Wouldn't It be awesome if....

[baylorbear2008]

Sai King and publishers decided to release a complete and uncut version of IT, just like The Stand recieved? I know a lot of CR love the book and I for one would salivate at the chance to read IT as it was originally intended to be read. I wonder what horrors were cut from the original manuscript.

Wishful thinking I know, but how sweet would it be...

[faithraine96]

Do we even know if there IS an uncut version of It? The uncut version of The Stand was the original, and was edited for length, released, and then the complete version (C&U) was released. I would definitely buy an uncut It, as it is so far my favorite SK book, though. And another thing to think about, The C&U Stand was released, what, about 10 or 15 years after the original? It was released in '85 (?), so wouldn't we have at least HEARD of it? I don't know. BUT, if there IS a longer, more in-depth look (if that's possible, which I don't think it is; the book is 1100 pages long, and probably the most interwoven book I've ever read), it should definitely be released.

[Moderator]

To the best of my knowledge, only the usual editing was done for IT. The Stand was a much different situation where the publisher cut the pages because of the production cost factor not because of editing to improve the story.

[Jake Featherston]

To the best of my knowledge, only the usual editing was done for IT. The Stand was a much different situation where the publisher cut the pages because of the production cost factor not because of editing to improve the story.

Keep in mind the original version of The Stand (which I actually read, before reading the uncut version) was published in the late 1970s. King just wasn't that big a deal back then; he had to pretty much go along with what the publishers wanted. By the time, say, It had come out, he was in a much better position to force the publishers to release a book that was longer than they would have preferred.

As an aside, I'm reminded of my father's best friend, who was a retired professor, literally owned more books than some public libraries, and he used to read one book nearly every day (if the book was long, it might might take him 2-3 days, but he always read 400-500 pages on any given day). He died in 1982, but a few years before that, he told me about the plot of this great vampire novel he'd read, from this new writer that really impressed him. Nearly a decade after his death, I read Salem's Lot, and realized the "new writer" he was talking about was Stephen King.

He'd read all the classics, from the Greco-Roman period, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, 18th & 19th century England (and America), as well as nearly every novel (and a Hell of a lot of the non-fiction) of any consequence to be written since the end of the Second World War (if not the First), and wasn't shy about denouncing much of what he'd read as "crap." Its probably safe to assume that he wasn't the sort of person the publishers had in mind when they first decide to publish King's work, but I think its interesting that surely the best read man I will ever meet thought Stephen King was very good, back when he wasn't that famous.