Stephen King is a massively successful author who came from humble beginnings. And he just told a moving story about those beginnings and the single mother who raised him. Stephen's mom, Nellie Ruth Pillsbury King, died from cancer when she was just 60. But she did see Stephen find success from his first novel, Carrie.
He just opened up about that first success and the moment he told his mother, who was battling cancer, that she didn't have to work anymore. "The hardcover advance was small, but the paperback advance just bowled us over — it was, like, $400,000 in 1974," Stephen explained to anchor Jane Pauley on CBS Sunday Morning. "It was a huge amount of money."
So, Stephen and his brother discussed what to do with the money and it was decided they would pay a visit to their mother who was working at a nearby hospital to tell her she could stop right then and there.
The story is nothing short of moving. He recalled the moment when he and his brother let her know that she would never have to work again. He says it's a story he's never told before.
It may be because the story is simply so personal, especially because of his mother's cancer battle. "But she was stoned, totally stoned on over-the-counter medication," he recalled. "She was in excruciating pain by that point. And my brother and I, we said, 'Mom, you're done. There's enough to take care of you now, because the book sold for a lot of money, and you can go home.' And she just put her hands over her face and cried."
Carrie would go on to be a massive hit. It was released a year after his mother's death in 1974. Two years later, it was made into a film that earned $33.8 million worldwide.
While Stephen's mother didn't live to see his monumental success, he did get to give her that amazing gift. It's one he was thrilled to be able to give. Nellie raised Stephen and his brother by herself after their father left when Stephen was only 2 years old. He says he has no memory of his dad.
Luckily, it sounds like Stephen's mom was a pretty incredible woman. She noticed his passions and gifted him a typewriter when he was 12 years old. It was the freedom to truly get lost in his own world and find what he loved that he is so grateful to her for today.
"My mother gave me room to be what I wanted to be," he said. "She didn't laugh about the ambition to write stories." Either she knew he was tremendously talented early on, or she just wanted her son to embrace his passions. Either way, it was an act of love.
All these years and dozens of novels later and Stephen is still writing, though he says that words don't come as easily as they once did. But it's still his passion every bit as much as it was when he was just starting out. "One of the things that I've tried to do is to keep my imagination young," he said. Clearly, it's working because the stories just keep coming.
