Why Is Jack Torrance So Important In Stephen King's The Shining?

1. In the book The Shining by Stephen King, one of the main characters Jack Torrance was a former alcoholic, but still suffers from anger issues. One of the first episodes where his anger had lapsed and injured Danny was around the age of two or three. Jack was drunk and still had an open beer on his desk as he was writing his play and after he left the room for a moment, Danny tore up his play and spilled beer all over it. Blindly upset and angry, Jack grabbed Danny’s arm and raised it so he would drop the manuscript; breaking his arm. All Jack could do was apologize and feel terrible about it, he blamed it on being drunk and that he had a lapse in control. In all actuality, Jack never realizes (at least until before Chapter 21) that he is

The Shining is the name of the ability to read other people and sense emotions among other things, much like the abilities of a psychic. The word is learned by Danny from Dick, who also has the ability to shine. It reveals the inner secrets of the Torrance family by saying what has never been said. For example, when Danny gets stung by the reincarnated wasps and is taken to the doctor the next morning, he confesses to the doctor that his parents were thinking about divorce but are not anymore. More surprisingly, Wendy and Jack admit to this even though they had never discussed with each other about potentially getting divorced. When Dick learns of Danny’s ability to shine, he had no preconception of how powerful Danny’s shining was. Dick said that his own was passed through genetics, but Danny it doesn’t seem that way as his mother doesn’t and his father is so concealed by darkness and shame that neither can read him to see if he shines; it is perceived at this in the book that he does not. Although, if Jack does have the talent of shining and doesn’t know it, it he could have had dreamed that Al ran over a child and that he used the bug bomb but did not actually. Also in the book his inability to be read could refer to the car accident as stated before, or it could also be something that he doesn’t remember that is blocked out of his mind because it was terrifying; just like how Danny never remembers the

In The Shining one similarity in comparison to Long Day’s Journey into Night is the fact that both families have an inability to communicate. Danny is able to partly understand what is happening with his family, but fails to ever ask to talk to them about what he is suffering from. Just as Wendy and Jack both know about Danny’s intelligence and abilities, but have never discussed it or acknowledged them. The son also was first to even say the word divorce out loud in reference to his parents, even though Wendy and Jack both were considering it seriously, but they never spoke about to each other about it. While the Torrance family has a lack of conversations about topics, the Tyrone family always is conversing or arguing about something. The Tyrone family also doesn’t communicate how they feeling or their beliefs, but they tell each other when they are talking and simply just ignore the issues when someone asks. At one point in the play they are talking about Mary Tyrone’s addiction, but as soon as she walks his they pretend as if nothing has changed. Until both families are able communicate more efficiently, neither will be 100% happy or content with their life. In the novel, King even addresses Jack as potentially being a future O’Neill (in reference to his