Earlier King works, the shorter than elephant novels he writes now, actually left things up to your imagination every now and then. I think he lost that as he wrote more and more.
I've read a lot of earlier interviews with King. I am not really a fan of his recent work, so I really haven't seen any recent interviews. But generally, if he is like he was in the 80's and 90's, he doesn't particularly like talking about "Pet Semetary." He doesn't like the book and claims that he wishes that he never published it. You're unlikely to find anything where he goes into any depth about it other than the reasons why he wishes he didn't publish it (generally the scene where Louis exhumes Gage is the one he hates the most).
Strangely enough, I never wondered about Pascow. "Pet Semetary," the book, was such a good read that I was too focused on the plot to think about it.
I guess one way to look at it, is that the ambiguity was evident from the moment Pascow died. He suddenly knew who Louis was and he suddenly knew that Louis would eventually go and bury something in the burial ground. Louis even wonders right away how he has this knowledge. What King did was establish two things with this scene: 1. Death bestows knowledge unto the dead and 2. As long as you're alive, you'll never know exactly why.
I would assume that it has a lot to do with sort of becoming one with the rest of the universe. Sort of like some people think that you die and in the afterlife you are presented with a lot of knowledge you didn't previously have. I am not saying I personally believe that, but it's not an uncommon belief.
This is how I see it:
If you read "The Stand" you are presented with this idea of an ambiguous but all powerful evil force that fights against this ambiguous but equally powerful good force. This idea is represented throughout King's work. When Pascow died, he became part of that good force and it wasn't just Pascow who was trying to help Louis, it was that good force as well. The good force was helping him, in the form of Pascow, which it could do because he joined into it.
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chasing_dogmas
9 years ago
In case anyone's wondering, the only reason King had a problem with Pet Sematary was because he thought he had gone too far with it. Iirc it was inspired from a personal experience he had with his son, possibly also a toddler at the time, when he was almost run over by a truck. That's why he's not too fond of the book, no other reason.
Anyway OP, good question. It was never explained what was behind Pascow's return and it's completely up to your own imagination. There's definitely no concrete answer to it.
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Foxbarking
9 years ago
The near accident with Owen was part of it, but it was inspired by two incidents. The first was his daughter's cat Smucky getting run over by a truck on the road. He buried it in a pet cemetery and was troubled over how he was going to explain death to his daughter. Three days after this event, he started thinking about the novel. It was his idea of the consequences of not being honest with your children and telling them about death, the reverse option being worse. It was later when his son Owen almost got hit by a truck that King put the two ideas together.
http://stephenking.com/library/novel/pet_sematary_inspiration.html
http://www.johnconnollybooks.com/int_king.php
I only have a hard copy of the interview where he talks about why he hated the book, but you're right, he thought that it went too far and was just grisly. However, in the interview it was the exhuming scene that seemed to disgust him the most. I'll put why in a spoiler tag in case someone doesn't want to read it
When Louis exhumed Gage, he described the corpse and Louis hugged the body, making it pass a large amount of gas. He was very vidid in the description of this man and his dead kid and hated the fact that he had written it.
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fiatlux-1
9 years ago
I always wondered why King wrote what he did over & over, and then claimed he hated what he wrote...over & over!
Didn't he proofread what he wrote, for God's sake?
Some of it I may be able to answer my own question, at least partially.
At least 2 of his earlier novels, King admits he wrote them under a heavy fog of alcohol. "Christine" was one of these novels.
King was a hardcore alcoholic for some time.
I'd say this cloud is Cumulo Nimbus.
Didn't he discover America?
Penfold, shush.
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vodka_and_caviar
9 years ago
I read somewhere that he was so high on cocaine when he wrote Cujo that he can't even remember writing it. He wishes he could remember.
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Foxbarking
9 years ago
He also doesn't remember directing Maximum Overdrive.
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agunnut
9 years ago
Someone asked him once why he never tried directing again after "Maximum Overdrive." His response was "Did you actually see the movie?" He also mentioned that he was "coked out of his mind" to the point that he barely remembers it.
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Foxbarking
9 years ago
Stephen King is very much the sort of writer who doesn't plan much out in advance and he simply writes as he goes along. In a lot of his earlier interviews, he makes the claim that the stories write themselves, he is just there as the conduit, so to speak.
I wrote a novel about 12 years ago using this style and let my mom read it for editing purposes. She liked it, but told me I had too many sex scenes in it. I was shocked, because I had absolutely no memory or intention to write like that. Going back and rereading it, she was right. There were these sex scenes that not only did I have no memory of writing, but they were embarrassing to even admit I wrote them.
I think Stephen King writes like that most of the time. "Pet Sematary" probably came out in a rush of inspiration and he just went with it.
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