The Shining: This Inhumane Place Makes Human Monsters

Ephesians 6:12

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

Stephen King’s The Shining (1977) is a phenomenal psychological horror that turns a man’s inner demons into a villainous obsession. The Overlook Hotel, a remote resort in the Colorado Rockies, is somewhat like a living entity —harboring and amplifying the negative energy of its tragic past. The hotel was the site of murders, suicides, mob activity and secret scandals involving wealthy and powerful guests. All of these spirits remain under the same roof, including the former caretaker, Delbert Grady, who murdered his wife and two young daughters before taking his own life.

Jack Torrance, the current caretaker, was simply facing spiritual warfare. The entire novel centers on Jack fighting against himself. He fights against alcoholism. He fights against his anger. He fights against his fears of failure. Unfortunately for Jack, he fell victim to these attacks. As Jack’s internal struggles grow, he lashes out, blaming his family—especially Wendy—whenever he teeters on the edge of relapse. The only person that was privy to the forces that was weighing down on the entire family was Jack’s young son, Danny Torrance, who possessed the ability known as “the shining”.

When reading this book, I was intrigued and terrified, not because of the ghost and horrors inside of The Overlook, but because the real terror derived inside of an ordinary family. Things that occur in reality - addiction, anger, domestic violence - will always be more terrifying than made up villains or clowns. When it came to the Torrance family, their reality became both tragic and fatal.

King’s use of internal monologue is what makes this novel so immersive. Without the internal monologue, we wouldn’t have known the natural timeline and progression of Jack’s mental deterioration. Wendy’s internal monologue, showed how little she trusted Jack and her efforts to hide her fear behind domestic routines. Danny’s perspective deepens our understanding of “the shining” and allows us to glimpse the unspoken thoughts of his parents. His psychic connection to their minds makes the story eerier and more intimate at once.

This inhumane place makes human monsters.

This line, repeated throughout the novel’s internal reflections, carries immense weight. The Overlook Hotel - the “inhumane place” - represents temptation, corruption and the darker side of memory. It mirrors the biblical warning from Ephesians: the world is filled with unseen powers and spiritual wickedness that prey on our weaknesses. These forces tempt and manipulate us, offering false promises until we lose sight of what truly matters. Once they twist our minds beyond recognition, they control our actions, making us “wrestle against flesh and blood” instead of fighting the true spiritual enemy. When this inhuman world succeeds in making human monsters, the outcome is always destruction—just as it was for Jack Torrance, whose world quite literally went up in flames.

On a personal level, it was hard for me to sympathize with Jack while reading this book at first. He wasn’t relatable to me, but I recognized towards the end of the book that his most unrelatable qualities early on in the book was due to The Overlook already working it’s claws into him. He seemed liked he hated is his family and the only thing he truly loved was his ego. When it was bruised he would lash out by calling out Ullman, by writing an expose, by assaulting a student, by breaking Danny’s arm. He was already a very unstable and unlikable man.

However, I can’t help but understand and sympathize with this deeply damaged and tortured man. From a young age, he witnessed violence from his own father. He was victim to a cycle of violence that did not begin with him. What child sees their father beat their mother - so violently that five of her teeth are knocked out - actually grows up normally?

This inhumane world makes human monsters.

Jack’s relationship with his parents — especially his abusive father — is the root of his psychological unraveling. The Overlook doesn’t create his madness; it awakens what’s already buried in him from childhood.

Despite Jack’s faults and his shortcomings, I do believe if he did not take the job at The Overlook he possibly could have healed and become a better man. I don’t want to hate the man. Honestly, it is hard to when reading how he cracked when he was on a murderous trail to “correct” Danny. In one of the most heartbreaking moments of the novel, King writes:

‘The face in front of him changed. It was hard to say how; there was no melting or merging of the features. The body trembled slightly, and then the bloody hands opened like broken claws. The mallet fell from them and thumped to the rug. That was all. But suddenly his daddy was there, looking at him in moral agony, and a sorrow so great that Danny’s heart flamed within his chest. The mouth drew down in a quivering bow. “Doc,” Jack Torrance said. “Run away. Quick. And remember how much I love you.”’

In that moment, the real Jack—the man fighting against his demons—briefly wins. It’s a glimpse of the father he wanted to be, the man he could have been without the Overlook’s corruption.

Jack Torrance was a deeply tortured man that feel victim to his inner demons. Stephen King’s writing enthralled me and had me flipping page to page feverishly. His usage of symbolism and motifs from the boiler as a ticking time bomb to the topiary animals symbolizing being trapped inside of one’s own mind was masterful.

In the end, The Shining is not just a horror novel. It is a parable about how the unseen evils of this world—addiction, violence, pride—can twist the human heart. It reminds us that the most terrifying battles are not fought with ghosts, but within the soul itself.