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It’s spelled “dialogue” and yeah, I always felt the same way. It isn’t one of his strengths as an author (though I’m generally a big fan of his writing).

Dialogue is one of the hardest things to write well.

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I don't like Stephen King. His books have stupid premises and I think he's probably a pedophile, honestly. Why'd he feel the need to write a sewer orgy between a bunch of kids?

I agree. If it’s worth reading it’s worth writing correctly. OP deactivated spell check on a device that has literally all the words?

r/therewasanattempt to criticize bad writing

By that logic you should maybe reread Stephen King until you understand it

Unpopular opinion, but... Stephen King isn't a very good writer. He's a popular writer, which doesn't mean he's good.

I like the guy on a personal level, and his career has been an absolute banger--hat's off to him.

But if you want to read a good book, I wouldn't recommend King.

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> Makes post criticizing writing quality of an author.

> Doesn't even write at a high school level of competency.

Bait harder.

Bro...

Oh yeah. There was a relatively recent short story of his with a kid in it that was just a bit over the top with the adult thinking. It's definitely one of King's tendencies.

That good book thing must be subjective, unless a lot of people are reading bad books for fun. Wait, it is subjective! Son of a bitch!

Another author I just can't stand.

"Literary genius"?

Ok.

You disagree?

I know! It's always subjective. Arrrgh!!! *shakes fist at sky*

Big King fan here and obviously biased but, I find he writes kids the way he 'remembers' feeling as a 15yo/25yo/etc. That comes with all the cloudiness and rose tinted thinking of the past. I've actually found that helps me identify with the character because I'd have a tendency to do the same, but to a person of that actual age it may seem outlandish or odd. Another reason could be due to the translations you're reading possibly? I say this because you noted that English isn't your first language so maybe the way the writing flows in its native format doesn't translate across exactly right? I recently read the Metro series in English, it was translated from Russian as far as I know and I felt like I was missing something important in the way dialogue and abstract concepts flowed. Probably a great book in its native form, but I was glad to finish it and put it down.

insert meme of people getting yelled at for enjoying bad books

This take is really reductive. King is prolific, but he doesn't always try and write literary masterpieces.

You absolutely cannot read The Body, Hearts in Atlantis, or the Green Mile and not consider him a modern literary great.

Sure, stuff like UR and other schlocky works aren't masterpieces. He didn't write them to be.

I'm a massive Stephen King fan, but The Institute was awful. Stephen openly admitted literally at the start of the book I believe, that he was experimenting with being topical. All the dialog was extremely rough and he was really angry with politics at the time. Just a bad book period. I think he's seen the feedback. That said he's in the sunset of his career, there's a million examples of great dialog throughout his works. It's sort of like pooping on the 50 or 60th book in a world class authors library.

I feel the same, though more so with his newer books. I couldn’t get behind Fairy Tale, for example, because the character was so close to my own age. No one born in 1996 did or said those types of things- it was just extremely disconnected from the time and reality in which it was set. I do feel his earlier books are better, but the way kids speak and bond is still unnatural.

He’s a good writer, and I see why he is popular. Personally his books are quite hit and miss for me, and although he is a great writer not all of his writing is great. He does handle youth dialogue in an unrealistic way. Valid criticism.

Yup.

Where did I say people shouldn't enjoy what they enjoy? I'm all for people enjoying bad books.

Hell, I unironically LOVE Neil Breen's films.

Sorry, I didn't realize it was "reductive" to have a personal opinion.

Better cancel me now. RIP.

Ain’t Stephen King old as fuck?? He’s 75. It’s been so long since he was a child that he probably can’t occupy that headspace anymore. He’s probably not around a lot of kids and, if he is, he’s a grandfather, granduncle and such. He wouldn’t understand how modern children would interact with each other because he was a kid 65 years ago.

He's obviously not typing in his first language, no need to be a jerk about it, the intent is clear, and I agree with him. King's modern American dialogue is awful, which is why his fantasy prose surprised me.

He writes kids talking like it is the 50s or 60s , just without the slang of the times.

You seem a bit sensitive about your favorite author. In no world is Stephen King considered a “literary genius.” The guy was simply asking a question and you couldn’t answer without insulting him.

He is a popular author, but he is one of the best writers out of the popular authors. I mean, out of Danielle Steele, Nora Roberts, Dean Koontz, Tom Clancy and such, he is obviously a better writer. He has quite a few duds, but he’s so massively prolific that he still has lots of good works, too.

He may not be the most literary, but he will probably be one of the authors to be remembered in future centuries. Kind of like Charles Dickens.

I'm having a hard time figuring out how someone unfamiliar with English knows the dialouges in an English-language work are unnatural.

I don’t think he is a pedophile; I just think he has an extremely dirty mind. He seems like one of those people who will turn anything into a double entendre and will somehow inject something inappropriately sexual into almost every conversation. We all know someone like that.

Nah, the dialogues in Metro and writing in general are just as lame in Russian too.

Yeah, that’s partly why I stopped reading The Institute. Couldn’t stand the dialogue with the kids.

I was thinking about this the other night when I caught the tail end of some sitcom my friend was watching. The mannerisms were just so exaggerated that it was hard to watch. Then I remembered it was a show about a girl who talks to dead people and I got off my high horse.

I've definitely encountered this in books as well, but unless it's wholly unbelievable I just chock it up to that's how people talk in their universe. Ive yet to read anything that can accurately describe how two people who are close to each other can communicate through body language and inside jokes. I know ive had whole conversations with my best bud where hardly a word is spoken. I also know ive had nonsensical exchanges with a girlfriend that no one but us could understand because its a mix of inside jokes and reference quotes.

I haven't read much of Stephen king's newest stuff so maybe he has gone downhill, I couldn't say. I just know for myself when reading fiction, that a level of acceptance for the suspension of reality is necessary even if it takes place in the world as I know it.

Well, in any case he’s right. It’s why I stopped reading The Institute.

Understanding a foreign language and forming sentences in one are very different. OP understands well enough if he can form sentences that aren't perfectly spelled but still get the point across. His experience with hearing English is different than the way King writes it, which is true for everyone, because King writes really bad modern American dialogue.

I like to give him the benefit of the doubt and chalk it up to regional and generational differences, because he does craft a good story despite the truly awkward spoken words, and when I read The Dark Tower I actually found the dialogue pleasant when it was in the Fantasy worlds, and right back to terrible when it came to our world.

Yeah I normally like his work, but I almost quit The Institute. It was such an interesting idea, but the middle sucked and it was almost all middle. I did finish it and enjoyed it but don’t think it’s his best work.

The answer is "cocaine"

He uses slang from the 80's for kids in modern times.

Teenagers today don't sound like the old TMNT cartoons or Bill & Ted. Also, iirc, the kid in Fairy Tale goes to a video game arcade at one point.

I like him enough that I've read nearly everything he's ever written but I'd agree with his own statement.

"I am the literary equivalent of a Big Mac and fries.” -Stephen King

What do you read?

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I never claimed he's my favorite author. He's just really smart and his books are great. If you write books, it's not an argument. It's a fact. He knows what's up. He knows what he's creating. He knows what people want, and he's really good at consistently delivering dopamine.

And yeah, I couldn't. He didn't make any sense. The words were all spelled incorrectly. No grammar. There was no thought behind whatever they were saying. I'm still clueless how you can be that illiterate while trying to bash one of the most successful authors on this planet.

I'm not being sensitive lol. That's the way it is. It's fucking clownshoes.

Aye. Like Big Mac and fries.

Oh, that's a shame. Just thought I was missing out since I'd seen people saying the original books that inspired the game were great!

When are we as a culture going to stop throwing around baseless allegations of pedophilia?

I consider him to be a good storyteller and mediocre writer. Joe Hill (his son) is a much stronger writer, but not quite as good a storyteller.

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I don’t know why we need weekly “I think Stephen King is overrated” posts.

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I thought Dr. Sleep was a good book, but his attempts to make Abra feel like a ‘modern kid’ by having her name drop Game of Thrones characters definitely made me cringe.

There are lots of other popular writers besides the ones you named. There's quite a large pool of popular writers, in fact.

Rushdie, mostly.

An actual literary genius.

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I dunno man, I've never felt like entertaining myself or readers with an underage orgy. Shit like that doesn't cross my mind.

I was just kind of open-mouthed while I realized what I was reading and then closed the book.

Nor have I, but I have written other disturbing scenes in my life. It doesn’t mean I want to commit murder. I don’t know why people have so much difficulty separating an artist from the art.

And meanwhile, we got jokers running around accusing people of pedophilia because they don’t know the difference between art and artist.

I couldn't even finish Fairy Tale. King's kids have gotten to be pure tropes these days. I think King tries to give characters and especially kids, some very specific tics and slang to make them "unique" in a place and time. And then he just over-does it to the point of caricature. Almost like he's making them "overly unique."

His "good" kids are so overly earnest and respectful that they just become very phony.

I'v had this problem with King since the 1980s. I vastly prefer his short stories versus his novels since the mid '80s. There's less of this caricature building.

I really like most of King's concepts--the ideas are super cool--but I find his execution is often lackluster.

He does like to write the spooky stuff, maybe he's hired some ghost writers?

Okay, I'll stop before you BOO me...

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I haven't read The Institute, but I really didn't have trouble with Fairy Tale. The only time the man's language was strange was when he was on his journey, and that was affected by his location.

It's not so much a triggering thing, just... surprise I guess. I'd always heard about what a good author King was and then I was reading this drivel. Christine wasn't any better.

A book that I enjoyed that you can do the same with is literally any of them from the "Earth Children" series. The most well known from that would be Clan of the Cavebear. But there are pages and pages of beautiful descriptions about the world around the main protagonist (and a few uh, just straight animal sex scenes. I remember one with a mamoth in particular...) that overall add nothing to the story that you can skip. Fantastic books otherwise.

I’d be more than surprised if “Stephen King” isn’t a bunch of ghost writers these days.

Everything about his recent novels feels off. The Institute was just terrible.

In the case of The Institute, those were all HIGHLY traumatized kids. Children with that level of trauma don't communicate well. I thought it was, at the very least, well thought out in their interactions, even if it wasn't exactly how kids interact. They eventually formed trauma bonds and on and on... I don't want to ruin it too much for anyone else. Someone else brought up Fairy Tale. My interpretation of that young man was a little bit of superimposing older kids attitudes on younger kids personalities. I think that's ok. I always tried to impress the geezers when I was younger, it does track that modern kids could at least attempt to do the same.

Are either of those my favorite books of his? Nah, but I did buy and read them all the way through. It's funny, Duma Key is the one closest to me at this point in my life (not because of major injury, just because of age) and I don't identify with that character at ALL.

I don't agree OP, I think the dialogue is written with intent. But you are 100% welcome to your opinions!

And in one way the opposite of the book.

I have a joke/theory. The reason the hungry ones have been having trouble finding Shining munchies is because the Can-Toi have been collecting psychics to train as Breakers.

I never thought the kids in his stories were dated. They’re usually from small towns and as someone from a small town, the dialogue can be sooooo different than kids from a city. It just really depends. A lot of his stories take place in Maine and they have an unusual way of speaking and thought process so that could be it.

I'm just here to say Steven King is a bad writer and take my downvotes.

Why do I do it? So others like me can see that they're not alone in hating the books and screenplays he's written.

I've also read The Institute and many of his other books and I can tell you that he actually hits the children very well in the dialogues. Nowadays there are some children who still speak normally and others who have already looked at the youth language. He only takes those who still speak normally.

Kids/young people aren't his main target audience I'd suspect. FWIW, I think people tend to assume that if he writes something a certain way he is entirely out of touch, but I think he knows what he's doing when he does that because his point is to create a feel of a place, and plenty of rural places are a bit like living in ghost towns that are relics from the 70s and 80s. It's the feel of those places, IMO, that he's after, and if you've lived in, or been to, those areas, he gets the feel pretty spot on. We live in one. We still have an arcade. People are still driving trucks from the 1980s. They still talk like rednecks because they and their parents and their grandparents have never left town to expand their world and so they want everything to stay the same. That's pretty common in rural areas.

I always chalked it up to regional dialect as well, maybe with a touch of nostalgia for the era in which King was a child.

As someone who grew up in Maine - can confirm. We’re an odd bunch.

A few arcades are still around. But I think young people see them as a novelty , not a social hub lol

Little known fact, but Agatha Christie was a prolific serial killer.

Can confirm that small town kids can be different, especially in more rural areas.

And let’s not get started on Jessica Fletcher.

I like the way you phrased that- totally agree.