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The Big Picture
- In Stephen King’s novel ‘Salem’s Lot, the traditional tough guys in the small town aren’t the true heroes and threats, but rather the men who aren’t imposing and don’t need to prove themselves.
- The length of ‘Salem’s Lot makes it well-suited for a TV series adaptation, as it offers enough material without leaving out important details.
- The novel not only focuses on different types of men but also explores the importance of male bonds and the power of found family.
Perhaps one of the most significant chapters in Stephen King’s second novel Salem’s Lot is one that’s devoid of gore, scares, or even monsters — of the supernatural variety, at least. The setting is an elementary school playground in a small town in Maine. Schoolyard bully, Richie Boddin, is looking for his next target and finds it in one Mark Petrie — tall, yet bookish and bespectacled, not appearing particularly threatening, especially compared to his new foe Richie, who’s not just tall, but big, authoritative, and stomps around his peers as if he were Godzilla.
The kids live in fear of Richie. All except Mark, who is unbothered by Richie’s menacing presence and stature. After some homophobic jabs from Richie, Mark tells him precisely what he thinks of him: “I heard you were a big clumsy stupid turd.” Richie, stunned by Mark’s boldness, knows that he can’t let this kid upset the order that Richie has tormented his peers to preserve. With all of his weight, Richie is about to launch his fist into this revolutionary, but then, things take a different turn. Mark — tall, slim, and agile — deflects Richie’s blow, instead managing to jump on the bully’s back and twist his arm until he submits. All the while, Mark is calculating his opponent’s next move as well as his own. Soon, Richie acknowledges defeat and leaves the playground defeated. It’s a new era for the kids of Stanley Street Elementary School, but it’s also a changing of the guard: the oafish, tough guys’ days of superiority are numbered. The men and boys of ‘Salem’s Lot, Maine who are the true heroes, and the true threats, aren’t the good ol’ boys who like to peacock ruggedness and adhere to tribalism. With ‘Salem’s Lot, their era of brute conquest is sunsetting. And, with the revelations of the going-ons of a small New England town, sunset is something to be feared.
Many of King’s works have been adapted for the small screen: Under The Dome, The Mist, The Stand, and ‘Salem’s Lot is one of his many works that is ripe for a series. While ‘Salem’s Lot was first adapted into a two-part miniseries in 1979, at 451 pages, the novel is one of King’s lengthier works that is well-suited for a series. The film has been well-received but, like most movies adapted from books, details had been left out or arranged that could leave one feeling that they’re not getting the full experience of the Lot. Its length is long enough to provide enough material for a series but short enough that details wouldn’t have to be left out. Currently, ‘Salem’s Lot is being remade as a movie, though its production has been murky and there’s no set release date.
‘Salem’s Lot’ Is Ripe for a TV Series Adaptation
Published a year after his debut novel, Carrie, King laid the groundwork for a format he would utilize for many of his future works: making full use of a small town. ‘Salem’s Lot takes place in a small fictional town in Maine named Jerusalem’s Lot, which the locals either refer to by the book’s title or simply “the Lot.” The main protagonist is Ben Mears, a somewhat successful novelist who moves back to the Lot where he spent four years as a child to write about the mysterious mansion overlooking the Lot called the Marsten House — a place that holds a traumatic memory for him. The Lot’s residents, suspicious of outsiders, as many small towns are, are curious as to why a writer has made a temporary home of their little Maine town. Ben befriends some of the locals, including Susan Norton with whom he develops a romantic connection.
Ben isn’t the only newcomer to the Lot; foreigners Richard Straker and Kurt Barlow are new arrivals, too, there to ostensibly open an antique furniture shop. The Marsten House was purchased by Barlow. Along with being foreign and seeming to come out of nowhere, Straker and Barlow also raise local eyebrows, many assuming that they are a couple–it’s a small town in the ‘70s, long before things like seeing pride flags hanging from store windows would be common.
But as people have moved in, others have seemed to disappear. First, it’s a little boy. Then his brother falls ill and dies, then another, then another, and then another. ‘Salem’s Lot begins to decrease, at first going unnoticed, but then becoming impossible to ignore. Ben and some local men he befriends, including the child Mark Petrie, have to figure out what is happening and how to stop it.
‘Salem’s Lot’ Has Vampires, Stephen King’s Way
For his second novel, King covered the widely popular genre of vampires. While not the most distinct premise among his novels, he manages to make the genre his own with his unique interpretation of vampires. In a prologue for ‘Salem’s Lot, King says he didn’t want to make his vampires like the wine snobs that so many vampires appear as. His vampires aren’t Dracula, they’re Nosferatu. King, unsurprisingly, doesn’t shy away from gore, and his bloodsuckers are monsters and nothing more. Anne Rice’s vampires were humanized; Stephanie Meyer’s vampires were sexualized; but King’s serve only to terrorize.
Vampires have become common in films and television: Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s vampires are prosthetic-clad embodiments of adolescent trials; The Vampire Diaries followed the vampire romance craze ignited by the Twilight series; and in What We Do in the Shadows’ fanged protagonists are followed mockumentary-style from one folly to the next. A series based on ‘Salem’s Lot would offer enough of a build to keep viewers engaged minus any entanglements from the monsters that have become common for the genre. King’s vampires would also break from the tradition of making vampires sexually appealing. Both versions of Fright Night have attractive men (Chris Sarandon in the original and Colin Farrell in the remake) inviting women to their house under the guise of a good — and unfortunately for them, last — night. Interview with a Vampire depicts its killers as masters of eroticism. A series focused on vampires taking over a small town, save human-vampire mingling, could be a good back-to-basics approach. As per a Stephen King novel, just because a character is endearing doesn’t guarantee their well-being; anyone is at risk.
Many of King’s best works have made a town a character. Needful Things, King’s 1991 novel about a proprietor quietly turning a community against itself takes clear inspiration from his tale about vampires. In Needful Things, King takes the same approach to storytelling: a novel covers the lives of the inhabitants of a small town, but the town itself is a character. ‘Salem’s Lot has her own personality, as each small town does, and her citizens are all facets of her identity. Perhaps what sets ‘Salem’s Lot apart from much of King’s other adapted work is how it delves deeply into the varied lives of the Lot’s residents. A small town can provide to perfect backdrop for rich stories. In the Lot, infidelity, secrets, reputations, and history all come into play. The many residents the novel covers would provide ample opportunity for storytelling. Viewers would be able to identify with Ben who having been away from the Lot for years is learning and re-learning all the idiosyncratic quirks that come with small-town life.
‘Carrie’ Was About Women; ‘Salem’s Lot’ Is a Story About Men
Carrie, though delving into religious fanaticism, the cruelty of high school, and the reckoning of power, is a novel about women — “Hell is a teenage girl.” King’s wife Tabitha is his most trusted advisor, and her influence and insight are palpable throughout the novel, especially regarding the inner workings of the mind of a teenage girl. ‘Salem’s Lot, by contrast, is a novel about men. The novel only has one well-defined female character — men take center stage in this story.
But it’s not just a book about men, it’s a book about different types of men. King was writing from a place of experience in ‘Salem’s Lot, though I assume the author had no prior experience with vampires. No, King can be seen in Ben Mears: both are writers; both are tall; both have dark hair; both had Maine childhoods; and both were raised by women. But Ben isn’t the only man represented: Matt Burke is an English teacher who proves to be a voice of reason when chaos creeps in on the town; Jimmy Cody is a doctor whose courage and intelligence provide a form of defense and counter to the rising evil; Father Callahan is self-sacrificing; and Mark Petrie is intelligent, brave, and knows how to kick ass. They’re men who would typically be overlooked in a crisis; they’re not imposing; they aren’t gunslingers; and they don’t have a need to prove themselves like so many insecure men parading as macho feel the need to.
In fact, it’s the town’s typical tough guys who either don’t last or refuse to take a stand. Parkins Gillespie, the town’s constable, abandons the Lot and its people when he becomes privy to the evil that has taken over. Many of the town’s bullish men such as Nolly Gardener, Reggie Sawyer, and Royce McDougall all fall prey to the vampires. It’s the men who are thinkers, not brash actors, that prove any real threat to the vampires. But much like how schoolyard bully Richie was overthrown and proved not to be the biggest threat by Mark, who is bookish and nonaggressive, it’s the men who aren’t seemingly threatening that are the true sources of mayhem. Strickland and Barlow, whom the town rumors to be lovers and neither of which exude red-blooded machismo, are the true terrors.
‘Salem’s Lot’ and the Importance of Male Connection
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But it’s not just different types of men that ‘Salem’s Lot fixates on, it’s a book about male bonds. Strickland and Barlow are bonded by evil, but it’s a bond nonetheless. Ben creates meaningful bonds with Matt, Jimmy, and Father Callahan, all of whom welcome him as an outsider. But perhaps the deepest and most profound bond is the one shared between the “tall man” and the boy at the beginning of the novel. Despite not being related by blood, the man and the boy have developed a father-son relationship that exemplifies the need and necessity of male connection. Their bond is given a higher value than the vampires that stalk the night.
King begins the novel by emphasizing the found family they have in each other with the first sentence: “Almost everyone thought the man and the boy were father and son.” They’re able to be vulnerable with each other: “The boy came to him a day later with the paper in his hand, folded open to expose the headline: ‘Ghost Town in Maine?’ ‘I’m scared,’ he said. ‘I am, too,’ the tall man answered.” And the love that has formed between them is shown to be perhaps the most powerful element of the novel: “A week later he [the tall man] awoke sweating from a nightmare and called out the boy’s name. ‘I’m going back,’ he said. The boy paled beneath his tan. ‘Can you come with me?’ the man asked. ‘Do you love me?’ ‘Yes. God, yes.’ The boy began to weep, and the tall man held him.”
Vampires invoke blood, but ‘Salem’s Lot evinces that some things are stronger than blood.
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