To celebrate the release of his latest book, End of Watch, Stephen King – one of the most prolific authors of his time – sat down with George R. R. Martin – who, if you listen to his fans, is the slowest writer of all time – for a fascinating discussion at the Kiva Auditorium in New Mexico.
The authors have an acquaintance stemming back several decades, and it shows in this lighthearted conversation, in which King opens by talking about the genealogical and familial elements that he believes allowed him, wife, and two sons to all become published authors.
As King begins to talk about his early writing, his explanations are intertwined with stories and real-world experiences. They’re enough to fill entire novels, and on many previous occasions, they have – he’s written 60 books and around 200 short stories in less than 50 years.
That’s not lost on Martin, who ends the interview by asking the question on the mind of so many writers and non-writers alike:
“How the fuck do you write so many books so fast?”
Martin thinks he’s had a good six months if he’s written three chapters. In that same amount of time, King might have written three entire novels.
King – “Here’s the thing, ok. There are books and there are books. The way that I work, I try to get out there and I try to get six pages a day. So with a book like End of Watch, when I’m working I work every day, three, four hours, and I try to get those six pages and I try to get them fairly clean. So if the manuscript is, let’s say, 360 pages long, that’s basically two months’ work. It’s concentrated, but it’s a fairly — but that’s assuming that it goes well.”
Martin – “And you do hit six pages a day?”
King – “I usually do.”
Martin – “You don’t ever have a day where you sit down there and it’s like constipation, and you write a sentence, and you hate the sentence? And you check your email and you wonder if you had any talent after all, and maybe you should have been a plumber? Don’t you ever have days like that?”
King –“No, I mean, there’s real life. I can be working away and something comes up. And you have to basically get up and you have to go to see the doctor or you have to take somebody a care package, or you have to go to the post office, or whatever. But mostly, i try to get the six pages in. Although entropy tries to intervene…”
King ends by consoling Martin over the pressure they both face from expectant fans waiting on the next novel by telling a story about an event he appeared at alongside J.K. Rowling just before the release of the final Harry Potter book.
After appearing for soundcheck and being delayed by publicists, Rowling approached King and whispered “They don’t understand what we do, do they?”
King’s response?
“How can they understand when we don’t understand?”
You can watch the full, hour-long discussion below.
https://youtu.be/v_PBqSPNTfg