Stephen King, author extraordinaire, interviewed with Salon.com on 09-98 regarding his book, Bag of Bones, which was pointed out to me recently. Of course in the interview, the old gent came up. He, in all of his trailer park eloquence, described Lovecraft’s work as something best read by 13 to 15 year olds and is basically composed of gigantic disembodied vaginas. Albeit very true that whilst in that age, I was very much interested in vaginas, I hardly found Lovecraft a source for blatant pornography. NOW KING on the other hand, was always good for a pointless 300 pages describing in detail a character with some overly perverse obsession with some bizarre fetish that has really nothing to do with the story besides of course, securing the MA rating on his books. I’m not sure if King is using that material to draw readers in, a technique used primarily by Harlequin Romance Novels, or to engage in some sort of Freudian mental masturbation. All the while assuring his readers that his material is adult material and that they are in fact in that selective club, called grown ups. Parts of his stories remind me of small children shaving with their fathers razors.. the self delusional attempt to make themselves believe that they are more than they really are. Most of the King fans I know are… 13 – 15 year olds.
Lovecraft on the other hand, emits a sense of New English charm and class. Choosing sophistication over blatant sex, were he alive today, he would possibly detest King’s work for its blatant vulgarity.
The phone just rang, it was a local friend of mine who is asking what I am doing tonight, upon telling her what I am writing, she had this to say:
“King had a bad way of going way off topic, describing how a gun went off in someone’s ass in STAND, or how this certain ‘fag’ was dressed in IT, and how all ‘fags’ dress that way.” She elaborated that she personally lost the desire to read on, due to the fact that she didn’t want to read perversions, but rather a good story. “And then make all of his books into movies and they suck even more”, she adds on. Good point there, a lot of King’s work can be successfully put into film.
Perhaps his slasher film mentality is the secret of his success. Maybe he is trying to appeal to what drives the American media. Sex, violence and the strange. Give them backwoods nymphomaniacs, S&M Lawyers who dies leaving their nude wife tied to the bed, and maybe a shitload of dead pets and they’ll eat it for breakfast on Elm Street after they wake from their Nightmares..
So yes.. having Stephan King refer to your work as perverse trash for adolescents is kinda like having Hannibal Lector call you crazy. You kind almost want to take it as a compliment.
