My Thesis: Part One

Okay, here you go! This is the first 10 pages of the thesis... and the first 4 pages are really freebies like my dedication and table of contents, so you're only really looking at about 6 pages of serious reading. It covers my introduction, where I explain my project, and then my condensed biography of Stephen King himself.

And for the record, I haven't touched this document in four years... I thought about going back and tweaking things (like where I used the word "great" twice in my very first sentence... forehead slap) but figured it should stay how it was when I submitted it.

And for the second record, I wasn't even a Stephen King fan before I started this project. I had read a few of his things and of course like most everyone else I loved the movies based on his stories - The Shining, Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me. But I was fascinated, and still am, by the vast divide between the "literary" - the academic, high-brow, whatever - and the popular. It is not an issue specific to the written word, and can be seen rearing its ugly head in art, in music, and I'm sure a myriad of other pursuits. So I came into my project with that in mind, and found Stephen King as this really cool piece of the puzzle.

And for the third record, I am now an official big fan of Stephen King.

If you are not, I'll direct you to his volume of four novellas entitled Different Seasons. It is the perfect place to dip your toe into his work, and I assure you there is nary a rabid dog, deranged killer clown, or apocalyptic showdown to be found. Just fascinating, richly told human stories including the ones that inspired the aforementioned movies The Shawshank Redemption and Stand By Me.

Now, without further ado, click here to get the file. I'm working on a way to hotlink the PDF but for now you will have to click and download from the file hosting site. It's a pretty small file so it should be a snap to download.

Who Wants to Read My Thesis!?!

Okay, okay, everyone put your hands down. Everyone will get a turn! Sheesh!

So maybe no one was banging down my door asking for it, but I've decided to start posting chunks of my original senior thesis here for those who are interested. I was flipping through it the other day and it crossed my mind that even people like my own parents and husband have never read it completely... probably because no one but a big ole' word geek like myself would be clamoring to take a casual flip through 60 pages of "Stephen King: The Demystification of the Author."

However, I'm furiously proud of what I did, and I'd like to share it. For years of my life, academic and/or recreational writing was something I did on the daily. Recently I decided I wanted to get back to writing in some sense, so to motivate and inspire me, I picked up one of my all-time favorite books, Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. If you have any interest in the craft of writing or the challenges of authorship, I beseech you to go now and read this book. Try to forget any preconceived notions you have of Stephen King (more on that in my thesis) and just... read it. Trust me!

Anyway, reading that book again and thinking about writing and authorship... all that made me decide that maybe I could share a bit of my thesis here and that would be okay. Don't worry, I'll still post about all the other goofy and mundane happenings of my life (thank goodness for that, I know how you depend on it, dear reader), but I'll mix in some of those posts as well. I hope you'll indulge me or at least tolerate it!

Love you.