Trilogy of famous failures in History: Stephen King

Why does everyone know the name, Stephen King?

He’s the sort of success story every author dreams of becoming. Not only are his books popular, but quite a few of them have been adapted quite successfully as television and movies.

He’s known all the world around as being one of the great storytellers of the weird and creepy and has a considerable backlist waiting to be explored. 

So, where did he come from?

And how does his story apply to yours?

Stephen King was a writer at heart all the way back to his school days when he used to scribble out short stories for his friends.

Writing wasn’t his original career ambition, though. He’d set out to become a teacher, and only resorted to writing when he couldn’t find a job in his field.

Even this didn’t come easily though. When writing his first novel, Carrie, he was plagued with massive self-doubt, so much so he threw away his initial attempts.

But with the encouragement of those around him, he went on to finish the book and got it published to great success.

Too much success.

The stress of having to produce another book when his first had proven so popular caused Stephen King to question himself further.

He didn’t feel he was equal to the task and started drinking heavily. This was the beginning of a struggle with alcoholism that would nearly ruin him.