← New Books Network
New Books Network
Caroline Bicks, "Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King" (Hogarth, 2026)
00:53:29
Loading summary
Transcript128 lines
- [00:00]
Quince Brand Representative
I love wearing clothing that's both comfortable and elevated. Outfits I can wear on a walk through the park or in a meeting with a client. Quince has become my go to with fabrics that are incredibly soft, clean and versatile. This spring I refresh my wardrobe with quints. I especially love their Pima cotton tees and bamboo jersey lounge shorts. Surprisingly soft and breathable with a quality level you'd expect to pay a lot more for. If you're looking for new clothes this spring, I highly recommend checking out their Italian swim trunks. I love swimming but can never find swimwear that feels comfortable and looks good. Quince's swimwear is the best I've ever owned. I can't emphasize enough how affordable Quince is for the quality you get. Check out their incredible deals and offerings, especially if you're looking for clothes that feel good and look great. Whether you're at the office or the beach. Refresh your everyday with luxury you'll actually use. Head to Quince.com NewBooks for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's Q-U-I-N C E.com NewBooks for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com NewBooks this episode is brought to
- [01:08]
Prime Originals Advertiser
you by Prime Obsession is in session and this summer Prime Originals have everything you want. Steamy romances, irresistible love stories and the book to screen favorites you've already read twice off campus. Elle every year after the Love Hypothesis, Sterling Point and more slow burns, second chances chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime Girl. Winter is so last season and now spring's got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs. You're thirsty for the sun on your shoulders that perfect hang on the patio sundress. Those sandals you can wear all day and all night and you've had enough of shopping for from your couch. Done. Hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear open that envelope. It's time for a little in person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic.
- [02:07]
Pam Brown
Welcome to the New Books Network. Hello everyone. This is Pam Brown and I'm here from the Fox and the Hedgehog. Really happy to be joining you today and to welcome to the show Caroline Bix, the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature at the University of Maine. Quite a title, Caroline. I'd like to just turn it over to you to talk about how that. Well before that came to happen, who were you before that what was your career like, your life like before that? I know a little bit about it because we know each other, but I would like you to just to tell your own story.
- [02:50]
Caroline Bix
Yeah. So I have been an early modern a scholar for well over 30 years now. I trained at Stanford, got my first job at the Ohio State University, was there for four years as an assistant professor, and then moved to Boston to Boston College, where I settled in for 15 years. That's where I got tenure. And over the course of that time I wrote a few books. I focus on gender and early modern culture and theater, which is where you and I have had a number of great times together. So my first book was about midwifery and the culture of childbirth in Shakespeare's England. And along the way I've done work on Mary Ward and her religious institute and the work she did with girls, training them in theater. And my more recent book is Cognition and Girlhood in Shakespeare's World.
- [03:50]
Pam Brown
Where.
- [03:50]
Caroline Bix
Where I was really bearing down on looking at how people in early modern culture were describing what happens to girls brains when they hit puberty. And that gave me a really interesting way into thinking about Shakespeare's girls and other girls that we see on stage pushing back against a narrative about pathology that is such a popular one when people talk about early modern females. And then this position of the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature came along in 2017 and I. I could have finished down my days at Boston College, but was a really unusual opportunity, really unique. It was endowed by the Harold Alphon foundation with a mission to support the public humanities. So it had nothing to do with Stephen King other than the fact that it was named for him because he is our most famous alum at the University of Maine. But it's not like Stephen King was reading files and picking who was going to be the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature. I just. They were looking for a Shakespearean. So I thought, well, this is a fabulous opportunity late in my career to, you know, make a move, have a new challenge. I was four years into the position. I was told, you know, you will never hear from Stephen King. Do not reach out to him. He's not part of this. I was like, okay, fine. Wonderful opportunity to support the public humanities and keep teaching Shakespeare. Move to Maine. I have some connections to Maine from growing up. My, My spouse was very, you know, gung ho about it too. So that made it easy. My kids, not so much, but, ah, they're talking to me now.
- [05:34]
Pam Brown
Yes. Okay.
- [05:35]
Caroline Bix
Used to Blue Hill and yeah, four years into the job Though I got a call it home. Hi, it's Steve King. And so that started a really lovely working relationship. He seemed interested in making contact. I invited him to come speak to some of our English majors on campus. He hadn't really been on campus for a while, and it was a magical few days. He agreed to come for two days. He was so generous, so kind of. I felt comfortable asking him and his wife Tabitha, who's also a novelist. And they met at the University of Maine as English majors. They've been together for, you know, well over 50 years. And I asked them if I could be the first person into their private papers, their archive that they had just collected and attached to their iconic home in Bangor, which is about 10 miles from campus. And they generously said, sure. So I spent my sabbatical year, took a, you know, took a detour off of my Shakespeare path and thought, this is an incredible opportunity. I. I had loved Stephen King since I was 12. I loved his writings. And I thought, what a great opportunity to read all of these drafts and to see how did he craft these iconic stories that still stick in my head, in millions of readers heads. And that was really the genesis of this project. I didn't know what if it would even be a book. I didn't know what I would find. But, you know, I know you can relate to this as someone who works in early modern culture, like, it's unusual to have access to manuscripts with an author's handwritten marginalia and.
- [07:19]
Pam Brown
And the living author.
- [07:20]
Caroline Bix
Right. And to edit, talk to a living author and someone, you know, much less someone of Stephen King's stature. So it was really a remarkable journey for me.
- [07:34]
Pam Brown
Right. And I was very interested in the way you went from draft to draft and kept it clear. I thought that was a very hard task, actually. Although for a fan who knew the end result, or the blended movie and film, like some of you saw about how sometimes that blends, but. But in the structure and the plot, how things that are very well known were extremely different. And we can get into that later. And I think that's the real. I mean, I would assume this is why your book is getting so much attention right now. This is early days, but you've already been called. It's a bestseller. It's been out not even a month.
- [08:16]
Caroline Bix
Yeah, two weeks.
- [08:17]
Pam Brown
Congratulations, Caroline. And also fantastic blurbs and reviews. People like Amy Tan know, it's so amazing. And my professor from Columbia, Jim Shapiro. Jim Shapiro, Yeah. I just want to say that as a Shakespearean, I was wondering if before, because you were a childhood. I mean, you know, you were very young when you were reading King for the first time. Right. And did you later, as when you became a Shakespearean, realize the connection? Did you. Did it sort of reset. Did. Were there echoes already in your mind before you came to this project?
- [08:57]
Caroline Bix
No, honestly. I mean, the only time it. Because I, you know. You know how it is trying to get tenure, doing your career. I was raising a family. Like, I didn't have time to read Stephen King. I was reading Shakespeare or I was reading all of that. And it wasn't until I was trying out for this job or, you know, was in the final phase of coming back to do my job talk at the University of Maine, that I thought, well, I'm giving a talk about my book Cognition and Girlhood in Shakespeare's World. But it would be. Maybe it's cool to weave in a little Stephen King just for fun, you know, maybe that'll give me an edge over the other finalists, you know, who knows? So I was like, huh. I seem to remember that Carrie is a teenage girl and she's doing interesting things with her brain. Maybe I'll find something. So I pull Carrie off the shelf, which I still had, but I hadn't read Carrie in 40 years. And the book literally fell open to the page where King describes her going through mental puberty as her telekinetic powers are awakening. And I thought, my God, first of all, that I wish I had come up with that phrase that my book was already going to press. But I was like, ah, mental puberty. That's exactly what I'm talking about. And that was the first time that I actually started thinking, huh? How does Stephen King maybe connect with what I'm interested in in my scholarly life? And, you know, I went back and read Carrie again. I was like, this is fascinating. So. So I did that. But then I really. And then I got a chance to teach a couple horror fiction classes at U Main because of my job title. And I thought, oh, but I hadn't met him again, you know, this four years in. So I taught a course called Horror and Humanity, and I taught Macbeth and Carrie. And so I did start to feel the echoes, you know, start to think about what? You know, how can we think about Shakespeare as a horror writer? You know?
- [10:43]
Pam Brown
Right, Exactly.
- [10:45]
Caroline Bix
Right, right. I mean, beyond Titus Andronicus, right? Like, where are there other ways that there are echoes? Or how can we maybe break down some of these genre silos?
- [10:57]
Pam Brown
Exactly. And he was a popular writer as
- [10:59]
Caroline Bix
much as absolutely and so that I, you know, I was starting to think about it, but again, I. This. I hadn't even imagined this project that ended in monsters in the Archives because I didn't know I'd have this access. That didn't. Yeah.
- [11:12]
Pam Brown
So from what, if I'm hearing properly, then in meeting King and he came to your class and all this happened, then you conceived this idea, like, oh, would you give me access to the archives? And that was crucial. And then the book grew from there.
- [11:32]
Caroline Bix
Yes, exactly. So I had no idea they hadn't even been gathering the archives until I was, like, in this position for, like, four years. That was just happenstance, you know, so. And then. Then I sort of started it. Things started clicking in my head. I was like, this is an incredible opportunity.
- [11:49]
Pam Brown
Absolutely. You were the first researcher in it.
- [11:52]
Caroline Bix
Yeah, yeah. For an extended period of time. And, you know, the fact that I had been developing a relationship of trust with the Kings, you know, because they're very private, as you can imagine, very generous, you know, they have a. Their own foundation. They're supporting everything from libraries to fire stations to, you know, post offices.
- [12:14]
Pam Brown
I have family in Maine, and I have family in politics in Maine. And so I've heard this, how important they are.
- [12:20]
Caroline Bix
Yes, very generous, you know, so I knew that about them. But they're also very private, you know, protective of their archives. So I think they just felt comfortable enough to let me be the first one in there. And I hope it was helpful to them as well, so they could see what's it like to have somebody, you know, looking at your papers? What's that going to look like? You know, and because they have opened it up now to scholars, but it's just there's a long wait list. You have to be very specific about what you're going to look at. And usually you're only in for, like, three days. So to get a full year access was just incredibly unique.
- [12:54]
Pam Brown
My Year of Fearful, I have to say, you know, my. My. Just be me for a while. Because you were. You're so great at being me in your book. I'll be me. But my of my master's thesis at Columbia was about titles, because I am obsessed with titles. Maybe the way you're obsessed. You are. So the Year of Fear, I thought, caroline, you're great. Monsters in the Archives was great. But let's go back to that title, Monsters in the Archives. Is that an homage to Natalie Zeman Davis, Fiction in the Archives?
- [13:27]
Caroline Bix
I wasn't consciously thinking that. And what a lot of this project has been. Has revealed to me. And in some ways it seems so obvious, but I think until you're deep in it, you don't realize it, right? That when I was going in and tracking the changes King was making and asking the question that Amy Tan asks and that he, you know, I quote in the introduction, you know, conversation Amy Tan and Stephen King were having, and he documents this in. On writing, in the introduction, in the foreword, where. Where she goes, how come no one ever asks about the language? You know, at these book events, I was like, I'm going to ask about the language. Like, this is what I'm going to do. This is what. This is my superpower, right? I'm an English professor. I know how to ask about the language. So. But day one, when I was in the archives looking at, you know, Pet Sematary and the different copy editor comments and how he was responding to them, what became immediately clear was that this is a writer who cares about the sounds of words, right? That he was being really intentional about keeping particular words because of the ways they sound. You know, he would say in his note to the copy editor, say it out loud. You'll see. And I hadn't thought of King as a writer who sticks in your head because of the sounds of the words. But that became so clear day one. And of course, Shakespeare, he sticks in your head because he's writing for. In an oral medium, right? Like you're meant to be hearing his words. So I bring that up to get back to the question of the title. Is that words echo in your head, right? So even though I didn't have Natalie Zeman Davis in the front of my mind, clearly that title of hers was echoing somewhere in my gray matter that when I came up with that title, I was accessing it somehow. You know, King writes about this. He learned from one of his English professors when he was at umaine, Burton Hatlin, this idea of the myth pool, the language pool that we all drink from. And I think that's just such a profound image. And it works so well for thinking about, like, how you have to keep reading to be a writer, right? That's what he always says that. And all the great writers read all the time, you know, So I love that you actually picked up on that about Natalie Zama Davis, because I think
- [15:43]
Pam Brown
I was like, I love a title.
- [15:44]
Caroline Bix
I love a title.
- [15:46]
Pam Brown
I love your title because. And I also think that it's so appropriate when you think about what Davis does. Did that it's about horror stories of murder that are the fictions and how that uses all the technique of fiction while claiming to be real, but to be the truth there of course shaped artful forms of truth. Right. Of what somebody experienced anyway. So. Yeah. And I also thought, you know, when you're talking about the why something's memorable. You know, I taught poetry for 30 years and so when I said this, what makes something memorable? That's in the poem, that's in the sounds of the words. And I loved what you did with that because people don't as you're saying, like how does it make a physical reaction? That's what poets try to do. That's what great writers try to do. So why did my husband and I awfully we have this certain moment in which we say, you should have told me Mama. Now, I don't know if that's in the original Carrie, but it was in the film, right? You should have told me, Mom. Harry always.
- [16:58]
Caroline Bix
That's right. Oh my God.
- [17:01]
Prime Originals Advertiser
Ready to soundtrack your summer with Red Bull Summer All Day Play. You choose a playlist that fits your summer vibe the best. Are you a festival fanatic, a deep end dj, a road dog, or a trail mixer? Just add a song to your chosen playlist and put your summer on track. Red Bull Summer All Day Play. Red Bull gives you wings. Visit RedBull.com BrightSummerAhead to learn more. See you this summer.
- [17:27]
Caroline Bix
Your summer starts now with Memorial Day deals at the Home Depot. It's time to fire up summer cookouts with the next grill 4 burner gas grill on special. Buy for only $199 and entertain all season with the Hampton Bay West Grove 7 piece outdoor dining set for only $499. This Memorial Day get low prices guaranteed at the Home Depot while supplies Last price invalid May 14 through May 27 US only exclusions apply. Seehomedepot.com Pricematch for details.
- [17:58]
Prime Originals Advertiser
Good sleep is everything. That's why Ollie's Science Bag Support is made with a blend of melatonin and L theanine for both kiddos and grownups. So when your mind won't switch off, you've got something that can help your racing thoughts and restless nights won't stand a chance. Find Ollie Sleep solutions for the whole family@ollie.com that's o l l y.com I
- [18:21]
Caroline Bix
don't know if that exact wording is in there, but it's probably pretty close. I mean, Mama. She does call her Mama. M O M M A like King Mama. Mama. Mama. And in fact, that was one of the things that I. I mean, there were so many incredible surprises that I was able.
- [18:36]
Pam Brown
I mean, things that are just. You're never going to forget that. Plug it up.
- [18:38]
Caroline Bix
That's in the book. That's all in the book. And, you know, one of the real. There were so many incredible surprises in the archives, you know, like. And one of them being that the original Carrie draft that's in there is so different. I mean, she's like a monster. She is a monster. She's not like a monster. I mean, she has.
- [18:57]
Pam Brown
She is a monster. She has a pulsating.
- [18:59]
Caroline Bix
She literally becomes a pulsating brain sack that explodes.
- [19:04]
Pam Brown
Alien.
- [19:04]
Caroline Bix
You know, he's an alien, right? But as he's crafting her and I was able to see how he's changing her, you know, one of the things that he really starts emphasizing and leaning into is that Mama, Ma, ma, ma. Like, he writes it on the page. It's visual, but you can hear it too, right? Say it out loud. You'll see, right? It's like mama. And you just. Even at the end, even though her mom is completely abusive and the worst mother, she's still. She has to kill her mother because her mother's going to kill her. I mean, her mother's coming after her with a. With a knife, you know, so she has to kill her mother. And even so, she's crying for her mother at the end when she's dying, which to me just is so, oh, so deep. Because that's why Stephen King's stories endure, right? Because he's. He knows how to tap into those vulnerable stages we all experience, right?
- [19:56]
Pam Brown
But as you. As you say, this idea of, I'll say the right phrase, telepathy in action, right? From on writing that. How does just these little words on a page, these little marks, move us, change us, make us fear, make us terrified or whatever, or disgust us, whatever it is, make us lustful. I think that I loved how you showed over and over his parenthetical. Like, when there would be the thought of Mama, Mama, or whatever the phrase was in parens in lowercase. It was like E, E. Cummings in there. And it was like. You know what I mean? It was like a poetic.
- [20:35]
Caroline Bix
I love that you pick up and like, yes, he was painting him so
- [20:39]
Pam Brown
well that nobody would question it. That understood totally, completely comprehensible.
- [20:44]
Caroline Bix
And, you know, he's a poet as well. I mean, he wrote poetry. He and his wife met in a poetry workshop at the University of Maine. Like, he was writing a poem when he came up with the idea for Randall Flagg and the Stand, you know, it was coming out of a poem he wrote when he was in the student center. Like it was called the Dark man, you know, and he reads poetry and what's. So this was another revelation for me because I knew like that he had epigraphs in his novels, like Wallace Stevens. Like a whole section of Salem's Lot is called the Emperor of Ice Cream, you know, which is like, which I document, you know, I talk about in the book, like talking to him about why that one. That's a hard poem, you know, but, but he's.
- [21:25]
Pam Brown
But then chilling. You don't have to understand it. It is so chilling. You know, let the horny feet protrude.
- [21:32]
Caroline Bix
The horny feet protrude. You know, and that's, it's just so. I didn't appreciate how embedded in poetry he is. But I love that you picked up on the E. Cummings thing. But like he just last month sent me an email. We were talking about Salem's Lot. You know, we still talk about these novel. And he was telling me that he was really into James Dicke's poetry when he wrote Salem's Lot. And he got obsessed with it. He said he was reading it all and then he went back and then he read Deliverance and then he read the poetry again. And then that really influenced how he described the town of Salem's Lot. There's some very poetic chapters in Salem's Lot. And you know, it's so he's, he really, he's the real deal. Like when people like Harold Bloom or whatever, like, oh, he's just a nobody writer or just spews crap out. I'm like, this is the most well read writer I've ever met. You know, Stephen King has read everything.
- [22:29]
Pam Brown
Well, I think that, that, I mean, you're no slouch either and you bring quite, quite a toolkit, put it that way to, to, to doing this book. And I think that's why it's getting so acclaimed. It's not just Stephen King's brilliance here. So I want to just give you some props here and. But I also also have to say that your, your generosity or courage in talking about revealing, it's sort of, it's in the academic sense of what line do I cross that other people don't cross or wouldn't go there. And it's not so much that it's sort of horrifying confessional stuff. It's more about how deeply. And I'll just give an example it's easy to talk about being scared as a 12 year old, 13 year old even, you know, as a child reader, whatever. Yeah, that's of course King is going to be really terrifically scary and horrifying. But you still want to read more. But when you're an adult and you drive to Durham, Maine, and you're going to the graveyard and you're like keeping the car running because you're so scared now, that's not something everybody's going to admit.
- [23:42]
Caroline Bix
Well, I was trying to be.
- [23:44]
Pam Brown
Are you kidding me? Because my brother lives in Duraman.
- [23:48]
Caroline Bix
Oh, no. Are you kidding? I wish I had known. Okay, well, now I want to go back and visit again. I mean that. So part of. I hope that came across as humorous
- [23:57]
Pam Brown
too, because it did. There was, there was self deprecation, irony, all that.
- [24:02]
Caroline Bix
I wanted to bring my humor into this because. And one of the great pleasures of writing this book was that I was able to first of all get the book to sold to David Ebershoff at Hogarth, who's just an incredible writer himself and he was an amazing editor and he was so great about encouraging me to bring my personal voice in more, you know, because when I got the book contract, I had only written chapter one and I was experimenting with how much of myself am I going to bring into this book? I wasn't sure what this was going to be yet. And I had done some, you know, first person essay writing, like I did a Modern Love column for the New York Times. And you know, I've been doing, you know, I wrote my Shakespeare Not Stirred cocktail book. Like I've been experimenting with humor and with telling my own stories, but I had not yet brought my academic writing into that space. You know, I had kept that, you know, because as academics were trained, you don't bring your personal into it. But I think, I don't know if it's acknowledgments, only in acknowledgments. And I don't know if it's just that I'm getting older and I don't care anymore, but I just. Or I just doesn't serve me anymore to do that kind of writing. I mean, I still do that kind of writing, I shouldn't say, but now that I've done this kind of writing, I think I, I don't want to stop because it's. It just feels like, first of all, I love being able to reach a wider audience. I think this is a book that can appeal to academics if they'd like to read It. But I want to write. I want to bring literary scholarship to a wider audience.
- [25:35]
Pam Brown
Okay, I'm going to bring. I'm going to ask you the fox and the hedgehog question. So have you gone from being the hedgehog to the fox?
- [25:43]
Caroline Bix
I think I probably was always a fox. Although I can be a hedgehog, you know, Like, I can. And part of this project required me to be a hedgehog. You know, I had to be like I am now. I know everything there is to know about Carrie. And frankly, I'm now the expert in these particular books because I've seen more than anyone else. Like, I've had access to these drafts. So I'm a hedgehog when it comes to how he craft these five books, you know, I'm not going to now claim I'm a hedgehog for all of Stephen King's works. Some people have asked me, like, well, how do you see this unfurling through his whole career? I'm like, look, I know these five works really, really well. I'm not gonna claim the big thing,
- [26:28]
Pam Brown
you know, It's a big thing because it's a big thing.
- [26:31]
Caroline Bix
It takes a lot of time, you know. The man does not write short novels, so.
- [26:35]
Pam Brown
And how many has he written with East?
- [26:37]
Caroline Bix
70. 70 books and counting. The man does not stop, like, he. One to two books a year.
- [26:44]
Pam Brown
I read it. I read an interview with him where he says, well, what do I do from 9 to 12? I. I have to entertain myself. It's just like, I wish I had that because I, you know, I'm a writer too, but I don't really that.
- [26:55]
Caroline Bix
He's extraordinary. He's so disciplined. Yeah. And if I would send him an email, like, as I would go, I would sometimes want to ask a question, you know, I mean, sometimes not. Sometimes I'd want to just see what I saw and not be influenced by his voice, you know, but he's always. He was very hands off through the whole process. But if I had a question, I would email it to him, you know, like, for example, in the early days, when I wanted to make sure I. It was his handwriting, you know, when I was seeing a margin note, I would set. I would send him an image, and he'd get back to me within like, an hour. The man is so. He's just so responsive. He's so. And efficient, and he just. And detailed at the same time. So he would give me a really.
- [27:40]
Pam Brown
I could tell. But also, you know, the. The. The marginal. I had a. I had a. I had a bad boss. Once in journalism. And his Marginella would be like, this sucks. But. But Stephen King has this wonderful polite and humorous tone toward an editor. He's pushing back. I was an editor, too, so I could feel Bill Thompson's role. Right. And how he would push back a copy editor or the main editor. And so it really impressed me what his personality was in his marginalia. Yes.
- [28:13]
Caroline Bix
That was day one when I went in, and I was like, wow, I feel like I'm getting to know him just through this, you know, and that was. You know, I started with Pet Sematary and the book I ended up. And I. I really was doing this pretty instinctively as I went. Like, I wasn't planning it all out ahead of time. So I just went in with Pet Sematary as the first thing I was going to look at and spend two months with, even though that's the latest of the five that I talk about. And it just kind of organically worked its way backwards. And I'm so glad that's how it unfurled for me, because I was able to start with Stephen King in 1982, when he's already famous, you know, talking to the copy editor. Pushing back but not being a diva, to use your favorite word. Like, he's incredibly polite. You know, he doesn't have to be, but he is, you know, and then sort of working my way back to Carrie, which is his first one that he publishes, when he really has to do whatever his editor says because he hasn't published a book yet.
- [29:12]
Pam Brown
Yeah. And. And, you know, and. And he has good instincts to follow. And, like, no, we can't have the pulsating brain. I can't have the horns. I mean, you know, when you. I mean, to me, that's like a big. That's a huge. The change is so major. And that becomes the book that he, of course, makes his fame, where he gets the first big chunk of money. And he says that that makes him into. Right. And so I. I guess I don't want to go to Carrie just yet. I want to sort of end. Let's just go to the other ones first. Because I'm not, you know, because I hadn't read or seen Pet Sematary or Salem's Lot. I saw the Shining. I know the Shining and Carrie just as films. But now you make me want to read the books. I have to hand that to you because they weren't on my list, and I read a ton. And now I'm really curious about reading Carrie and the Shining. But I also want to say that I noticed that you just sort of say, and then I flew to Colorado, and I'm in the hotel. I'm like, wow, good on you, Caroline.
- [30:16]
Caroline Bix
Oh, that's the beauty. A sabbatical year, right? I mean, that's. I could not have done this without a sabbatical. And this was the first time I'd ever had a full year in my whole career as an academic. I'd never had a full year when I wasn't raising a baby, you know, like, so this was so luxurious, you know, to be able to be like, I'm. Now I'm going to go to Colorado and see the Stanley Hotel where he had the dream, the nightmare where he imagined the Shining.
- [30:43]
Pam Brown
Or, you know, the fire hose.
- [30:46]
Caroline Bix
You know, to see the fire hoses on the side of the wall, you know, it was really. It was a fully immersive experience. Or, I'm going to go take a field trip to Durham, which isn't too far away, but it's two and a half hours away from where I live. Yeah, no, I really wanted to do the full deep dive.
- [31:02]
Pam Brown
And the. The. The experience that he recounts of being at the hotel the first time and how it just gave him the bones in the book, the whole. And I think that we all may have dreams as scary and as detailed and vivid as that one with the fire hose, but we don't think, like, oh, I can make a book out of that. You know what I mean? And now I'm gonna be like, no, I'm gonna keep my dream journal and start right. You know what I mean?
- [31:30]
Caroline Bix
It's like he has.
- [31:32]
Pam Brown
He knows how to turn it into a plot and give it legs, you know?
- [31:37]
Caroline Bix
Well, yeah, and that's one of the things that he's written about. But also, the first day I met him, when he was talking to the students, you know, that this came up where he was talking about that he doesn't plan out his plots. He actually just lets the characters drive it. And I believe it, you know, So I think something like his son being chased down the halls with a fire hose, that was the inspiration. But he let that character of Danny drive the story. And one of the things that was really, you know, I write about this in the books, you know, that I had access to this unseen first draft of the Shining, which is just horrific. I thought that the published version was terrifying. Yeah. I mean, I was like, what did he just do to. Her name's Jenny in the first draft, not Wendy. I was like, oh. Oh, Jenny. Like, and when he was talking to. So I got a chance to actually take my students to the Bangor house. This fall. I taught the Shining for the first time in a class I put together called American Ghost Stories. And. And King talked to them for an hour in his personal library in his house. It was just mind blowing. And he was talking to them about why he changed the ending. He said it's because I fell in love with Wendy and Danny and I couldn't let that happen to them. You know, it's really powerful.
- [32:59]
Prime Originals Advertiser
So with Plan B Emergency contraception, we're in control of our future. It's backup birth control you take after unprotected sex that helps prevent pregnancy starts. It works by temporarily delaying ovulation and it won't impact your future fertility. Plan B is available in all 50 US states at all major retailers near you with no ID, prescription or age requirement needed. Together we've got this. Follow Plan B on Insta at Plan B. One step to learn more. Use as directed. Your next chapter in healthcare starts at Carrington College's School of Nursing in Portland. Join us for our open house on
- [33:37]
Caroline Bix
Tuesday, January 13th from 4 to 7pm
- [33:40]
Prime Originals Advertiser
you'll tour our campus, see live demos, meet instructors, and learn about our associate degree in nursing program that prepares you to become a registered nurse. Take the first step toward your nursing career. Save your spot now at Carrington Edu Events. For information on program outcomes, visit carrington.
- [33:58]
Pam Brown
Edu Sci I must insert because I know that he did not like, I think the Kubrick version, which is what I know most people know if they haven't read the book and saying that that was a quite misogynistic portrait of Shelley Duvall. Not that it was her fault, but. No, I'm thinking of the actress and the way it was. She was so, I guess, so weak. Is that why?
- [34:32]
Caroline Bix
Yeah, she was hysterical. I mean, the Kubrick directed her to be. Yeah, yeah. And in the book she's really very smart. I mean, it's. It's not unlike how passionate I get when I talk about Opilia. You know, the way that these Shakespearean females get, you know, have been misinterpreted because of how different time periods have adapted them or, you know, made them, shaped them to their cultural, you know,
- [34:57]
Pam Brown
more as good of that because, like, I could tell we're going to run out of time. We don't get to it. My thing is, I would love to hear you talk more about Juliet and Ophelia, the brain work that you already had developed. And then you find this incredible sort Of, I would say, kindred spirit almost in King, if that's not too much to say. But it's sort of like how you perceive this sort of cognitive, I think you call it catalyze the catalyst and this dry charge that he talks about that is. That worked on by other people. And so the. It's also. But talk a bit about your work and how you use it to read King, especially with Carrick, and talk about, like most people wouldn't put together Carrie and Juliet or Ophelia.
- [35:45]
Caroline Bix
Right, right. I mean, well, so I, you know, I've been thinking about and writing about and talking about these girls for a decade before I, you know, took this job. And again, it was coming out of my own research I'd been doing into cognition during the time period. But also I was so interested in that space of adolescence for girls specifically, and what I was seeing. You know, when you look at how Shakespeare writes Juliet and you really track, you know, what she's doing with her brain. She's using all of her faculties and really unusual and quite powerful ways, you know, not just being. I mean, certainly people have written about how she has these poetic flights of fancy and she's able to, you know, give these beautiful speeches about love and, you know, so the imaginative space. But she's also able to, you know, think through planning her and Romeo's escape. But at this, I could just go down this rabbit hole and use the rest of our time talking about this. But I will say, you know, like, that's a great situation where, you know, take a look at the language used to describe Romeo. Right. He's the lovesick one. He's. I mean, I know, you know, this like he's the melancholy one. He's the one who's. Whose brain is. Is not firing on all cylinders. It's not her.
- [37:09]
Pam Brown
Right.
- [37:09]
Caroline Bix
And Ophelia. I get really passionate when I think about Ophelia because I'm like, she's the one who sees things and remembers things and is really tasked with remembering things in that play in Hamlet. But we only tend to remember her as drowned or hysterical or suicidal or, you know, like, that's how she's been taken up culturally ever since Millay's painting and probably earlier, you know, or Taylor Swift, you know, the fate of Ophelia, you know, and so I get very passionate and this is part of why this is going to connect back to King. I promise. I get very passionate about close reading and that we all have to pay a lot more attention to the words on the Page. Even recognizing that Shakespeare. That the words on the page that we're seeing when we read a Shakespeare play aren't necessarily the exact words that he picked or wrote down on a piece of paper. But we need to be attending to what was. What was coming down to us at the time, or what is the language that people are using to describe these girls at the time. Right. To be attentive to that. So when I got to the Shining, for example, like, the Kubrick film has so dominated the way people understand the Shining that they're, you know, and that's not the book. Like, it's so different. And when I was, you know, my first encounter with the Shine, that first draft of the Shining, what was so shocking to me was that King had divided it into acts and scenes, like Roman numeral acts and scenes. And that's not how it's published, but that's how he first wrote it when he wrote his first draft in 1975. And it looks like a play. Like, it just looks like a play. And then I ran across introduction. He had written to a 1982 issue of Whispers magazine that's in the archives. And he talks about how he was imagining a Shakespearean tragedy when he wrote the Shining. And so, of course, that blew my mind as a Shakespearean. I was like, okay, what is happening here? Like that. That was one of those creepy moments where I'm like, I am here for a reason, and I'm just gonna ride, get on this train and see where it leads me. So I bring this up because it's very. I. I care so much about, like, what was he thinking about? What is the Shakespearean tragedy? And, you know, Kubrick's film is not a Shakespearean tragedy. Like, Jack Torrance is not a Shakespearean protagonist. Like, he, you know, Jack Torrance is kind of crazy from the get go, right? You're not going to feel anything for him. The reason the Shining is such a brilliant novel. And I always tell people, go read it. Go read it. Just like I say, go read Hamlet. Like, don't. Don't rely on, you know, a portrayal, you know, of it.
- [40:02]
Pam Brown
Read it.
- [40:03]
Caroline Bix
You know, read all three versions that we have from the 17th century. Like, go. Go read them and make your own decisions, but at least pay attention to the words on the page. Because when you go back and you read the Shining, and then when I got a chance to talk to him about what was the Shakespearean tragedy he was imagining, you know, well, first of all, I had a chance to see references that he ended up taking out to Shakespeare, you know, Macbeth. There's Macbeth embedded in that first draft for sure. So I thought for sure that was the one he was thinking of.
- [40:32]
Pam Brown
I'm doing Lady Macbeth in her hands.
- [40:34]
Caroline Bix
Yeah, because it's got the brain bashing. It's got, you know, the hallucinations, it's got the ghosts. I was like, oh, must be Macbeth. And then I found some Macbeth references that he ended up taking out, but I also found some Ophelia references that he also ended up taking out. And it turns out Hamlet is the one that he was imagining. And it makes so much sense because that. That novel, what makes it so brilliant and I think the reason it's going to endure 400 years from now, I think people will be reading the Shining is because it, like Hamlet, it's embed, you know, it's. It's about intergenerational trauma. It's about, like, do you follow what your father did, or do you. You know, what are the consequences? How do you break the narrative? And the Shining, that's all that. That's about. I mean, Jack himself was an abused kid, and he's abusing his son, and it's like, okay, and what's going to happen to Danny, right? Is he going to be okay? How do you walk away? And also, why is empathy important, right? You have to be empathetic as well, toward, you know, Danny. As I watched Stephen, I mean, I could just call him Steve now, you know, changing Danny, changing his relationship to his father, his abusive father.
- [41:50]
Pam Brown
So in this, I'm just. I really want to pursue this, because in Hamlet, is that like saying that Claudius is Claudius and the ghost, the ghost that haunts him, the father's ghost, right? I am thy father. Right? I am thy father's ghost. That. This is the crux, right? That is this. You must revenge, avenge me. Right? So. So that. That load is abusive. I'm trying to say, like, get something here.
- [42:21]
Caroline Bix
He's asking his son if it's even his ghost of his father, you know, but whatever, if, you know, Hamlet can't move forward because he's like, do I become a regicide? Like, am I going to do this for my father, you know, who's dead, or am I going to break that? You know, I mean, so many scholars have written brilliantly about this. Am I going to be part of the revenge cycle, or am I going to break the revenge cycle, right? And in. When you read the Shining through that lens, you see that King is thinking about that story, because the ghost, Jack's own father's ghost comes through the radio telling him to kill his family, you know, and it's like, oh, right, Jack has to decide. Or as. As King said to me when we were talking about it, he's like, well, Jack's Jack is Hamlet. He's like, should I stay or should I go? Right. I mean, that's sort of the big psychological dilemma.
- [43:16]
Pam Brown
He's not simply, I'm a killer, demented killer from the beginning.
- [43:20]
Caroline Bix
He's Tornado.
- [43:21]
Pam Brown
And he feels. He feels protect or he feels love loving towards Danny.
- [43:26]
Caroline Bix
And what. And what's extraordinary is I saw him crafting and changing this. So in the original ending that he imagined, Jack is, you know, he's been taken over by the demons of the hotel. And that goes all the way to the. To the published version. But in the first, you know, when he's about to kill Danny and Danny, you know, just runs away from him. He's terrified. Right. That's the first draft. By the end, what he's done is he's crafted this incredibly powerful scene where the ghost. Where Jack turns to Danny and says, danny, run and remember I love you. And I was like, oh, my gosh, I get the chills. Because it's like, it's not remember me, right? Because of course, that's the ghost of Hamlet's father. Remember me?
- [44:09]
Pam Brown
Right.
- [44:10]
Caroline Bix
He's like, remember I love you. I think, what an amazing rewrite of that encounter between father and son.
- [44:17]
Pam Brown
But also given going to the more political analysis that you touch on here and there, and especially in that sort of wonderful, strange, you know, going back to the archive of his columns in Beauty and King's Garbage Truck and all that period and Watergate and, you know, just to say that was really a very interesting way of getting at later allusions to something's rotten in the state of Denmark. Okay. So you're talking. And then you talk about the hotel having. Is like a person is personified and has agency and is doing things. The hotel is the monster. Right, Right. So that's like this, you know, the court. Right.
- [45:02]
Caroline Bix
Yeah.
- [45:03]
Pam Brown
And I see so many ways when you. When you start talking about it, I can see it more.
- [45:09]
Caroline Bix
Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I hadn't thought about. So the Night Shift chapter, that's the middle chapter of the book. And I wasn't sure what that was going to be, you know, because that's my first encounter was with Night Shift when I was 12. And that's the Boogeyman story, and that's the one that had scared the crap out of me when I was 12. And that's sort of like the Earth story that drives monsters in the archives. Because, like, I was like, okay, what is this Boogeyman? Why is it scaring me so badly still? Like, I can't sleep next to an open closet. So that's sort of the mystery. I was unpacking as I was going. Then I'm actually encountering the first draft of the Boogeyman, like, holding it in my hand. And it was. You know, there's so many different ways that this project was asking me to bring all parts of myself, but it's
- [45:50]
Pam Brown
such a great joining of, you know, a person, you with particular memories and fears and then. But also skills to the Archives and to King. I mean, so I guess you offered him a lot, Caroline. I mean, I really do. Because. Because there's no more imprimatur than Shakespeare than a Shakespearean saying, this will be read in 400 years. Right. It's very different for that to be acceptable. You understand? Absolutely. For me, I circled some things and I said, ott, which means over the top. And I thought, wow, When. Caroline, I can see the King with Bill Thompson when he would say, don't say that the craft airliner looked like Hamburger Helper or something, where he's over the top. Right?
- [46:47]
Caroline Bix
You have to be.
- [46:48]
Pam Brown
To be a horror writer, you have to go over the top.
- [46:50]
Caroline Bix
Right?
- [46:52]
Pam Brown
And so. But sometimes when you would go over the top, for me, as a Shakespearean, was saying, he is our Shakespeare, because that's sort of like, what about Melville? What about Whitman? You know what I mean?
- [47:03]
Caroline Bix
Yeah. I'm not saying he's. I'm not saying he's the only one who's Shakespeare.
- [47:09]
Pam Brown
Well, I'm just saying I was like, oh, my God. And I'm a Shakespearean. So it would be like, wow, you've really got to prove that to me. Right?
- [47:18]
Caroline Bix
Right. So, I mean, first I'd say read the books before you say that, because I think the problem is, like, Harold Bloom never read the books. He just.
- [47:26]
Pam Brown
Right.
- [47:27]
Caroline Bix
You know, crapped on them.
- [47:28]
Pam Brown
And I'm like, I didn't. I didn't know he had.
- [47:30]
Caroline Bix
Oh, my God. I'll read you the quote. Hold on. He ended up like, so I think I have this here somewhere because I like to keep it handy. Right? So in 2003, Stephen King won the National Book Foundation's Distinguished Contribution Award. And Bloom wrote that King is an immensely inadequate writer on a sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, book by book basis. His books do little more for Humanity than keep the publishing world afloat. And it. I was like. And then he goes on to edit a collection of essays about Carrie and then crap on it in the introduction and, and. And says, I've never actually read Carrie. Yeah, no. So it's like when I hear that kind of like, defended, I just say, how about Harold Bloom defends what that, you know, like, well, now we can't. But, you know, like, I. I feel
- [48:21]
Pam Brown
like there's such a cite that piece that he wrote.
- [48:24]
Caroline Bix
Oh, yeah.
- [48:25]
Pam Brown
Oh, oh, yeah.
- [48:26]
Caroline Bix
No, this is like. Yeah. So I guess I feel like, first of all, just read it yourself, you know, and you'll see. But I would say his stories like Shakespeare's are going to endure. Some of them are going to endure because King understands how to craft something that will stick in your head. Right. I think time is already showing us 50 years later, his novels are still being read. People are still drawn to them. People are still remembering them. People are still scared of them. And that, you know. And yes, he's writing for a popular audience, as was Shakespeare. You can be a brilliant writer and write for a popular audience and make money.
- [49:09]
Pam Brown
It's so rich, this book. But I have to say that your fears and how you described your fears and. And sort of treasured them in some way. So I just could give you a chance, the end of our interview, to be like your Bruno Bettelheim. What are the uses of. Not just enchantment of uses of horror for you? What has it been to be so important and lead you here or maybe just personally.
- [49:40]
Prime Originals Advertiser
Yeah.
- [49:40]
Caroline Bix
I mean, when I went into this project, I was like, oh, I'm just scared. I'm scared. I'm scared. But. But what. What's been amazing and getting a chance to talk to people all over the globe about monsters in the archives and like getting people's reactions and realizing that horror, you know, when a story scares you and it endures his do it. And I think same with Shakespeare, because they tap into. It's not about the monsters. Right. It allows you to metabolize fears that you have about loss and grief, which are really at the core of all of his horror stories. But that getting a chance to talk to other people in their memories about these same stories, it's actually kind of oddly optimistic or hopeful that there's community. Right. And when you think about horror stories as a genre, it's about people sitting around a fire talking and telling stories. Right. That there's a community element that is part of, part and parcel of a horror story. And if it's told well, you know, think about sort of the classic, like, Turn of the Screw or Frankenstein. Like, there's always a frame. Right. And it's usually about people talking to each other. Right. So what's the purpose of horror? Like, for me, it's been like a way to metabolize and talk about. And get out in the open about fear and allow us to feel like we've all been so numbed. I think the last 10 years, it's been so awful that we're not tapping into our feelings. We're being protective. And I think fear can make you feel, and then you don't want to be paralyzed by it.
- [51:13]
Pam Brown
Right.
- [51:14]
Caroline Bix
You want to be able to talk to other people about it. And so I see this book has really been, for me, an opportunity to bring the fear out into the open and be able to express, you know, what I'm really scared of, you know, and not feel as alone, I guess, with it.
- [51:30]
Pam Brown
But you're not tempted to write a horror story yourself? No, no, no.
- [51:36]
Caroline Bix
I. You know, also, I'm not a fiction writer. It's funny, but I'm feeling more brave about writing about my fears and being more open about them.
- [51:45]
Pam Brown
Right. I just. I love. I love how you.
- [51:48]
Caroline Bix
When.
- [51:48]
Pam Brown
When I was finishing the book and I thought, but what about Oz? And then they go and you ask about Oz at the end, I was like, right.
- [51:57]
Caroline Bix
Well. And that I had to overcome my fear of being. Because I'm a very shy person, actually. Like, I don't. I'm not someone who feels like. And, you know, as an academic, it's unusual. I'm a third child of four. I'm not a first. I'm not an only. You know, Like, I don't go into a situation thinking what I have to say is what everyone needs to listen to. That's not my personality, you know. So for me, even dealing with Stephen King, this famous author, you know, it took a lot of courage for me to be able to talk to him, even though he's very nice, you know, it's not. My first instinct is to bother him. You know, my first instinct is to give space. So for me to get to the point where I can say, what about Oz? Come on, you've got to give me the answer like that.
- [52:35]
Pam Brown
Because he had. He had not given you.
- [52:37]
Caroline Bix
He had sort of given the sidestep. I was like, oh, I'll leave him alone. I was like, no, I'm gonna. I need to know this answer. So, you know, that took a lot of courage. On my part.
- [52:45]
Pam Brown
And that's, and that's a, it's just, just for the, the listener here. You should read Caroline's book to understand how, how pervasive the Oz character and the wizard and how important that is as an American myth. And really, in popular culture, Oz is very big. So what King does with it. And so I'll just have you read her book to find out what he says at the end because it's linked to Macbeth in this wonderful.
- [53:15]
Caroline Bix
It is.
- [53:16]
Pam Brown
And linked to Macbeth. Yes. And Carrie. So thank you, Caroline. We have to go. And. I will certainly be reading more Stephen King in the future, thanks to you.
- [53:31]
Caroline Bix
Thank you, Pam. Thank you for listening to this episode of the New Books Network. We are an academic podcast network with the mission of public education. If you liked this episode, please share it with a friend and rate us on your preferred podcast platform. You can browse all of our episodes on our website, newbooksnetwork.com Connect with us on Instagram and BlueSky with the handle ew booksnetwork, and subscribe to our weekly Substack newsletter at newbooksnetwork.substack.com to get episode recommendations straight to your inbox.