Stephen King Pulled This Novel From Print After It Was Linked to Four School Shooters

Before Carrie made him a household name, Stephen King wrote a novel called“Rage”under his Richard Bachman pseudonym. Published in 1977, it tells the story of a high school student who shoots two people and holds his classroom at gunpoint. Years later, at least four school shooters were found to own copies. In the late 1990s, King let“Rage”fall out of print, and it has stayed unavailable ever since.

In a 2013 essay called“Guns,”King addressed the decision directly. He wrote about the young men who committed violence after reading his work, and he made a striking point:“People aren’t monsters, even those who do unspeakably terrible things.”His profits from that essay went to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. The novel was originally collected in“The Bachman Books,”alongside three other novels that remain in print to this day.

This is a rare case of an author pulling his own work from the world because of its real-world influence. It raises a question we still argue about: when art and harm connect, who holds responsibility? King answered with action instead of words.

What do you think? Should authors ever pull their own books from print? Sound off in the comments.