The Transformation Of Jack Torrance In The Shining By Stephen King

Tony has a scratchy, slightly lower pitched voice form of Danny’s. Tony is most comparable to a tulpa; an entity created in the mind, acting parallel to or independently from one's’ own consciousness. Danny created this “invisible friend” as way to cope with his family's issues following the Danny event. “The greatest terror of Danny's life was DIVORCE, a

Throughout the gothic horror short story, “The Masque of the Red Death”, Edgar Allan Poe illustrates the struggle of an egotistical prince who refuses to face the inevitable reality of death. Through the downfall of the protagonist, Poe establishes the idea that the inability to face reality often leads to the destruction of the mind. The downfall of the Prince is emphasized by Poe’s use of characterization, setting, and symbolism.

The Shining is about the Torrance family having to stay at the Overlook hotel for five months. Having that said, the family was completely isolated in such a big place over the winter. The hotel had horrific history of a murder done by Charles Grady who had committed suicide after killing his two girls and wife with an axe. The shocking information given to Jack did not bother him at all and he even said that his wife, Wendy would enjoy a good scary story. The film proceeds into a story that would seem calm and full of tranquility but this would not be the case since it soon enough turns out into something more horrifying. After a month has gone by, one can clearly notice the difference between the old Jack to the new Jack. This has to do with his personality and how he is acting by himself and towards others. His attitude changes to wanting to spend more time alone and not caring to do the work for the hotel, which he was hired to do in the first place. Danny is the young son of Jack who has psychic powers which at times confuses him but most of the time frightens the young boy. Danny encounters the two young girls that were killed in the hotel. Danny tries to avoid the girls as much as possible and tries to stay away from room 237 but it attracted Danny’s attention.

Within the story, the masked figure is used as an important symbol in portraying that no one can escape death. The masked figure, who made its presence at midnight, had not been seen by anyone before. The masked figure is described as “tall and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of the grave” (Poe 5). Furthermore, when the mask of the Red Death appears, it is shocking to all the guests. The reader discovers that this guest is even more strange than all the other guests. The figure resembles a corpse of a victim of the Red Death, thereby symbolizing the presence of the plague, which is the dangerously deadly disease all the guests are attempting to escape from. This comes to show that death finds its way to everyone. The appearance of the

The masquerade in Prince Prospero’s palace symbolizes an escape route for his guests to camouflage themselves within the elaborate works of art hanging on the walls. “The guests depend on art so much that it virtually animates them: when the orchestra stops playing, they freeze in terror” (Dudley). The guests use the art in a way to obscure themselves away from the sick-ridden world of the outside. Since art is such a prepossessing object, and eternal, the guests find a getaway from the evil that kills the living. The whole justification of the creation of the masquerade in a manner based off art, gives the guests a feeling of superiority over the power of fate itself:

This mask holds back all the sorrow, protects you from being further destroyed by others words or actions, and covers up the real extreme problems people are facing such as suicide and drug overdose. Both texts use these “masks” metaphorically to show how the people protect themselves.

During the period of American Gothic literature, authors, such as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe, incorporated the sinister perspective of the human nature in their writings. Both Hawthorne’s symbolic short story, “The Minister’s Black Veil”, and Poe’s violent fiction, “The Tell-Tale Heart”, demonstrate separation and symbolism throughout the course of each story. In Hawthorne’s story, the protagonist, Minister Hooper, decides to wear a black veil over his face and vows to never remove it. This vow continues to the point of his death. Mr. Hooper’s decision to wear the black veil consequently separates him from society. Hawthorne uses the veil to symbolize the human psyche and efforts to hide sins. In Poe’s story, the narrator is the caretaker of an old man with a blind eye. He describes his internal discomfort when he sees the eye, and later devises a plan to murder the old man. His separation from humanity due to the uneasy feeling of the old man’s pale, blind eye are shown through his efforts to commit murder.

     During the masked ball we are given, what the reader believes at the time, a very good

In reality the veil represents the secrets everyone is hiding within themselves. The unifying theme is the conflict between the dark, hidden side of man and the standards imposed by his puritanical heritage. Hawthorne brings evil and unauthorized desire into the way of puritan life, and in so doing suggests a insightful truth that is disturbing in its implication, that is to say that we can never hope to know each other's true selves. The themes in the story are suggested by the veil-symbol, the tension between the minister and the community. Every person has something to hide from the world. The veil is symbolic for the cover up of peoples secrets. Although most people would not wear a veil, the minister is proving a point. By wearing a simple black veil Mr. Hooper is making all the villagers evaluate their everyday actions in life. The symbolic value of the black veil lies in the physical and mental dilemma that it creates between the minister and his environment, and the guilt it conveys. Many people believe that the face provides information about a person's primary characteristics, therefore, predicting a persons possible behavior. As a result, by

They also seek to show how this facade separates and alienates you from society, peers, reality, and spirituality. " 'Have patience with me, Elizabeth!' cried he, passionately. 'Do not desert me, though this veil must be between us here on earth. Be mine, and hereafter there shall be no veil over my face, no darkness between our souls! It is but a mortal veil--it is not for eternity! O! You know not how lonely I am, and how frightened, to be alone behind my black veil. Do not leave me in this miserable obscurity forever!' 'Lift the veil but once, and look me in the face,' said she.'Never! It cannot be!' replied Mr. Hooper." " 'Tremble also at each other! Have men avoided me, and women shown no pity, and children screamed and fled, only for my black veil? What, but the mystery which it obscurely typifies, has made this piece of crape so awful? When the friend shows his inmost heart to his friend; the lover to his best beloved; when man does not vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely treasuring up the secret of his sin; then deem me a monster, for the symbol beneath which I have lived, and die! I look around me, and, lo! On every visage a Black Veil!' "

Steven King did an incredible job creating “The Shining”. Using a real life issue as damaging as alcoholism and allowing the reader to sympathize and even relate with the main characters was truly a remarkable idea. This thriller is, in no doubt, a masterpiece that will stay a treasure for years to come.

A number of strange incidents occur throughout the story. Jack finds a wasps' nest while maintaining the roof, uses an appropriate wasp bomb on it, and puts it in Danny's room. That night, although Jack had checked there were no wasps still in the nest, Danny is stung several times, and when Jack manages to put a bowl over the nest, there are many wasps trapped inside. Then in an almost hypnotic fit after spending too much time going through the hotel's papers in the boiler room, Jack smashes the radio, effectively cutting them off from the rest of the world as snow has fallen heavily, and reaching the nearest town has become impossible except by snowmobile.

In contrast, Manfred in The Castle of Otranto, is stupefied for a time into insane behavior, but then, is brought around to sanity after stabbing his daughter, as shown in this quotation here: “Manfred, waking as from a trance, beat his breast, twisted his hands in his locks…” (100). In this excerpt, Manfred is shown feeling remorse and regret in his actions, confirming his change back to sanity. Kubrick in The Shining however, makes the film much more terrorizing for audiences, as Jack never shows remorse, but instead, continually and purposefully pursues his family with an axe. At this scene in the film, the audience knows that Jack, although at one point a regular family man, is beyond reverting back to his previous sane state, increasing despair within audiences. The expression of Jack’s unperturbed insanity in the film furthermore requires the audience to reflect on their own lives, and realize that within every family is the possibility of

As a gothic writer, Edgar Allan Poe created horror using gloom as his weapon. Hidden within the suspenseful story of “The Masque of Red Death” is an allegorical tale of how individuals deal with the fear of death as time passes. Frantic activities and pleasures (as represented by Prince Prospero and his guests) seek to wall out the threat of death. However, the story reminds the reader that death comes “like a thief in the night”(Poe 3), and even those who seek peace and safety shall not escape. Poe uses symbolism to illustrate that man cannot hide from his own mortality.

Based on Stephen King’s horror novel of the same name, Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining features hallways filled with butchered daughters, and their guts and blood splashed down the hall. Horror and realism fuel Kubrick’s notoriously disturbing films and The Shining stands clear-cut amongst them. Although in the case of this movie, Kubrick shifts emphasis from visual horror to psychological fear and instills mounting dread from the sequence of disturbing events. Kubrick states, “one of the things that horror stories can do is show us the archetypes of the unconscious; we can see the dark side without having to confront it directly.” Never falling flat, The Shining provides a psychological horror masterpiece complete with brilliant acting, tight camera angles, haunting score, and unanswered questions.