The Gilmore Book Club

How to Find Your Creative Voice with Stephen King

 What do a flying turtle-bird and Princess Lea have in common? They’re both Halloween costumes!

While it’s never been my favorite holiday, I did celebrate, or at least participate, in the Halloween festivities when I was younger. In this scene, my grandmother played my Lorelai, sewing an excellent costume for whatever her granddaughters decided to be for Halloween. She had even stitched a little button into the Princess Lea costume so the Star Wars theme played whenever I pressed it. Take that, Turtle-bird!

Rory may not have been able to choose between a turtle or a bird, but I had very clear inspirations: Princess Lea, Esmerelda, and Cleopatra. Spot a theme, here? Well, just keep that in mind for later.

Most of me felt detached from all this Halloween hoopla because for most of my life, Halloween has been about scary things: scary movies, scary stories, haunted houses, jumping out from behind bushes, monsters in the closet, creatures in the dark. And I didn’t want any of it.

Part of that was because it wasn’t my personality to begin with; the other was because my imagination was too powerful. My mind could make up stories for anything, even if I were just listening to the music of Les Misérables, a part of my mind read the undertones of the horrors that took place during the French Revolution. Those ghosts plagued me for much of my childhood, so my mom could no longer play that CD around me, much to her dismay.

And my day-mares often turned into nightmares, forcing me to wake up in the middle of the night, checking my bed for snakes or sharks or bushes, whatever happened to be chasing me that night.

Therefore, I didn’t need any more horrors in my life. I had already met my limit. Sorry, Halloween, I skip straight to Christmas.

But I now have some friends who like to mark Halloween in their own ways, delving into the mystical past of the Holiday to Samhain, the Gaelic name for this time of year halfway between the autumn solstice and the winter solstice. As we talked about the Holiday, including topics from the cycle of death and rebirth to our connection to our ancestors and everything that came before, we turned to my dislike of Halloween.

“Maybe this is a time to discover a new ritual, a new celebration. Everything we’ve talked about today relates to who we are as people, our costumes, our ancestors, our relationship with death- it’s all identity. Just do something you love or enjoy, something that really resonates with you and feels like a part of you, to mark the day,” one of them suggested.

And maybe it is. Why had I let this Holiday be what others wanted it to be? I’ve certainly never cared what other people thought about my obsession with Christmas, so why did I let Halloween get to me? I’ve been so confident and brave about other things, but why did I let the fear around this day and all the horrors get to me? 

I understand that the imagination is limitless, but I put boundaries on it nonetheless. Only some daydreams were an apt foundation for the career I wanted to build. Only select wanderings of the mind would contribute to the life I could live and the relationships I could have.

I could certainly imagine what it would be like to be Esmerelda or Princess Lea, but I hold evidence of what it’s like to be an author in my hands daily. Why was I avoiding trying on more of those costumes to see what I would want to keep for myself?

I’ve been watching some of the courses on Masterclass, two of my current ones instructed by Shonda Rhimes, one of my favorites, and Neil Gaiman, even though I’ve only listened to one of his books. Now I don’t agree with absolutely everything both instructors say, I believe that artists should listen to other artists but ultimately have to decide on their process for themselves, but I do agree that you should experience as much of your chosen art as you can.

It’s a very Lorelai Gilmore kind of principle. In the case of Shonda Rhimes, that means you watch as many TV shows as possible. I do that pretty easily already, but in honor of Shonda, I’m currently expanding my attention to The Sopranos. In Neil Gaiman’s case, that means reading everything.

Cue the King Quintet- the five novels mentioned in the seven original seasons of Gilmore Girls. We have Cujo, the one about the rabid dog. Carrie, the one where telekinesis meets teenage outcast. Christine, the one with a haunted car. The Shining, the one about a haunted hotel you should never stay at. And Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, where a felon escapes through a chiseled hole in the wall covered by a pin-up poster.

So we've established I wasn't reading these for fun, so why was I reading them? To check them off a list? I've decided that this year for Halloween, I would ''try on'' Stephen King's writing styles. 

When I was studying writing in college, many lessons included analyzing and replicating the work of other authors. Part of our assignment was to write a parody, replicating the elements in what we read. I penned a story called ''The Toe'', based on Nikoli Gogol'sGogol's The Nose. I also wrote ''The Change'' in which the main character finds himself transformed into a moose (but a very cute moose, make boy moose go waahh) in homage to Franz Kafka'sKafka's Metamorphosis.

This Stephen King analysis is a similar exercise, but I'll do the first step of detailing all the little characterizations that stylize each book.

So in that frame of mind: what is it like to write like Stephen King? What are his subjects, his theme, his voice?

 First, let's talk about genre. While I went into this project thinking all King's books are classified as horror, that's not the case. Carrie is paranormal; it's freaky but, for the most part, not bloodcurdling. Christine would be paranormal too, but definitely with some horror tones. To me, Cujo and The Shining are straight-up horror. Shawshank Redemption reads more like suspense and thriller. And the Gunslinger is a classic Sci-Fi dystopian with YA undertones.  

King writes across many different genres, something I've always admired about writers because I want to do the same. Sure, my current project is all personal essays, but someday I want to write a Fantasy novel, a romance series, and maybe even a children's book. I want to span across all writing mediums by composing a screenplay for a movie or TV series, penning the lyrics for songs, and developing a script for Broadway. Why put a limit on it? If I'm dreaming big, I may as well go all the way- breath and depth.

Who knows how many of those I'll complete, but studying how other writers jump across genres is an important step in the process.

But could you read a book with its front pages missing and know that it's Stephen King's work? In film, they call it the auteur theory, that you could watch any film and know which ones are certain directors because they all have a certain feel, a directorial fingerprint you can pick up on in each one. Think Tim Burton or Wes Anderson; their movies are made in particular styles. Or, for a TV example, Amy Sherman-Palladino's lightning-fast dialogue.

I'm not versed enough in Stephen King to determine this now; however, I could make an educated guess if the untitled, unauthored book I was reading was King's.

Yes, his books contained horrors and paranormal activity. Yes, they were all very colloquially written (not like Tom Sawyer or anything, but the writing wasn't flowery. It read like the characters talked). But to me, one thing stood out across all King's books: they were smart.

And in this case, I'm using 'smart' as a synonym for 'Gilmore'. Each book was peppered with allusions to the Bible, classic Greek literature, Shakespeare, astrology and tarot, and poetry. The characters in King's books are not especially educated, they're ordinary people, yet they have a certain Lorelai Gilmore-like quality of dropping in references only someone with a vast array of knowledge would know. As a Gilmore fan and an avid reader, this particular quality resonates with me and crops up in the essays on this blog. But I know myself well, and even though it may not be in the same style, I have a feeling these kinds of references will pop up in some way, even when I change genres and play with my voice.

That’s two things. Two things I respect about an author whose primary genre I don’t like. Two things our writing has in common. Two aspects I’d add to my author costume. And knowing my author identity is everything.

What is your creative identity? Try on the characteristics of your favorite artists and see where it takes you.

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