Vermögen

Stephen King net worth in 2023 Career & Relationship

Estimated value: €357 million
Age: 74
Born: 09/21/1947
Country of origin: United States
Source of Wealth: writer
Last updated: 2021

Short introduction

Stephen King is the author of numerous novels, most of which are in the horror genre. His books have sold over 400 million copies and are available in over 50 different languages. He is considered one of the most commercially successful writers ever.

early life

He was born in Portland, Maine, in 1947, the US state where he still lives today. When he was two years old, his father left the family. Growing up in poor circumstances, he still had frequent opportunities to see science fiction and fantasy films in the cinema. These have shaped his writing from an early age. He is said to have written his first stories at the age of seven. His first publication was a story in Comics Review magazine when he was 19. After leaving school, he studied English at the University of Maine from 1966 to 1970, where he met his future wife, whom he married in 1971. He then worked as an English teacher in Hampden, also in Maine. However, since the income from this was not sufficient to feed his family, he also worked at night as an ironer in a laundry. Despite this, he managed to write more short stories in the scarce amount of free time he had. Despite some sales of these stories, it was still some time before his breakthrough as a commercially successful author. He achieved this with the novel “Carrie”, which he actually wanted to throw away. However, his wife persuaded him to finish the work. Eventually, Stephen King was able to sell the novel for $400,000.

Career

From then on, his career as a best-selling author really took off. The following novels “Brennen muss Salem” and “Shining” were also big hits with the public, with the corresponding financial success for King himself. During this time he also wrote many short stories that further underpinned his standing. Even in this early period of his success, many of his works were filmed, which not only enabled him to earn more money, but also contributed to his enormous popularity.

In the course of his career, Stephen King has written over 50 novels and 100 short stories, as well as a number of novellas and screenplays. Stephen King has also written a number of poems, columns and even non-fiction books. A typical pattern of his actions is that of the average person who is suddenly drawn into nightmarish and not least supernatural events.

Despite the success, King himself slipped more and more into drug problems. In addition to alcohol, he also consumed cocaine and other stimulants in excess. In 1987, however, at the insistence of his wife, he managed to put an end to these addictions in a rehab clinic, so far successfully.

His creativity was only briefly interrupted by the renunciation of drugs, Stephen King very quickly regained his former creativity and production rate with sometimes several novels per year. He also formed a band of writers in 1992, with which he performs primarily at fundraisers.

In 1999 he was the victim of a traffic accident in which he was seriously injured. But he recovered well from that and wrote his first work afterwards while still in the hospital by hand.

Career highlights

The best known worldwide are the novels “Shining”, “It” and “Cujo”, with almost all of his works achieving huge sales figures. Many of his novels were also made into films, although King was not always satisfied with the adaptation, which was particularly the case with the Shining. But this feature film, which goes back to King’s novel, also became a global success. If you look back over his entire career, you might say that his greatest success is that he has not had a long creative crisis for decades – nor has he ever fallen in favor with his audience.

Famous quotes

“My books are the literary equivalent of a Big Mac with a big helping of fries.”

“People think I’m a very strange person. But that is not correct. I have the heart of a little boy. It’s in a jar on my desk.”

“Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful is a lot of hard work.”

“When I’m asked, ‘How do you write?’, I don’t hesitate to answer, ‘One word at a time.’”

“The beauty of religious fanaticism is that it has the power to explain everything. Once God (or Satan) is accepted as the primary reason for everything that happens in the mortal world, nothing is left to chance…logical thinking can safely be jettisoned.”

Amazing Facts

Stephen King is a very big baseball fan and in particular the Boston Red Sox. He has owned two season tickets for himself and his wife since the 1980s.

Stephen King has made cameo appearances in a number of films based on his books, up to 2019 there were over 10 different ones.

Stephen King also appears several times as himself in the TV series “The Simpsons”.

Estimated value: €357 million