocking to
start. But for me, at least, that’s also part of the fun. If that makes me sick, hey, don’t call the doctor.’
King says he has a three-book deal with Simon & Schuster, for Bag of Bones, On Writing, and a
collection of stories, which was to include many of his recently published stories and would have
been titled One Headlight. When actually published in 2002 the title became Everything’s Eventual.
He also talks about writing the novella Hearts in Atlantis, then eventually Low Men in Yellow Coats
and Why We’re in Vietnam, and combining these with a pre-existing short story, Blind Willie (the
collection’s fifth story, Heavenly Shades of Night Are Falling was added at the last minute).
Closing this interesting piece, King writes: ‘ Hearts in Atlantis will be available from Scribner
in September. If you were in your teens when the platform shoe was king and there actually were
groups with names like The Strawberry Alarm Clock, maybe it will remind you of what you were,
what you had, what you lost, and what you gained. If you came later, Hearts in Atlantis might explain
a little bit about just what we were and why we turned out the way we did. I hope you’ll read it and
tell me what you think. In the meantime...peace, dude.’
This article appeared in the Pocket Books mass-market paperback edition of Bag of Bones, first
printed in June 1999. It was republished later that year as Letter from King on Simon & Schuster’s
official web site. That version is somewhat longer than the original appearance.
The Bogeyboys (1999)
This is a transcription of the keynote address King gave at the Vermont Library Conference on
May 26, 1999. He tackles the serious subject of violence in the United States, opening: ‘When I speak
in public, a thing I do as rarely as possible, I usually don’t speak from a prepared text and I hardly
ever try to say anything serious; to misquote Mark Twain, I feel that anyone looking for a moral
should be hung and anyone looking for a plot should be shot. Today, though, I want to talk about
something very serious indeed: adolescent violence in American schools. This outbreak has become
so serious that a bus driver from Conyers, Georgia, interviewed last week on the CBS Evening News,
suggested that the slang term “going postal” may soon be changed to “going pupil.” I suggest that a
great many parts of American society have contributed to creating this problem, and that we must all
work together to alleviate it... and I use the word “alleviate” rather than “cure” because I don’t think
any cure, at least in the sense of a quick fix—that is what Americans usually mean by cure; fast-fast-
fast relief, as the aspirin commercials used to say—I don’t think that sort of cure is possible. This is a
violent society. Law enforcement statistics suggest it may not be as violent now as it was fifteen years
ago, but it’s really too early to tell; we may only be witnessing a blip on the graph.’
At the time, the Columbine murders were still fresh in everyone’s minds. King addresses that
outrage specifically and references the title of his speech: ‘And yes, there needs to be a re-
examination of America’s violent culture of the imagination. It needs to be done soberly and calmly; a
witch-hunt won’t help...let’s go beyond the question of whether or not the next crop of natural born
killers are currently honing their skills in Arcade 2000 at the local mall. It’s time for an examination
of why Americans of all ages are so drawn to armed conflict (Rambo), unarmed conflict (World
Federation Wrestling), and images of violence. These things are not just speaking to potential teenage
killers, but to a great many of us. Their hold on the national psyche has progressed to a point where
the Columbine murders dominate our headlines and possess our thoughts to the exclusion of much
else...Harris and Klebold are dead and in their graves, but we are in terror of them all the same; they
are the Red Death in our richly appointed castle...They are our bogeyboys, and perhaps the real first
step in making them go away is to decide what it is about them that frightens us so much. It is a
discussion which must begin in families, schools, libraries, and in public forums such as this. Which
is why I have begged your attention and your indulgence on such an unappetizing subject.’
Clearly, this is an important opinion piece, deserving of much broader circulation. It appeared
on the VEMA (Vermont Educational Media Association) website. According to one source, ‘King’s
entire presentation was videotaped by the Regional Educational Television Network, which is
making King’s speech available to cable access channels throughout the state for cablecast and for
use in encouraging discussion.’ In the same year the author, clearly concerned by attempts to link
school shootings to his work, withdrew his early Bachman novel Rage (which features gun violence
in the classroom) from publication.
The piece appeared on VEMA’s official web page in 1999 and may now be found at a number
of other web sites through the use of a good search engine.
Untitled (7 June 2000)
The Plant is an epistolary novel King began publishing in the 1980s in limited edition format,
and then ceased after three installments. In 2000, he decided to revise the tale and publish it in
installments on his official website, using the honor system for payments. The early sections cost a
dollar each, and King vowed to stop publishing them if too many people did not pay up. He proposes
this concept by telling readers of this letter: ‘If this idea interests you, will you e-mail the web site
and say so? By the same token, if it sounds like a bad idea, will you tell me that?’
King writes he decided to undertake this project because he was ‘intrigued by the success of
“Riding the Bullet” (stunned would probably be a more accurate word), and since then have been
anxious to try something similar, but I’ve also been puzzling over issues of ownership when it comes
to creative work.’ Riding the Bullet was originally published on King’s web site in a non-printable
PDF file for $2.50; and some web sites (including amazon.com) gave it away, leading to a near
meltdown of servers worldwide. King closes: ‘So tell me what you think, keeping in mind that The
Plant is an unfinished work (although I reserve the right to continue the story, and to continue posting
further installments, if the feedback is positive) and I can’t guarantee you an ending, either happy or
sad. And I reserve the right to cease publication if a lot of people steal the story...but I just don’t
believe that will happen. I mean, we’re talking a buck a pop here, right?’
This piece was posted at Stephen King’s official web site on June 7, 2000. Older posts are no
longer accessible online but copies circulate in the King community. There would be quite a number
of posts about this project over the following months (see below).
Untitled (14 June 2000)
In this two-paragraph piece King informs readers responses to the question of whether or not to
publish The Plant online (see directly above) were very positive, and that he is going to go ahead. He
closes with a subtle reference to the honor system he proposes for payments: ‘remember the Philtrum
Press motto: “It takes a really bad guy to steal from a blind newsboy.”’
This piece was posted at Stephen King’s official web site on June 14, 2000 and the first online
installment of The Plant appeared the following month. Further posts on this subject are discussed
below.
Will We Close the Book on Books? (June 19, 2000)
This three-paragraph article was part of a lengthy special feature in Time magazine dealing with
the future of technology and titled Visions 21. King mentions his eBook experiment Riding the Bullet
and weighs in on the question posed in the title: ‘I suspect that the growth of the Internet has actually
been something of a boon when it comes to reading: people with more Beanie Babies than books on
their shelves spend more time reading than they used to as they surf from site to site. But it’s not a
book, dammit, that perfect object that speaks without speaking, needs no batteries and never crashes
unless you throw it in the corner. So, yes, there’ll be books. Speaking personally, you can have my
gun, but you’ll take my book when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the binding.’ The last is a pet
saying of this serial promoter of the written word.
The piece was published in the June 19, 2000 issue of Time magazine. As Time is an important
magazine any major library will hold back copies. Collectors looking for an original will find copies
at online used magazine outlets.
Untitled (July 11, 2000)
This is a further update to the Plant eBook project. A ‘To’ heading at the top of the page reads,
‘Constant Reader/Constant Webhead’; and the ‘Subject’ heading reads: ‘ The Plant Update’.
The piece is split into subject headings with explanatory text for each: ‘What It Is’; ‘Depends on
What?’; ‘How Much’; ‘What I Promise’; ‘What You Promise’; ‘What We’ll Have’; ‘If You Have
Other Questions’; ‘If You’re Not Satisfied’; ‘Will It Work?’; and ‘Is This The End of Publishing?’
He’d answered this last question in more detail in Will We Close the Book on Books? (see directly
above). King closes, ‘I hope this answers your questions. Now go be good to someone, and
remember: this ain’t Napster. Take what you want...and pay for it.’
It was posted on Stephen King’s official web site on July 11, 2000 and is part of a series of such
items covered both above and below.
Steve’s Comments (July 25, 2000)
King starts this brief update by thanking readers for their response to The Plant. He says
payment rates by credit card were around 75%; that they are hoping for between 85-90% pay-through;
and promises an update of the figures on July 31, 2000. He says he is not going to be talking to the
press about the matter for awhile as he prefers discourse with his readers: ‘Good or bad, you deserve
the news first, you deserve to read it here, and that’s the way it is going to play out. For the time
being, just let me reiterate this experiment seems to be working. I am delighted. Thank you. Tell your
friends.’
This piece was posted on Stephen King’s official web site on July 25, 2000 as part of a series of
such items covered both above and below.
Steve’s Comments (Post #2) (July 25, 2000)
In King’s second post of the day, he reveals more of his thoughts regarding The Plant project:
‘Here’s the truth: When I made a decision to post the first two installments of The Plant, my hopes of
success weren’t very high. Publicly, I have always expressed a great deal of confidence in human
nature, but in private I have wondered if anybody would ever pay for anything on the Net. It now
looks as though people will, and I am faced with the real possibility of finishing The Plant.’ Next, he
outlines a planned future for the tale, indicating there would be longer installments for episodes two
and three; and an increase in price for installment four, which would be considerably longer than any
previous section.
Steve’s Comments (July 31, 2000)
This is the update promised in the Steve’s Comments post for July 25, 2000: ‘I promised
visitors at this site—not to mention interested media types—an update on how we’re doing as of
7/31. This is that update. I have been as honest and specific as I can be, believing that’s the best way
to spike rumors.’ Similar in style to the untitled July 11, 2000 post, King divides this piece into
subcategories: ‘How many downloads so far?’; ‘How many have paid?’; ‘Costs to you, as of Part
1?’; ‘A lot fewer downloads than “Riding the Bullet.” Disappointed?’; ‘Do you expect more
downloads of Part 1?’; ‘Are you go for Part 3 in September?’; ‘Are you working on The Plant
again?’; ‘Will people continue to come back?’; ‘And if the downloads don’t stay up?’; then, finally,
‘If I have other questions?’
This piece was posted on Stephen King’s official web site on July 31, 2000 as part of a series of
such items covered both above and below.
Steve’s Comments (August 25, 2000)
This is another update regarding King’s online experiment with the publication of The Plant.
Downloads for Part Two were down as compared to Part One; and that the pay-through rate has
dropped. Although he’s written more, a decision about whether or not to continue will come after Part
Three is released in September; and he addresses other minor issues such as pricing for the remaining
parts, and complaints received about the cost of ink and paper when printing these pieces out (one
cannot help but be amazed!)
‘In closing, I just want to add that I appreciate all the support you have shown me thus far, and to
add that the profit-motive was never the principal force driving this amusing exploration, and that is
not what’s driving it now. We are exploring a new continent, that’s all, and so far it has been fun.’
This piece was posted on Stephen King’s official web site on August 25, 2000 as part of a
series of such items covered both above and below.
Clarifications (September 5, 2000)
This one paragraph piece clarifies a mistake by The New York Times about King accepting
unsolicited manuscripts. The author points out he does not do so, and that in On Writing he had asked
readers to submit a short sample via his official web site if they felt inclined to do so. It was posted
on Stephen King’s official web site on September 5, 2000. Older posts are no longer accessible
online but copies circulate in the King community.
My Favorite Things (September 2000)
In this very short aside of only a couple of sentences King names his favorite object, which is,
allegedly, his 2000 Dodge Ram pickup truck. It appeared in the September 2000 issue of Men’s
Journal magazine. Copies of this publication are available from the usual used magazine resources.
Stephen King (2000)
This is an excerpt from King’s 1988 Commencement speech at the University of Maine. He’d
opened in typically humorous style: ‘I am not addressing you, because you are not letters. Even if you
were put in a large package and could be sent bulk mail, I would have nowhere to send you. I am not
commencing anything. I did that when I began to talk. You are not commencing anything, at least in the
aggregate; I am aware that individuals are always commencing something: some of you are
commencing respiration, commencing efforts to stifle yawns, commencing to feel the need for a beer.
But as a group, you’re just sitting there, and you commenced that already....’
King closes: ‘ There is no metaphor for your life. There is only one single man and one single
woman living a life with the earth under and the sky over and all the worlds of possibility in the head
existing between the two. You want to know what is going to happen to you? You want to know what
to do next? I don’t know the answer to either question. But I know as surely as I know summer
follows spring that you can, and that most of you will.’
This piece appears in Onward!: Twenty-Five Years of Advice, Exhortation, and Inspiration
from America’s Best Commencement Speeches, edited by Peter J. Smith. Published in hardcover by
Scribner in 2000, copies are available through abebooks.com, Amazon.com and other online
booksellers.
Stephen’s Comments (December 4, 2000)
King ceased publication of The Plant in December 2000 with Part Six of the story. He says this
final part concludes the first major section of the novel; and that The Plant is not finished online—‘it
is only on hiatus.’ The hiatus now appears permanent; as he told fans in 2006 it wasn’t likely he’d
ever go back and finish this twice-halted tale.
He also provides a link to a New York Times editorial on The Plant, and his response, The
Plant: Getting a Little Goofy (see directly below). Then, in apparent frustration: ‘May I scold for a
minute? This whole discussion is beside the point. My job is not to comment on art and fiction. I am
not a critic. If anything has discouraged me about the course of The Plant from July until December, it
has been the almost total lack of discussion of the story. Let’s get back to that and try to stay there.’
This piece was posted on Stephen King’s official web site on December 4, 2000 as part of a
series of such items covered both above and below.
The Plant: Getting a Little Goofy (December 4, 2000)
This post responds to an editorial in The New York Times for 1 December 2000 titled King
Closure. Amazingly, the newspaper refused to print King’s response and he was left with placing it
on his official web site, asking fans to read both in order to form their own opinion on the matter. One
of the uninformed statements in this editorial was this clanger: ‘… one reads Stephen King novels in a
single gulp. Their chief effect is suspense of a kind that cannot be drawn out over months.’ In
response, King mentions his serialized novel The Green Mile and the fact that all six parts appeared
on the newspaper’s paperback bestseller list at the same time!
He declares that he’s learned a lot from this online experiment. Once the dust had settled, he was
able to identify issues with the project: ‘I see three large problems. One is that most Internet users
seem to have the attention span of grasshoppers. Another is that Internet users have gotten used to the
idea that most of what’s available to them on the Net is either free or should be. The third—and
biggest—is that book-readers don’t regard electronic books as real books.’ The latter statements are
clearly still the case.
King closes philosophically: ‘None of this is a bad thing or a good thing. Neither is any of it a
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