Stephen King is the undisputed Master of the Macabre. With over 70 novels to his credit, his books have sold nearly 400 million copies worldwide, making him one of the most read and commercially most successful authors of all time. His impressive range of horror, supernatural fiction, science-fiction, and fantasy novels has left an indelible mark on American popular culture.

 

Iconic characters like Pennywise the Clown or the rabid dog Cujo are household names the world over - the author himself was even immortalized with cartoon figure cameos in the animated comedy series "The Simpsons.” In addition to all that, Stephen King has won almost every prize going. In 2014 President Barack Obama awarded him America’s highest honor for artists, the "National Medal of Arts.”

There’s only one prize that seems to elude him: the Nobel Prize for Literature. Best-selling author or not, Stephen King has yet to be considered on the list of nominees for literature’s most prestigious award. But why is that, exactly? As an American herself, DW’s literature expert Traci Kim goes after the question why Stephen King will never be Nobel Prize material. She meets with fans and fellow authors, like French-Moroccan writer Lëila Slimani, and she takes stock of critics like the legendary Harold Bloom, who described Stephen King as a writer of penny dreadfuls. One thing is certain - Stephen King doesn’t need a Nobel Prize to polish his reputation. He’s already cemented it as one of the world’s best known writers - one who’ll be 75 years young on September 21st, 2022.