What horror themes and conventions are referenced in The Shining?
David Kirkpatrick writes: I’m as guilty as anyone in the newsgroup of plumbing the depths of The Shining in search and exploit missions of sub-texts, bypassing the obvious horror story on the surface (but what a guilty pleasure it is!). This time, though, I’d like to look at some of the stuff on the surface of what Newsweek called “the first epic horror film”, if I’m not mistaken. Well, one characteristic of epics is an encyclopedic scope. Let’s look at way in which The Shining is an “encyclopedia” of horror themes. (1) Ghost / Haunted House. That The Shining is a ghost story is self-evident, so I’ll save my detailed remarks for items below. (2) Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde. Besides being a story about a haunted house, The Shining is also the story of Jack’s descent into insanity. Here, alcohol is the magic drug paralleling Dr. Jeckyl’s experimental potion. And as Mr. Hyde reflects a side of Dr. Jeckyl that was already there, but stripped of its impediments, so does Jack’s ultimate descent
