DUUN DUUN DUUUUN!

Edward Lau

The Shining
Stephen King

The genre horror can be shown in many ways. The novel The Shining, by Stephen King is what I’ve been reading for the past 2-3 months. The novel focuses heavily on history and how that implies to the modern day. Jack Torrance and his family are watching over a hotel that has a dark history to it. Jack Torrance needs this job due to his failure as a teacher. He would show up late to school, be drunk or hungover when he arrived, and he would eventually physically assault a child which would lead to him being fired. He has a wife named Wendy that is skeptical about staying at the hotel due to the effects that it is having on Jack, and she is the one that made Jack quit alcohol. She said she’ll leave him if he doesn’t stop. Finally, one of the most interesting people in the novel, Danny Torrance. Danny has a ability called The Shining which lets him see the future and the horrific past of the Hotel. Throughout the novel you will discover the terrible past of the Hotel and how that will play into the madness that makes this novel a horror.

My last post, I only got up to chapter 5, now I have finished reading the book. In Chapter 5, Jack has just started to see the hotel and has started to move in. From then, Jack has been taking care of the Overlook Hotel. He takes care of it and in doing so, realizes the dark past that the Hotel has experienced. “State trooper Benjamin Moorer discovered two dead men outside the door of the Presidential Suite” (King 241). Jack found out about this and was immediately mad at Ullman, the hotel manager. “I’m calling about some things that you didn't tell me during your history of the Overlook deep and interesting past” (King 263). Danny starts to have visions of the massacre that will soon happen due to his physic abilities. The whole news article that Jack reads about the murders and the story about how a man went mad when staying at the hotel in the winter foreshadows how the rest of novel will play out. Danny starts to have more and more visions of his imaginary friend Tony telling him REDRUM, a reference that is used whenever Danny saw a vision of something terrible, zombies crawling towards him in Room 217, a room he was told by the informant to never go into, and future glimpse of what will happen to Jack if he continues staying in the inn. From the history of the murders, the reader can infer that the dead zombie that marched towards Danny was a victim of the murder. Things start getting worst in the Hotel throughout the Winter. Jack’s drinking habits pop back up again as he is trying to write a play and his anger is rising more and more. Wendy is scared for Danny, wondering if he is schizophrenic or mentally ill, and Danny is troubled with hallucinations of dead twins, zombie corpses, and the haunting letterings of REDRUM. Jack’s anger get to him, he starts snapping at Wendy, making threats, and acting insane. He is drinking gin when Wendy is worried and goes to check up on him, he attacks her, bruising her neck and having her frightened. She soon realizes that Jack is turning into the other caretaker who went insane, she locks Jack up and tells Danny to stay away from him and that his dad is crazy. Danny, with the power of the The Shining, knows this already and tries to escape while Jack is talking to the previous caretaker, Grady. “You will have to kill her I fear. I’ll do what I have to, just let me out!!” (King 565). Jack gets loose while Wendy and Danny are in a room that Wendy considers safe, Jack attacks Wendy and Danny and they both fear for their lives. Danny escapes and Ullman helps set a fire in the hotel and trap Jack in there. Wendy, Ullman, and Danny all live through the event and the chaos ends. Ullman meets a lady and she tells Danny that the nightmares of the event will soon go away. The story ends with the three of them at the dock being in the afternoon sun.

Even if it was a long one, I totally recommend The Shining to readers. The plot may be long but it makes sense once you put all the facts together. Also, the Horror aspect of it was amazing. Due to the fact that no one made a horror based novel on a hotel shows that it is unique and the story shows that also. The way the dark history of the hotel blended with the characteristics of the protagonist made the result really scary and enjoyable. Also the way the characteristics of the protagonist tie into the plot is a interesting way of making a story. Jack not being a alcoholic would just make the story really boring and would make the backstory of Jack really bland. In conclusion, I strongly recommend this book to readers that enjoy Horror or a good plot.