A Stephen King essay and some creepy stories.
NIGHTMARES IN THE SKY: GARGOYLES AND GROTESQUES by Stephen King, with photographs by f-stop Fitzgerald
Nightmares in the Sky is a coffee table book that primarily consists of pictures of gargoyles that were taken by the photographer called f-stop Fitzgerald – but the folks behind this book didn’t want to send it out into the world with just Fitzgerald’s images between its covers. They wanted to start it off with an essay; so they turned to the legendary horror author Stephen King, then at the height of his ‘80s popularity. King knew little about gargoyles or photography, but he agreed to write some words for the start of this book – and ended up turning in around 35 pages.
As he admitted, King was no expert on gargoyles, so while there is a bit of a history lesson in there toward the end of his essay, a large portion of his write-up is simply the story of his realization that there are gargoyles all over New York City. He had never noticed them before they were pointed out to him, and now that he had been tasked with writing about these sculptures, he spends some time wandering around the city, looking up at the gargoyles, counting them, and getting neck pains for his troubles. The subject also inspires him to discuss the 1972 TV movie Gargoyles for a while – and he reveals that, while he could see that the movie has its faults, it also scared him. It also scared his son Joe (now known as author Joe Hill) when he got a glimpse of it... but, just like I did when I caught a terrifying glimpse of a horror movie as a child, that troubling glimpse just made Joe want to watch the movie some more. And watching Gargoyles again and again became a father/son bonding experience for King and his son for a few years.
King’s essay is interesting and paves the way for the f-stop Fitzgerald pictures, which take up the rest of the book’s 130 page count. Taken in different locations around the United States, these images are fascinating and sometimes creepy, and the book kindly lists the location of each gargoyle in the final pages.
CREEPSHOW by Stephen King, with illustrations by Bernie Wrightson with Michelle Wrightson
Back in 1982, two masters of horror – author Stephen King and Night of the Living Dead / Dawn of the Dead director George A. Romero – teamed up to gift us with the horror anthology film Creepshow, which King wrote and Romero brought to the screen with the style and tone of the classic EC horror comics of the 1950s. While Creepshow looks like a comic book come to life, there was also a comic book adaptation of King’s screenplay, turning it into a graphic novel with awe-inspiring artwork by Bernie Wrightson, with Michelle Wrightson.
Creepshow is one of my favorite movies and I love the comic book artform, so it’s a lot of fun to see the five stories that make up Romero’s movie – Father’s Day, The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill, Something to Tide You Over, The Crate, and They’re Creeping Up on You – represented on the page.
When I was a kid in the ‘80s, my local library didn’t just have King’s work on the shelves with the other books, they gave him his own separate bookcase that stood against a back wall... and every time I visited the library, I would wander over to that bookcase and look over all the disturbing horror stories King that written. They had a copy of the Creepshow graphic novel on that bookcase, and I remember standing there in the library, leafing through it, looking at the great artwork, examining the stories that were told through that artwork. I may have already seen the movie Creepshow at that point, but I wasn’t very familiar with it, so looking through this book was one of the first times I was ever exposed to these stories. Now I’m very familiar with that movie, I have watched it many times – but it’s still awesome to see them drawn out on the page in the Wrightson style.
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