STEPHEN KING’S debut novel, Carrie, has returned to screens in the form of an eight-part TV series for Amazon Prime Video.
With renowned filmmaker Mike Flanagan at the helm, a new generation has been .
Carrie tells the story of a bullied teen who uses telekinetic powers to exact her fiery revenge on her classmates.
The original novel launched King’s career when it was published in 1974, and its big-screen arrival in cinemas two years later cemented it as a horror classic.
But is it based on a true story, and where did King take inspiration when dreaming up the story’s tragic anti-hero, Carrie White?
Is Carrie based on a true story?
The supernatural events in the story are quite obviously not based on real-world happenings.
But King drew inspiration for Carrie White’s character from his own teenage experiences.
The fictional character was heavily inspired by two real teenage girls King knew from school.
King has previously discussed the truth behind the novel, revealing in his memoir On Writing that he merged the personalities and lives of two classmates to create his famous protagonist.
To create Carrie herself, he drew upon his own high school memories.
Who were the real girls that inspired Carrie?
King has referred to the first source of inspiration only as “Tina White,” pseudonym he uses to protect the real person’s identity.
Tina was a girl in King’s class who was relentlessly bullied. She came from an impoverished background and would often wear the same clothes to school every day.
The second girl, whom King referred to as “Sandra,” provided the inspiration for Carrie’s home life.
Sandra was raised by a strict, fundamentalist Christian mother, who herself served as a template for Carrie’s terrifying mother, Margaret White.
King was once hired by Sandra’s mother to help move some furniture.
When he entered their home, he noticed large crucifixes and religious leaflets scattered everywhere.
But none of the real women lived to see the global impact the character they had inspired had.
According to King, both Tina and Sandra died young in real life; one died by suicide, while the other suffered a fatal seizure.
Their early deaths confirmed King’s view of high school as a brutal, unforgiving environment.
Where did the telekinesis come from?
Of course, that doesn’t account for Carrie’s supernatural telekinetic abilities – so where did they come from?
King was reading an article in an issue of Life Magazine on the phenomenon of poltergeists when the idea came to him.
The article suggested a theory that poltergeist activity – objects moving on their own, doors slamming – could be linked to dormant psychic abilities in adolescent girls going through puberty.
But writing King’s debut novel was not all plain sailing.
Frustrated with his early drafts and struggling to write from a teenage girl’s perspective, King threw the first three pages of Carrie in the bin.
His wife, Tabitha, fished the pages out, read them, told her husband he had something, and helped him understand a female perspective.
Fifty years, multiple film adaptations, and millions of sales later, it seems .
