Literary Allusions
Geoffrey Cocks notes that the film contains many allusions to fairy tales, both Hansel and Gretel and the story of the big bad wolf, with Jack Torrance identified as the wolf which Bruno Bettelheim identifies as standing for "all the asocial unconscious devouring powers" that must be overcome by a child's ego.
The saying "all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" appeared first in James Howell's Proverbs in English, Italian, French and Spanish (1659).
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