Stephen King’s “Carrie” Turns 50: How the Novel Almost Never Happened.
Happy 50th Birthday to Stephen King’s Carrie! Published on April 5th,1974, it was King’s first published novel, earning him a $2500 advance. It was for many people (myself included), their entry into the horror genre. I read it for the first time in high school and have been hooked on the genre ever since.
Carrie’s impact on horror can’t be understated. It launched several successful movies and plays, and its themes of adolescence, bullying, mental health, peer pressure, social exclusion, and religious fanaticism remain relevant today. But even more fascinating is the story behind how King came up with the novel and how he almost didn’t complete it.
The Origin Story of Carry
In the early 1970s, the Kings struggled financially, living in a trailer with no telephone in Hermon, Maine. His wife Tabitha was working at Dunkin’ Donuts while he was working at a laundry and later as an English teacher with a $6400 a year salary. King shares in On Writing about their money struggles, his limited success with writing, and how difficult it was to find the energy to write after teaching all day.
The opening scene of Carrie came to him while working one summer as a janitor at a local high school. I won’t spoil the opening scene of Carrie here, but let’s just say the memory of cleaning the girls’ locker room inspired a scene of adolescent girls being exceptionally cruel to Carrie in the showers. King connected this imaginary scene to an article he read years before about telekinesis and how girls in young adolescence may be more prone to telekinetic abilities.
“Pow!” he writes in On Writing. “Two unrelated ideas, adolescent cruelty and telekinesis, came together, and I had an idea.”
Yet, the opening pages of the novel manuscript were tossed in the garbage by King, and almost lost forever. King had issues with the storyline, didn’t particularly love the character of Carrie White, and had misgivings about whether he could write from a teenage girl’s perspective.
Luckily for horror readers, his wife, Tabitha, saved the day. She pulled out an early, crumbled manuscript out of King’s trash and read the story. She liked it so much that she urged him to finish the story so she could find out what happened next.
“You’ve got something here,” she told King.
King followed her advice and sent it off to Doubleday to his friend, William Thompson, and soon forgot all about the book and focused on teaching, writing, and raising his children.
Months later a fateful telegram changed their lives:
Congratulations,
Carrie officially a doubleday book. Is $2500 advance okay? The future lies ahead.
Love, Bill
Some time later, Thompson reached out again by phone (the Kings were now in an apartment with a telephone) to inform him that the paperback rights to Carrie had been sold to Signet Books. King had told Tabitha he expected a few tens of thousands of dollars at best.
Instead, on Mother’s Day, he got the surprise of his life, forever changing his trajectory as a writer:
Are you sitting down?
The paperback rights to Carrie went to Signet Books for four hundred thousand dollars.
After the shock and excitement wore off, King went out shopping for Tabitha in downtown Bangor, determined to get her something “wild and extravagant.” He settled on a hair dryer. When Tabitha returned home, he gave her the hair dryer and told her the news. At a loss for words, she looked around at their tiny, dingy apartment—they’d never live like that again—and cried.
Carrie stands alone as a remarkable horror novel. The novel created a space in the horror genre for adolescent female protagonists and shattered the ‘passive’ and ‘helpless’ female trope common in horror. Carrie White is a complex, multidimensional character that invites the reader to empathize with her—even when she does monstrous things with her powers—leaving the reader uncomfortable with not only Carrie’s violent acts, but with how we as the reader are rooting for her.
Do yourself a favor and celebrate the 50th birthday of Carrie with a gift of the book to you or your loved one. And if you’re a writer or a King fan, take a look at his marvelous On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. Find both on Amazon using the links within the text and below.
Happy Reading!
Our Favorite Quotes from Stephen King’s “Carrie”
This is the girl they keep calling a monster. I want you to keep that firmly in mind. The girl who could be satisified with a hamburger and a dime root beer after her only school dance so her momma wouldn’t be worried…
Jesus watches from the wall,
But his face is cold as stone,
And if he loves me
As she tells me
Why do I feel so all alone?
People don't get better, they just get smarter. When you get smarter you don't stop pulling the wings off flies, you just think of better reasons for doing it.
“She did not know if her gift came from the lord of light or of darkness, and now, finally finding that she didn't care which, she was overcome with almost indescribable relief, as if a huge weight, long carried, had slipped from her shoulders.”
- Chris Carroll