I loved it.
I love parody and satire and Ray Rexer is very good at it, indeed. The finest satirical writing comes from a complete and comprehensive knowledge of the subject being parodied, and if there's anything Ray Rexer has a complete and comprehensive knowledge of (other than artillery maintenance and methods of bruiseless interrogation) it's the work of Stephen King.
In the following piece, Ray gives an overview of his parody newsletter, and talks a little bit about its appeal.
Following Ray's essay, I will give you a look at some of my favorite moments from the now-defunct Castle Schlock. --sjs [by Stephen Spignesi]
Castle Schlock
A Brief History
by Ray Rexer
The Origin
Castle Schlock began in mid-1986 and started out with a total readership of two: I wrote it, and a guy I work with named Leonard Norman read it. Now, Len is more than just your average Stephen King nut -- he's like an SK savant or something. He can't remember his own phone number, but I don't think he's ever forgotten a single word of any Stephen King tale he's ever read.
Len and I are both policemen (who feel badly miscast in the roll, by the way -- but that's another story), and Stephen King has gotten us through some pretty miserable times on the job. When things get rough, we try to meet and swap Kingisms -- stories, trivia, lines from SK books and the like. We escape into the Kingdom of Delain for a while, or "flip" with Jack into the Territories. It's like taking a mental vacation, and when we get back, some of the pressure's been relieved and things don't seem quite so bad.
Steve may not know it, but he's contributed vastly to the sanity of two Michigan cops.
One night I went home and cranked out issue #1 of the Schlock on my PC for just such an occasion. I gave it to Len at work a few days later and he loved it. I'll never forget what he said to me after reading it. He said, "This is better than getting a check in the mail! Betcha fer!" I was touched -- who wouldn't have been?
And Castle Schlock was born.
The Growth
Word about the Schlock got around via the SK Underground Grapevine (The SKUG -- and yes, I just made that up, but I'm pretty sure something like it actually does exist), and requests for copies started pouring in at the rate of something like one in a millenium. Momentum grew; the Schlock took on a life of its own. I received a lot of good feedback on Castle Schlock from various King devotees, and before long the reverberating chant of "WE WANT MORE! WE WANT MORE!" could be heard from coast to coast.
It wasn't something I could ignore.
So, I wrote issue #2...then #3...then #4. Shortly thereafter, a couple of mail-order booksellers started offering it through their catalogs: Craig Goden from the Time Tunnel in New Jersey, and Dave Hinchberger of The Overlook Connection in Georgia, who puts out a hugely entertaining catalog. Just recently, Weinberg Books added Castle Schlock to the large and varied list of items they sell.
The Appeal
Castle Schlock seems to appeal mostly to the person who's an accomplished Kingologist, a true kindred spirit, someone with a PhD in SK.
There are a lot of inside jokes in the Schlock that only such a person could truly understand. For example, issue #1 mentions SK's new cookbook, Food Processor of the Gods, an obvious takeoff on a similarly named short story by King -- but only to someone who's "in" on King.
In the classified ad section of another issue, a man named Art Denker advertises three King limited editions for sale: an asbestos-bound Firestarter, a leatherbound Skeleton Crew, and a dead-cat-bound Pet Sematary. Now, this would totally lose someone who doesn't read King, and rightfully so -- anyone who doesn't read King doesn't deserve to understand these things and to heck with them! Let'em go read an Updike book or something!
But I digress.
At the same time, there are a lot of inside jokes relating to Castle Rock (the real Stephen King newsletter, remember?). The Schlock's editor, for example, is a woman named Annie Lynn Steffard, a corruption of Stephanie Leonard's name (God bless her ink-stained heart). And one of the Schlock's contributing editors is a man named Tyris Greene, a colorful name, so to speak.
Castle Schlock is nothing more than harmless fun. It was never meant to be anything more than that, and I'm quite sure it never evolved into anything more than that. Harmless fun, no offense intended. I believe it's possible to be funny without being mean, and that's all the Schlock tries to do. And, as an added bonus of sorts, Castle Schlock is now low in saturated fats and completely safe when used as directed. Now what more could a person want in a parody newsletter anyway, huh?
The Future
None.
The original Stephen King newsletter, Castle Rock, ceased publication as of December 1989, so according to international parody laws, Castle Schlock had to do likewise. It's completely out of my hands. Sorry.
But...as a final offering of sorts, I combined the best of Castle Schlock from the first four issues with a fair amount of all new material to produce a single, larger, more professionallooking, action-packed laffa-minute issue!
And that'll have to do.
(Order back issues of Castle Schlock from either The Overlook Connection or The Time Tunnel.)
The Shape Under the Sheet: The Complete Stephen King
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