Stephen King

Introduction

It is a 1986 horror novel by American author Stephen King. The story follows the exploits of seven children as they are terrorized by the eponymous monster "It", an extraterrestrial shapeshifter that takes the form of its victims' deepest fears. "It" primarily appears in the form of "Bob Gray" a.k.a. "Pennywise the Dancing Clown," described as resembling a combination of Bozo, Clarabell and Ronald McDonald, in order to attract its preferred prey of young children, though it occasionally feeds on adults.

The novel is told through narratives alternating between two time periods, which is largely told in a third-person omniscient view. It deals with themes which would eventually become King staples: the power of memory, childhood trauma, and ugliness lurking beneath a façade of traditional small-town values. The novel won the British Fantasy Award in 1987, and received nominations for the Locus and World Fantasy Awards that same year. Publishers Weekly listed It as the best-selling book in America in 1986. The book is dedicated to King's family: "This book is gratefully dedicated to my children. My mother and my wife taught me how to be a man. My children taught me how to be free."

Themes

"It" apparently originated in a void containing and surrounding the universe, a place referred to in the novel as the "Macroverse" (a concept similar to the later established Todash Darkness of The Dark Tower series). Its favorite form is that of a clown (with fangs and large claws when it stalks a child) known as Pennywise the Dancing Clown, and its final form in the physical realm is that of an enormous spider, but even this is only the closest the human mind can get to approximating It's actual physical form.

Theme 1

Its natural enemy is "The Turtle," another ancient Macroverse dweller resembling a God-like deity, who, eons ago, created our universe, and possibly others. The Turtle shows up again in King's series The Dark Tower. The book suggests that It, along with the Turtle, are themselves creations of a separate, omnipotent creator referred to as "the Other". The Turtle and It are eternal enemies (creation vs. consumption). It arrived in our world in a massive, cataclysmic event similar to an asteroid impact, in the place that would, in time, become Derry, Maine, where it waited for humanity to appear.

Its power is apparently quite vast; during the second Ritual of Chüd, It offers the Losers ...