Nice try Mr King, but I’m still not scared
I love Stephen King’s writing. The way he writes, the manner in which his sentences are constructed, almost lovingly put together, they inspire pictures in such vivid clarity they could almost be real photographs.
But he’s not scary.
To me, at least. The Shining has now been added to the list of Stephen King novels/short stories that I have devoured and, like all of them, I relished the vivid imagery, the poetic beauty of his phrases, the depth to his characters but, I don’t think my heart started to race at any point during the novel. Hey, maybe it’s just me being part of the fearless, hard-to-scare Generation Y. But nope. It almost couldn’t scare me.
I’m not trying to bash his work. After all, I love it. But, I wish it would scare me, just a little. I guess it might have something to do with the medium. After all, you can stop reading a book if it gets a little too much. (You can do what Joey from Friends does and put the book in the freezer if you so desire.) And, while the same is basically true of a movie, people don’t really tend to stop or leave scary movies. They are content to continue watching, peering through their fingers. Maybe it was because I read the book over several days, giving myself ample breaks in order to help preserve my eyesight. In doing so, I unwittingly gave myself ample time to digest what was happening, reflect on what had already happened and speculate on what was going to happen next. You don’t get that luxury when you’re watching a movie. You’re thrown into that world and you can’t easily escape. So maybe, just maybe, if I hadn’t stopped, I would have found it scary, instead of just a magnificent piece of writing.
Eh. At the end of the day, I know I’ll always remember the first time Danny goes into Room 217. I didn’t think it was that scary but… wow.
~ Bats ♥
