To someone who is satisfied with reading a book or watching a movie once and then moving on with their lives the answer to my question might seem obvious; of course the Overlook is haunted! Topiary comes to life, the characters see ghosts, and Danny communicates using ESP. Some people might say that all of the supernatural parts were just the characters hallucinating, but I think that the real answer lies somewhere in between.
One of the most obvious examples of these supernatural occurrences is the topiary that attacks Jack. It can't simply be written off as Jack hallucinating because Danny is also attacked by them, and when Halloran arrives at the hotel at the end of the book, he is also attacked. This is also true with the wasps that attack Danny from the supposedly empty wasps nest. These examples are particularly curious because many of the ghosts seem throughout The Shining are past events that happened in the hotel that are coming back to life. But unless I missed that part in the Overlook Hotel history session, there was no point in time where topiary came to life and attacked people. This is perhaps the strongest evidence that the hotel really is haunted, and really leaves the option of hallucination out of possibility. The Shining is defiantly a mix of hallucination and memories from the characters past as well as supernatural forces.
Another example of an incident that can't simply be boiled down to cabin fever is when the door to the pantry that Jack was locked in was opened by Delbert Grady. Of course you could argue that the loving Danny didn't want his father to stay locked in the pantry, but even if he did let him out would he have left out a mallet for Jack to attack him and Wendy with?
Now that we have established perhaps the most concrete evidence that the Overlook Hotel is indeed haunted in the book, but what about the movie? Kubrick said that the topiary scene was cut because the special effects wouldn't look good, but that doesn't mean that his completely took the telekinesis out of his film. The film is littered with small details, including Kubrick's use of what might look like continuity errors, but are actually small examples of telekinesis that are meant to play with the audience on a more subconscious level. Of course some of them could have been continuity errors, but Kubrick was a very meticulous filmmaker and The Shining has some pretty glaring set changes like a three story tree that moves around the hotel's exterior at different points in the movie, or the table and chair set that disappears and then reappears behind Jack in the same scene.
Another example of an incident that can't simply be boiled down to cabin fever is when the door to the pantry that Jack was locked in was opened by Delbert Grady. Of course you could argue that the loving Danny didn't want his father to stay locked in the pantry, but even if he did let him out would he have left out a mallet for Jack to attack him and Wendy with?
Now that we have established perhaps the most concrete evidence that the Overlook Hotel is indeed haunted in the book, but what about the movie? Kubrick said that the topiary scene was cut because the special effects wouldn't look good, but that doesn't mean that his completely took the telekinesis out of his film. The film is littered with small details, including Kubrick's use of what might look like continuity errors, but are actually small examples of telekinesis that are meant to play with the audience on a more subconscious level. Of course some of them could have been continuity errors, but Kubrick was a very meticulous filmmaker and The Shining has some pretty glaring set changes like a three story tree that moves around the hotel's exterior at different points in the movie, or the table and chair set that disappears and then reappears behind Jack in the same scene.
For the scene where Jack is let out of the pantry, there is really no evidence that Danny would want to let his father out because there relationship is much more cold and distant in the movie than in the book. This makes me confident that it was Grady who let Jack out.
Finally the most obvious example of a supernatural presence that is featured prominently in both the book and movie: the shining. Danny is able to communicate with Halloran telepathically in both versions of the story, and really can't be explained by anything but supernatural powers. Of course this isn't a fact and everyone will interpret The Shining in different ways, but i'm convinced that the Overlook Hotel is indeed haunted.
If you are like me and like exploring every little detail, I highly recommend checking out the YouTube channel Collative Learning as it goes into much greater detail on aspects like the moving furniture and was also where I got the pictures used in this analysis.
Book's Page Count: 688
My Total Page Count: 1408
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