Kurt Barlow is a fictional character and the main antagonist of Stephen King's 1975 horror novel 'Salem's Lot. The character is a powerful vampire who moves to the Maine town of Jerusalem's Lot with the intent to form a vampire colony of its residents. Due to his own predations as well as those of the residents he turns, the entire town is ultimately overrun by vampirism; only a few of the residents escape. Although his true age is unknown, he claims to be so old that he predates the founding of Christianity by centuries.

'Salem's Lot is a 1975 horror novel by American author Stephen King. It was his second published novel. The story involves a writer named Ben Mears who returns to the town of Jerusalem's Lot in Maine, where he lived from the age of five through nine, only to discover that the residents are becoming vampires. The town is revisited in the short stories "Jerusalem's Lot" and "One for the Road", both from King's story collection Night Shift (1978). The novel was nominated for the World Fantasy Award in 1976 and the Locus Award for the All-Time Best Fantasy Novel in 1987.