pablo
07-02-2010, 02:50 PM
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128239303
In the summer of 1999, writer Stephen King was nearly killed while taking his daily walk. A driver had left the highway and struck King as he strode along the gravel shoulder of Route 5 in Maine.
While recovering from his injuries, King worked on a book called On Writing. The book was both a reflection on his craft and his thoughts about the accident that required months of rehabilitation to repair his broken bones.
In a 2000 interview on Fresh Air, King described his life-changing accident to Terry Gross but said it didn't change the way he approached his writing.
"Obviously, it has given me some new things to write about and some new experiences to put in stories, and I've already begun that procedure," he explained. "Given a choice, if somebody had walked up to me and said, 'Well, Steve, you can continue to live the same old, boring, healthy life and you won't have any real, new experiences and you can retire at 55, or you can go for the car accident: You can get hit by the van and put in the hospital, and you'll get some new experiences and you can write until you're 60. Which do you choose?' And immediately I would say, 'Give me the boring life. I'll stop at 55.' So I do have some new experiences, and I probably will write some other things and go on for a while."
More than 350 million copies of King's novels and short story collections are in print. He received the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. His most recent titles include Dreamcatcher, Under the Dome, Just After Sunset and Bag of Bones. The 10th-anniversary edition of his book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft will be released on July 6.
This interview was originally broadcast on Oct. 10, 2000
In the summer of 1999, writer Stephen King was nearly killed while taking his daily walk. A driver had left the highway and struck King as he strode along the gravel shoulder of Route 5 in Maine.
While recovering from his injuries, King worked on a book called On Writing. The book was both a reflection on his craft and his thoughts about the accident that required months of rehabilitation to repair his broken bones.
In a 2000 interview on Fresh Air, King described his life-changing accident to Terry Gross but said it didn't change the way he approached his writing.
"Obviously, it has given me some new things to write about and some new experiences to put in stories, and I've already begun that procedure," he explained. "Given a choice, if somebody had walked up to me and said, 'Well, Steve, you can continue to live the same old, boring, healthy life and you won't have any real, new experiences and you can retire at 55, or you can go for the car accident: You can get hit by the van and put in the hospital, and you'll get some new experiences and you can write until you're 60. Which do you choose?' And immediately I would say, 'Give me the boring life. I'll stop at 55.' So I do have some new experiences, and I probably will write some other things and go on for a while."
More than 350 million copies of King's novels and short story collections are in print. He received the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. His most recent titles include Dreamcatcher, Under the Dome, Just After Sunset and Bag of Bones. The 10th-anniversary edition of his book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft will be released on July 6.
This interview was originally broadcast on Oct. 10, 2000