The Stephen King Book That Might Be One Of The Most Valuable Items In Your Home
As we continue to move towards our seemingly inevitable all-digital media future, the remaining relics of physical media have become highly prized by some. From the extremely valuable VHS tapes hiding in your closet to video games that can fetch over a million bucks, you might have enough physical media sitting around your house to ensure a financially comfortable retirement. And that includes the Stephen King book "Rage," which can net you upwards of $4,000 if you have the right version.
Why is "Rage" so valuable when it's not even among the best Stephen King books? Because the author decided to let it go out of print after its plot — a troubled student takes his school hostage and kills two of his teachers — had started to embolden kids to commit similar acts in real life. Once "Rage" became fully out of print, its value skyrocketed. The most sought after versions are the ones that were part of the book's original 1977 paperback pressing.
"Rage" was also released as part of a compilation called "The Bachman Books," as it was one of the stories King wrote under his sometime pseudonym, Richard Bachman. More copies of that were produced, so that one is a bit less spendy to get a hold of, but it's still relatively valuable.
Several real life incidents were directly inspired by Rage
Just as there are directors who hate their own movies, there are authors that eventually disown their own books. But Stephen King wanting to distance himself from "Rage" isn't an example of ego or publisher meddling or anything of that sort. As he explained in a 2013 essay entitled "Guns," a kid brought a gun to school in 1988 and specifically mentioned "Rage" as one of the impetuses for doing so. Over the next 10 years, several more incidents occurred of students taking their schools hostage, all of whom also cited "Rage" as inspiration.
Realizing the potential for harm that his book had manifested, King made the decision to cease all future pressings of "Rage" and letting it go out of print. As he explains in "Guns" (via SlashFilm), "[Those students] found something in my book that spoke to them because they were already broken. Yet I did see 'Rage' as a possible accelerant, which is why I pulled it from sale. You don't leave a can of gasoline where a boy with firebug tendencies can lay hands on it."