Tower of Fable, Part One: This is the Story Room

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MAIN PAGE ⎔ SECTION PAGE ⎔ SITE MAP ⎔ GLOSSARY

TOWER OF FABLE – SKIP TO A SECTION
THIS IS THE STORY ROOM ⎔ STAR-CROSSED BLUEPRINTS ⎔ DNA OF A BLOODFALL

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Preamble

While writing the sixth series of my Decoding The Shining YouTube show, entitled This is the Story Room, several major, unexpected discoveries grew out of the writing-and-research phase, as a seemingly natural consequence of trying to illustrate the points I had planned to make.

I had intended to start by making the point that, as Hallorann opens the pantry door, the door handle makes a series of clicks as he pulls back on it, obscuring the sound of him saying, “Now, this is the storeroom” to keep the audience from noticing that he was actually saying “story room”. I have no way to prove this to you in print alone, but if you’d rather not watch the video series (which is not posted as of this writing, and may not be for several months), I’ll proceed as if I’m correct about this. Frankly, it makes little difference, thanks to what follows. But I’m sure “story room” will seem increasingly apt.

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When we study the mirrorform, what we’re looking for is synchronicity, right?–otherwise, what would be the point? But if you’ve read my study of that way of looking at the film, you know that the vast majority of these come in the context of each individual moment. Despite the film’s rather limited series of broadly defined locations (The Overlook, Boulder, and Hallorann’s rescue mission), there’s almost zero overlap between individual spaces. When you study the mirrorform in 30-second chunks, colour-coded by location, like so…

…what you realize is that Kubrick structured the film such that scenes can go on for forever in one location, which I suppose could’ve gone either way, but the way this was used clearly narrows the potential for overlap.

That is, in every respect but one: the period that starts at 22:46 (as Danny and Wendy meet at the egg-shaped Suite 3 mirror and seem to merge as Danny’s backward scene ends, and Wendy’s continues)…

…and ends 12:24 later, with Danny triking between Jack and Wendy’s lounge fight at 35:00.

And what should be right in the middle of these two moments of spatial overlay? An uninterrupted 10:30 of almost every scene taking place in the kitchen. Take another look:

All those scenes interlock like giant teeth of drama.

That’s what I had on my mind when I was building to my point about this “story room” being a room especially concerned by a particular story. The story Wendy invokes only moments before she enters the story room.

“Yeah, this whole place is such an enormous maze. I feel like I’ll have to leave a trail of breadcrumbs every time I come in.”

That’s Hansel and Gretel, right? Click that link if you want to see all the cool ways that folktale is subtly invoked by the film, because I won’t be going much more into it here. Here I just want you to know that there’s such a thing that was known at the time as the Aarne-Thompson Index, a series of hundreds of numbers (known as AT numbers) that attempt to classify all of the folktales in world history according to a sort of Dewey decimal system logic.

I’d been collecting the AT numbers for all the folktales invoked by the film sort of as a curiosity until I noticed how Wendy passes between a painting by Alois Arnegger and one by Tom Thomson in this moment (sorry, I couldn’t find an image on the site of them together on screen at the same time, and I’m trying to conserve space right now).

Arnegger. Thomson. Aarne-Thompson.

On the one hand, you have numbers that classify certain types of stories, so Little Red Riding Hood would be known as story type 333…

…and Snow White would be known as story type 709…

…and Hansel and Gretel, known by code 327…

…is revealed as a certain someone is offered a certain eye scream.

So, if this is the “story room” and the story is Hansel and Gretel, does that make this room 327? And is that a remix of room 237? And if you’re now wondering if room 237 might also signify an AT code…stop being so damn clever and wait for it. We’ll get there, I promise.

(And in case you’d like to fact check anything I’m saying, go here (for the AT codes) and here (for other motifs) for the two resources I used to collect all the data. I won’t be linking to each individual claim–that would take forever, and you’d still have to do a lot of scrolling.)

But first, let me tell you about a whole second set of AT codes. More accurately, they’re known as “Thompson motifs”. There’s thousands of them, and they don’t describe whole stories, but fragments, or aspects, of stories. They can start out as whole numbers, but they can also then break down into decimal points to make specific identifications of finer-pointed tropes. So while Hansel and Gretel is 327 (technically it’s 327A from a category called The Children and the Ogre (or Witch, or Demon), which is 327 proper–and doesn’t that 4 look kind of like an A?), the story is made up of numerous Thompson motifs, like G82, in which “A cannibal fattens their victim”.

You probably don’t need reminding that The Shining invokes cannibalism early on in the Donner Party discussion, but I have a deeper theory that the hotel is itself inherently cannibalistic. And note how this 82 is being blended with the number for Stephen King’s evil room: 217.

Another Hansel and Gretel motif: G412.1.1: ogre’s gingerbread house lures child. (You might also notice how the 3274 box is now housed by Jack’s crotch.) If Jack is the witch/ogre, Wendy and Danny could be said to have been lured here by a lack of means to support themselves other than to follow Jack to his gingerbread house of choice, the Overlook.

(Oh, you know what I just realized? The last four items Hallorann is describing in the lead up to the “eye scream” fade out, as the shrill ringing gets louder and louder, are “a dozen jugs of black molasses, we got sixty boxes of dried milk, thirty twelve-pound bags of sugar, and thirty five-pound bags of flour…” classic gingerbread ingredients. But also classic millions of baked goods, I realize. Still…)

And G512.3.2.3.2 designates when an “ogre is burned in their own oven”. This “5129” box is probably the most visible and stark of any of the sku numbers in the storeroom, so I wonder if Kubrick really wanted to underscore what King himself pointed out in an interview: that the real difference between book and film is that King’s witch literally burns in his own oven, while Kubrick’s minotaur has a markedly chillier time of it.

Also, I forgot to zoom in on the box in the lower left, but it has 13161 written on it in black marker. So, on the one hand, it’s been theorized that Hansel and Gretel was inspired by The Great Famine of 1315-1317, the middle year of which is in this number. But also, D1316.1 is when a “stone reveals truth”. The first thing Hansel does is actually not lay out breadcrumbs (that happens later, and they’re eaten by birds), but lay out white stones that reveal the true path back to their parents’ house. And who is Jack being woken by here? The hotel’s version of truth: the very white actor Philip Stone. Perhaps that’s why this number is written in marker, and not in one of the SKUs: it’s not the real truth this Stone has to reveal.

And in case you’re like, “Okay, but 5219 is not G512.3.2.3.2”, I hear you. You know, K512.2 is the code for “compassionate executioner: substituted heart”, a component of Snow White. So there’s room for a lot of orgiastic inaccuracy here. That’s not what we’ll be doing going forward. The following analysis is going to be much more precise about what actually appears in the film. I just wanted to show how the DNA of Hansel and Gretel is all over the place in this room.

Now, I’m desperately low on room for new photos on my site, so I’m not going to be able to provide graphic evidence for each number. Many numbers are only visible for one small passage of one slow-moving shot, so I’m just going to give one more example of how this works, and then I’ll probably present the rest in the hopes that you trust my good word (also, you can see a lot of the other numbers in the shots above).

At the start of Hallorann’s “eye scream” shot we can see three other boxes around his head: 3197, 3663, and 4214.

• 421.4 from the D category (“Magic”) refers to when a tiger transforms into an object. And what’s right beside Hallorann here? Tony the Tiger.
• 366.3 from the E category (“The Dead”) is when the talking bones of a man who was eaten give advice to the hero of the story. Hallorann’s not ground up in the teeth of this Ahwahnee quite yet…but he will be. And this number will be by Jack as he lurches to talk to Grady, a different sort of “talking bone man” and a different sort of “hero”.
• 319.7, in the P category (“Society”), is a story of “Friendship without refusal” when friends agree to grant every desire of the other. Even if that means flying 2000 miles and braving a blizzard. And, you know, dying, because your friend went in the one room you said not to. This one also appears near Jack and Grady, which is a different sort of friendship without refusal, isn’t it?

But yeah, there’s a unity in shots like this that’s missing from some of the more orgiastic shots, like when Jack lurches to Grady’s door, he passes 44 number combinations (not counting 2-digit codes, which I didn’t even bother with for the love of my eyeballs).

And in case going through every code in the film sounds like too boring a prospect, I’ll talk about the room 237 connection first.

Actually, sorry, let me next point out that this logic seems to extend to other sets of numbers that appear in the film.

Incest and The Ring of Polycrates

At 23:37 the gang is passing a licence plate that starts with 383. This can refer to the story type in which a woman dies of fright from learning she almost committed incest with her son. And if we remember our Overlook geography, Suite 3 would be directly above where the licence plate is here. And the Conquest well, where Wendy sees an avatar of hers committing a sex act, is somewhere very near there.

As for the other 3 numbers there, I’ve never found a frame that made me feel comfortable saying what it is with confidence, but in this moment it sure looks like 736, which is the AT code for The Ring of Polycrates, a story where a very fortunate and lucky ruler (Polycrates – a name meaning “many powers”) is dared to throw away his most prized possession, which he does, but the ring comes back to him after being swallowed by a fish that was then caught and cooked for him. The cooks discover it in the belly. Polycrates rejoices, but the friend who made the dare (Amasis, or Ahmose – a name meaning “The moon is born”) rejects his friendship anyway, frightened by the astonishing nature of his friend’s luck. The story is used as a way to discuss the shifting winds of fate and fortune.

I know this might sound a bit wild, but Hallorann is of course a cook, and is frequently seen near fish. The fact that the Overlook wants him dead is one thing, but, forgetting the fatalistic nature of the mirrorform, the number of things that have to go just right in order for Dick to get got are really staggering. So perhaps Jack is Polycrates and the Overlook is a more underhanded Amasis. In the Polycrates story, you go, wait, why would consistent greatness be a turn off? But in Kubrick’s hands it makes a little more sense.

The Overlook hired Jack because it suspected he was prime minotaur material. And it’s heard that he plans to use his time there to write his great work. He presents himself as a man of reliable good fortune and self-determination, but the Overlook can see through his phony PR smile, and knows the opposite to be true. It’s daring him to make his life worse in ways Jack can’t even imagine, throwing away the world he depends on for his sanity. When that world miraculously intrudes to try to save him from himself, he does what the hotel expects him to do and seals himself off from the world utterly. He thinks the pay off will be that he gets to be best buddies with the hotel forever, and in a way that’s what happens. So perhaps Jack is like the anti-Polycrates.

It’s also worth pointing out how 2 seconds after the licence plate leaves the shot, is when the mirrorform image of Hallorann’s rescue mission transitions to the scene between Jack and Grady, where Grady says Jack doesn’t “have the belly” for killing his family. And 38 seconds later is when Hallorann first appears in the forward-moving film.

I also think it’s cute that this car is an AMC Matador, since Hallorann does get gored by a minotaur, doesn’t he? In fact, Larry Durkin was servicing a Matador when Hallorann called him (at 9:07 in the morning – that’s Snow White (709) backwards), and Dick passes another Matador on his way to see Durkin, in the form of a cop car stopped at the Beatle wreckage, while opposite side Danny is noticing 237 for the first time. And 237 has its own code, but we’ll get to that.

THE QUEEN’S DOG and BLUEBEARD

The licence plate on the car before that one only has three digits on it: 449. Which is the code for Sidi Nouman, AKA The Queen’s Dog. As you can see, the other half of this plate is etched out as if to emphasize this number.

This is fairly apt, since the story is about a man who marries a woman who astonishes him with how little she eats, only to discover, upon following her nighttime moves, that she goes to a cemetery with a ghoul to feed on the flesh of corpses. This leads to him revealing what he knows, and the queen transforms him into a dog by means of magic water. In this moment, Ullman is talking about the hotel being built on an old indigenous burial ground. Again, Grady will soon be on the other side of the mirrorform, and wasn’t it after he “put some water” to Jack that Jack began to seem inferior to the lowly butler? There’s also a good deal of dog imagery in the novel, as the hotel’s ghostly owner Horace Derwent, teases his man-servant, Roger, at the ghost ball, while Jack watches on, and Grady drips poison in his ear. Sidi Nouman ends with him transforming back, and then turning the queen into a horse. Jack doesn’t really come back from Big Bad Wolf land, but the hotel’s finale has everything to do with horses, doesn’t it.

The name Nouman is a pre-Arabic word meaning “blood”.

449 is also a near miss for the number of pages in the novel: 447. That moment I was mentioning before, as Wendy passes between what we might call the “Aarne-Thompson paintings” is 47:40 in the time code. What’s neat about that is that D474 is the Motif code for “Object becomes bloody” the first variant of which is “Key becomes bloody” which is something that happens in Bluebeard, the folktale most openly and regularly referenced in the novel. Danny thinks of it heavily in conjunction with hearing about room 217 (pg. 88), then whenever he’s near (pr. 169-170) or about to go in the room (pg. 215). We’ll come back to the significance of this in later analyses. The important thing for now is that the Aarne-Thompson painting moment has a time code that speaks to King’s dominant folktale, which is a remix of his story’s page count.

And by the way, since 449 is two higher than 447, two lower would be 445, which is The Emperor’s New Clothes (a story in which a “king” is enlightened by the truth telling of someone he regards as inferior), which is referenced in the story room, as we’ll see later. The number 447 doesn’t appear in the film, to my knowledge.

I also want to point out how we cut to this 449 at the time code 23:31, and I have a theory that Jack’s spirit is absorbed into room 231. And part of that has to do with the fact that the AT code for Bluebeard is 312, a 231 jumble.

THE PARROT IS PUNISHED FOR TELLING THE TRUTH

Alright, so let’s talk 237.

The AT code for 237 is The Parrot is Punished For Telling the Truth, which I’m assuming most people haven’t heard of, so it goes like this. Someone has a parrot or magpie who can speak in short repeating phrases. Like, “No, I ain’t Mrs. Torrance.” “I don’t wanna go there, Mrs. Torrance.” “I just don’t.” The bird observes its overseer doing something underhanded…

…sometimes eating an eel her husband was saving for himself, sometimes cutting the sugar she’s selling with sand to make a profit…

…and the parrot reports on her to the one she’s trying to dupe. “You would never hurt mom and me, wouldja?”

The punishment is that the owner pulls all the feathers out of the bird’s head, and the story usually ends with the bird saying to the next bald person they meet: “You must have told about the eel.”

Or as Danny puts it: “You’re scared of room 237, ain’t ya?” As Jack rants and raves about “moral and ethical principles” on the other side, Hallorann is offended by the implication that he’s scared of “telling the truth”. He is bald, after all. He’s paid some prices for learning some hard truths about life, and trying to speak them.

The moral of the story: it’s not always to one’s benefit to go around squawking out the unvarnished truth. The life of Charles Darwin, whose work is alluded to inside room 237, was not made any easier by holding fast to his revolutionary discoveries. Quite the opposite. And I think this is why so many have wrested so much fodder for conspiratorial thinking from The Shining. The spectrum of painful truths Kubrick was dealing with here, from the horrifically significant issue of genocide to the relatively less significant, but still very powerfully felt, issue of the Beatles breaking up, would make for one overwhelming bummer of a documentary, say. And what this film does is what all good stories do: it chews up these truths in its narrative prism, fragmenting them for easy mental digestion. For those of us who care, the stony trail is there. For those of us who don’t…well, it’s still a masterpiece.

Also, I should mention that Jack passes a painting of Samson Peak on his way to the ghost ball. He does this while 37 seconds of a song called Masquerade is playing, and while opposite side Jack is about to confess his worst truth to Wendy about his terrible dream, and while Danny is escaping room 237. The Samson story of myth is about how one of the most powerful men in the land loses his power after confessing to his lover that his great strength lives within his hair. Samson suicides after revealing his most precious truth.

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THE PAGES OF KING’S NOVEL

I should also note that the page numbers in King’s novel may have inspired this phenomenon.

On page 333 (Little Red Riding Hood) is when Roger the dog mask man confronts Danny in a hallway, and quotes The Three Little Pigs at him. “Not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin,” casting Danny as the Big Bad Wolf. Then, on page 124 (the AT code for The Three Little Pigs) Jack is standing outside the suite 3 bathroom that Danny’s locked himself in, banging fiercely and barking mild threats. There’s no scene of Jack quoting The Three Little Pigs in the novel, so Kubrick seems to have gelled these phenomena into that later moment in his film (one that resolves at exactly 2:03:37, as he begins axing the bathroom).

Also, Wendy references Hansel and Gretel (AT code: 327A) on page 72, and on page 327 Jack is standing in the boiler room watching the boiler reach 212 pounds of pressure, creeping up to 217. On this page he references Frankenstein to himself (imagining the Overlook burning like the windmill at the end of the classic film), as well as the number 7-11, when he thinks, “Seven-come-eleven, die the secret death and win a hundred dollars.” He also refers to 7-11 convenience stores wen talking to Lloyd on page 239, when he quips that the reason he has no cash is because there aren’t any 7-11s around (“And I thought they had Seven-Elevens on the fucking moon.” Watson warns Jack on page 20 that if the boiler blows he and his “fambly’ll end up on the fuckin’ moon.”) On page 117 (the closest thing to 7-11) Wendy is calling Jack the “Eugene O’Neill of his generation, the American Shakespeare” while Jack is reading a copy of E. L. Doctorow’s first novel, Welcome to Hard Times. The film version of that novel featured Lon Chaney Jr. who also appeared in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein where he played the Wolf Man. Danny references Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein on page 97 when he expresses amazement at the Suite 3 dumbwaiter, and the “secret passage” it creates. The most explicitly referenced other fable in the film is Snow White, whose AT code is 709, and since the novel is only 447 pages, it could only show up as a partial/jumble, and since page 79 has only the last few lines of chapter 10, page 97 seems to have been the better place to connect it to this trail of breadcrumbs. Although, there is no direct reference to Snow White on page 97, just a reference to Hallorann’s never-seen colleague “Mr. Nevers” and a shelf of “Detective Book Club trilogies from the forties”. This made me think of Peter Pan (for the “Never Never Land” connection it could imply), which Jack unintentionally references in the film (1:48:23) when he says, “Wendy? Darling? Light of my life, I’m not gonna hurt ya.” Wendy Darling is the full name of Peter Pan’s girl friend. But Peter Pan is not a fable, and doesn’t have an AT code, and Nevers is actually the name of a place in the middle of modern-day France with a connection to one of Julius Caesar’s defeats (it was a place he kept hostages, and had a bunch of money, horses and corn stolen (or destroyed) by enemies in 52 BCE). And Never Never Land is thought to have been inspired by an old name for Australia, which is a place being invoked by an etching right through the wall from where Jack says “Wendy Darling”.

It’s also believed that a fable called The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats could act like a dramatic bridge linking Little Red Riding Hood to The Three Little Pigs, since it combines elements from both. It occurred to me that Kubrick may’ve been using Snow White and the Seven Dwarves as a kind of stand-in for The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats, since both stories contain several similar elements, but where the endangered figures are inverted. In the wolf story, seven vulnerable child goats are threatened by a wolf disguising itself as their kindly mother who’s away for the day, and in Snow White, it’s the mothering figure who’s threatened by the disguised queen while the seven dwarves are away. The AT code for the wolf story is 123, and that happens to be a jumble of 312, the code for Bluebeard, which is the most openly named and referenced fable in King’s novel. It’s never (to my knowledge) referenced directly in the film, although Béla Bartók – whose music is in the film, and who is referenced in Wendy’s thoughts on page 221 of the novel, right after Danny’s caught by Lorraine Massey in the 217 bathroom – did write an opera called Bluebeard’s Castle, which tells the story in song. Bluebeard first appears on page 88 of the novel, when Danny thinks of it as a way to understand what Dick’s saying about the hotel’s phantasms being like scary pictures in a book that can’t hurt you (something Tony does invoke to Danny at 51:07, though Dick never expresses that exact metaphor to the child in the film). Bluebeard next appears on pages 169, 170 and 173 as Danny is standing outside 217 alone for the first time, tempted to go in, but worried about what he might see (which means it’s not mentioned on page 171 (a 7-11 jumble) and 172 (a 217 jumble)). Finally, it’s mentioned on page 215 as Danny embarks on his final 217 quest. The AT code for Bluebeard, as I mentioned, is 312. And on page 89, right after the first invocation of Bluebeard on page 88, Dick tells Danny that if he does run into real trouble, Danny should give Dick a call way down in Florida, and he’ll come on the run. And on what page should Dick receive that distress shine? Page 312.

And the jumbles for that number are interesting: page 321 is the end of that chapter, when Danny sends another distress shine, while Dick is being held up on his way to the airport by an infantilizing traffic cop who’s telling Hallorann he hears all kinds of stories from speeding drivers, “Even as a kid, story hour was my favourite part of school.” He goes on to connect this to his desire for Hallorann’s license and registration numbers. Page 123 involves Wendy ruminating on her love her Danny’s childness, and her fear of his intellectual development and potential estrangement from her. Her eyes pass over his “picture books, coloring books” and his “pictures of Pooh and Eeyore and Christopher Robin“. Then, on page 132 Wendy is described using a “coloring book” to murder all the revived wasps from the wasp’s nest Jack finds in the Overlook roof and gives to Danny, while Jack gets a “Pyrex bowl” to trap the nest under. On page 213, apropos of almost nothing, Wendy is reflecting on a lovely day of playing with Jack and Danny in the snow, when her thoughts result in this line: “She thought of the wasps Jack had put out on the service entrance platform, under the Pyrex bowl, to freeze.” Page 231 is one of the ones between Danny’s 217 experience and Jack and Wendy finding him catatonic. At the top of it, Jack is asking her if she’ll ever let him forget how he “hurt” Danny’s arm. “When I’m on my deathbed you’ll lean over and say, ‘It serves you right, remember the time you broke Danny’s arm?'” We’ll get to my theory later that movie Jack’s spirit ends up in room 231 of the hotel, but for now, just consider that these 123/312 jumbles connect the notion of stories, childhood, and the abuses of our earliest memories. On page 123 Wendy is sad that Danny feels the need for privacy when he locks himself in the bathroom, but he has a very good reason to want layers of protection between himself and his father. On page 132 Wendy is using a symbol of Danny’s childhood, a colouring book, to kill the creatures that are stinging Danny thanks to Jack’s gift. It couldn’t possibly be Jack’s fault (could it?) that the wasps came impossibly back to life after he bug-bombed them, but they do sting Danny. On page 213, after a day of carefree play, Wendy is haunted by the memory of what Jack did to stop the wasps, trapping them under a clear bowl (which was later coated with revived wasps) and freezing them to death – but should they have only been frozen? They came back to life once already. Could they come back again? Perhaps they should’ve been burnt. The memory of Jack’s three-years-past destruction of his infant son’s arm is equally behind them…but not destroyed, and how do you burn away a memory? Also, stories, like Bluebeard (which Wendy was outraged Jack would share with Danny, shortly after the arm break (pg. 169)), have a way of being like the gentlest of wasps, burrowing their meaning down deep in our psyches, attaching to memories that would perhaps best be burnt away, if for nothing other than peace of mind. And it’s just such a peace of mind that’s shattered on page 312 when Dick gets Danny’s distress shine, causing him to almost crash his car, and causing a fellow driver to bring up some ugly racist hatespeech against Dick (racism being something like a cultural wasp wound that some would love to pretend never happened and doesn’t exist). The invocation of “story hour” by the cop on page 321 becomes something of a perfect sendoff to this daisy-chain, reminding that even asshole cops were children once, and have to deal with the narratives bouncing around in their skulls.

There’s also the matter of The Gingerbread Man, which is not referenced in the book directly that I know of, but is referenced very subtly in the film by virtue of Danny owning a copy of the board game Candy Land, which features gingerbread men as main characters. The AT code is 2025, which is too gigantic of course to be a page number, but Jack passes from the door of room 237 to the bathtub all throughout page 252 of the book, and it’s in this passage of the film that Jack passes one of the most easily-seen paintings in the film, Fox Resting. This is far from the only reference to foxes in the area, and it’s a fox who eats the gingerbread man in the fairy tale.

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TIME CODES

This is technically a different way of interpreting these numbers but I figured it might as well go here.

Believe it or not, it only hit me half a year after initially discovering the AT business that the 3- and 4-digit codes code be asking us to look at the different time stamps, and to consider what’s happening in those moments. Like, when Danny’s looking wonderingly at Dick’s approaching offer of eye scream, there’s a 1126 next to his head (on the Golden Rey box to the right)…

…which would make 18:46, and that’s the moment that Jack starts telling the history of the Donner Party. A subject that goes really well with the Portland, Oregon box behind Danny’s back, I think you’ll agree. Not to mention the fact that the Donner’s ventured into the mountains in 1846. So, part of Danny’s “eye scream” is about realizing the implications behind the story he heard about on his drive to the hotel. What does it mean that the Donners would venture into a place where they’d just end up eating each other?

There’s also a cool thing where the box next to Jack’s head throughout the entire Grady chat says 1439, and that would correlate to 23:59, which, in the mirrorform, is Jack giving his “word” that he’ll kill his family to be let out of the story room.

The shot cuts to Jack talking to Grady right at the end of 23:41, which means that it’s around 17 seconds from the “end” of Grady releasing Jack to Jack giving his word. And then, when he walks backwards and lays down to fall back asleep (in the mirrorform sense, where everything moves backwards), a box next to his head reads 1620 (you can almost make it out here, in the leftmost stack, it’s the box three down from the 5129 KETCHUP box)…

…which is 27:00 exactly, and which is 2 seconds after the shot cuts away from sleepy Jack about to be woken by Grady.

So that’s 17 seconds in and 2 seconds beyond.

2-17.

But the time codes also look like a 237 jumble: 23:59-27:00. And that gap is 3:01, which is 181 seconds, which is the number written on the box that Dick and the gang first pass on their tour. You can’t make it out here, but the 181 flows through the 1439 at 25:32, in a passage that runs from 25:30-25:37, as the box appears beside them and vanishes off the other side of the screen as they make their turns around the room.

But yeah, just as Jack is allowed to leave room 217/237 by the Massey ghost, he’s allowed to leave the storeroom by the Grady ghost. And note how the snowcat he’ll murder is through the mirrorform at 23:59, and the man he’ll murder is centre screen at 27:00, with the code C4 appearing above the walk-in freezer door behind him and Wendy as she quizzes him about his seeming shine powers. C4 is the square, in the Tower of Fable analysis, where Dick gets murdered.

Then there’s the other number appearing at great length beside Jack during the Grady chat (on the Golden Rey pimiento box): 25786. Divided by three this make 8595.3, which is the exact length of the Fibonacci version of the film, the Golden Shining: 143:15. So, I wonder if this is a nod to the fact that there are three film-wide ways of dissecting the movie. There’s the Fibonacci way, there’s what we might call the “folding” way (ie. the mirrorform, the twice-fold, the seven-times folded Shining), and there’s the alternate soundtrack way (Redrum Road, The Rum and the Red). That’s just a guess. But what that also helped me realize is that the length of the film times three would make 429 minutes. And that’s the page where Danny defeats Jack in the novel (for reasons relating to everything I just described, in fact – Fibonacci, music and mirrorformity).

Anyway, yeah, it’s possible there’s endless examples of things like what I just described if we gave a close-eyed analysis of all the following scenes and the time codes they’re describing, but for now I’m just going to plop them all on the page here for you to pick through as you please. So the box codes are divided first by the shot they appear in, and the descriptions that follow each number is first whatever action is happening in the forward movie, and second what’s happening in the backward mirrorform movie. So, 181 is the forward image of THE INTERVIEW appearing onscreen, and the backward end of Jack singing Bombo to himself in the maze at the end.

Wendy, Danny and Hallorann Enter the Kitchen

• 18 (Opening and closing shots)
• 81 (Final 21 key, with A STANLEY KUBRICK FILM, Goat mountain, Four Bears mountain)
• 181 (THE INTERVIEW, with end of Jack singing Bombo)
• 287 (“I guess so” (doesn’t Danny think the Overlook will be fun?), with Jack stalking face)
• 10124 (1012 = “He wasn’t exactly in the greatest mood that night” with Hallorann interrupting the Jack attack; 124 = JOE TURKEL flowing over Mt. Gould, with Jack falling into his death pose)

Hallorann Shows Off the Storeroom

Shot #1

• 25 (Passing Wild Goose Island, with full Overlook Hotel, July 4^th Ball, 1921)
• 27 (Same minus the 1921)
• 100 (THE SHINING passing over St. Mary Lake and all the mountains, with zooming on the F21 key and The Gold Room sign)
• 122 (Mt. Gould with Stone and Turkel, with Jack sitting down to die)
• 129 (ANNE JACKSON passing over Mt. Gould, with Jack stumbling to die)
• 184 (First second of Jack entering hotel with Bombo singing)
• 200 (Jack thanking the receptionist for directions, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 205 (Jack noticing the model maze and passing the kill spot, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 285 (Right before next number: 287)
• 287 (“I guess so” (doesn’t Danny think the Overlook will be fun?), with Jack stalking face)
• 338 (“I’m a writer” chagrin face with Danny hiding from Jack in maze)
• 716 (Bloodfall vision, with Wendy passing Moon and Cow)
• 1377 (“Yes, very cozy!” with Hallorann view through windscreen of Mt. Hood)
• 2145 (Wendy bringing breakfast to mirror Jack, with final bloodfall vision)
• 2375 (Jack studying the model maze, with Wendy calling out to him in the lounge)
• 3274 (“I am dad” after “I want you to like it here”, with “I have a wife and two daughters, sir”)
• 3619 (“I dreamed that I killed you and Danny” with Jack seeing the ghost ball)
• 4214 (“Mid and upper 90s” from Glenn Rinker, with Hallorann’s eye scream face)
• 5129 (“What?” (right before “You would never hurt mom and me would ya?”), with Jack and Grady passing the bloodrug, entering the impossible bathroom)
• 5617 (“Danny! Wake up!”, with Wendy entering Susie’s office (Stormy Weather/maze behind her)
• 8217 (Jack stumbling around in maze, with “Yeah, I guess so” – not exactly opposite 287, but 292 – Danny says the same line twice)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)
• 8-8830 (888 = Wendy’s relief about Danny’s health, with Dick entering the 2^nd entrance; 883 = “Mrs. Torrance, I don’t think you have anything to worry about”, with Dick entering 2^nd entrance, passing black umbrellas)
• 364281 (3642 = Wendy assuring Jack “It’s okay” after his nightmare confession, with Jack passing the “murdered Gradys” paintings on the other side; 6428 = “Single moment’s thought”, with Wendy bringing breakfast from Gold Room; 4281 = “While Miami continues to swelter”, with Dick’s shine face)

Shot #2 – Danny’s Eye Scream

• 100 (THE SHINING passing over St. Mary Lake and all the mountains, with zooming on the F21 key and The Gold Room sign)
• 122 (Mt. Gould with Stone and Turkel, with Jack sitting down to die)
• 170 (Establishing shot of hotel, with howling Jack)
• 200 (Jack thanking the receptionist for directions, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 610 (Jack nodding and grinning about Ullman saying how some people can be put off by staying in a place where a murder suicide happened, with Danny staring first series of escapes)
• 626 (Handwritten) (“She’s a, uh…” before saying “confirmed ghost story and horror film addict”, with Jack starting to chase Danny into the maze)
• 1226 (Watson agreeing to have someone take up the Torrances’ luggage, and Jack saying he better “collect” the family, with MURDER flashing into the screen)
• 12-46? (“It’s really gorgeous, isn’t it, hun?”, with Tony/Danny finishing writing REDRUM)
• 3663 (Post-237 Danny passing the 23-33-7/Wendy comforting Jack back in his chair, with Wendy crying after Jack’s stormy exit)
• 11260 (Jack starting to tell the Donner Party history with Wendy struggling to climb out the window)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)
• 361221(3612 = Wendy soothing Jack before his nightmare confession, with Jack approaching the ghost ball; 6122 = Wendy looking toward the 237 stairs, with Jack noticing the same baseball bat on his way to the maze; 1221 = “I suggest we go take a quick look at your apartment” with Jack axing the apartment)
• 364281(3642 = Wendy assuring Jack “It’s okay” after his nightmare confession, with Jack passing the “murdered Gradys” paintings on the other side; 6428 = “Single moment’s thought”, with Wendy bringing breakfast from Gold Room; 4281 = “While Miami continues to swelter”, with Dick’s shine face)

Shot #3 – Dick’s Offer

• 3197 (The opposite side of the final spiral cut, the first second of zombie Jack, and the start of Grady saying, “But you are the caretaker”)
• 3274 (“I am dad” after “I want you to like it here”, with “I have a wife and two daughters, sir”)
• 3663 (Post-237 Danny passing the 23-33-7/Wendy comforting Jack back in his chair, with Wendy crying after Jack’s stormy exit)
• 4214 (“Mid and upper 90s” from Glenn Rinker, with Hallorann’s eye scream face)

Shot #4 – Danny’s Reaction Face

• 626 (Handwritten) (“She’s a, uh…” before saying “confirmed ghost story and horror film addict”, with Jack starting to chase Danny into the maze)
• 3/11? (End of the “We’re all gonna have a real good time” fading into the entrance of Watson, with Danny escaping the heart of the maze)

Shot #5 – Dick Walks Them Out (All repeats)

Shot #6 – Leaving the Storeroom

• 100 (THE SHINING passing over St. Mary Lake and all the mountains, with zooming on the F21 key and The Gold Room sign)
• 200 (Jack thanking the receptionist for directions, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 3411 (“I’d never do anything to hurt ya!”, with first second of Grady’s head appearing at the ghost ball)
• 4214 (“Mid and upper 90s” from Glenn Rinker, with Hallorann’s eye scream face)
• One unclear one – 4628 maybe?+

Wendy Locks Jack Up

Shot #1 – Wendy Dragging Him In

• 205 (Jack noticing the model maze and passing the kill spot, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 626 (“She’s a, uh…” before saying “confirmed ghost story and horror film addict”, with Jack starting to chase Danny into the maze)
• 12-46 (“It’s really gorgeous, isn’t it, hun?”, with Tony/Danny finishing writing REDRUM)
• 3411 (“I’d never do anything to hurt ya!”, with first second of Grady’s head appearing at the ghost ball)
• 3663 (Post-237 Danny passing the 23-33-7/Wendy comforting Jack back in his chair, with Wendy crying after Jack’s stormy exit)
• 3686 (Post-237 Danny being approached by Wendy (who’s telling Jack she’ll be right back), with Jack growling about “shovelling out driveways”)
• 3825 (Jack arriving at the bar to meet Lloyd, with “I’m sure he’ll be himself again in the morning”)
• 4709 (“I think…he did it to himself”, with Gold Room Jack thrashing about)

Shot #2 – Jack from Wendy’s Perspective, Waking

• 100 (THE SHINING passing over St. Mary Lake and all the mountains, with zooming on the F21 key and The Gold Room sign)
• 122 (Mt. Gould with Stone and Turkel, with Jack sitting down to die)
• 170 (Establishing shot of hotel, with howling Jack)
• 338 (“I’m a writer” chagrin face with Danny hiding from Jack)
• 716 (Bloodfall vision, with Wendy passing Moon and Cow)
• 1439 (The transition between the snowcat and the Gold Room tour, with Jack giving his “word” that he’ll kill his family)
• 38000 (3800 = Jack turning into the Gold Room to meet Lloyd, with Wendy saying it doesn’t make sense that there was nothing in 237; 380 = “It’s 20-mile stretch of road”, with Jack following Danny’s tracks to their end; 38 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)

Shot #3 – Jack Being Abandoned

• 100 (THE SHINING passing over St. Mary Lake and all the mountains, with zooming on the F21 key and The Gold Room sign)
• 170 (Establishing shot of hotel, with howling Jack)
• 200 (Jack thanking the receptionist for directions, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 287 (“I guess so” (doesn’t Danny think the Overlook will be fun?), with Jack stalking face)
• 3274 (“I am dad” after “I want you to like it here”, with “I have a wife and two daughters, sir”)
• 3411 (“I’d never do anything to hurt ya!”, with first second of Grady’s head appearing at the ghost ball)
• 3619 (“I dreamed that I killed you and Danny” with Jack seeing the ghost ball)
• 3825 (Jack arriving at the bar to meet Lloyd, with “I’m sure he’ll be himself again in the morning”)
• 4709 (“I think…he did it to himself”, with Gold Room Jack thrashing about)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)

Shot #4 – Jack Stumbles Into Boxes, Being Locked Up

• 27 (Passing Wild Goose Island with Overlook Hotel and July 4^th Ball)
• 122 (Sitting down to die and Mt. Gould with Stone and Turkel)
• 129 (Stumbling to die with Anne Jackson and Mt. Gould)
• 184 (First second of Jack entering hotel with Bombo singing)
• 338 (“I’m a writer” chagrin face with Danny hiding from Jack)
• 570 (End of cabin fever explanation, Jack following Danny’s steps)
• 1377 (“Yes, very cozy!” with Hallorann view through windscreen of Mt. Hood)
• 1412 (“The place was built in 1907” with Hallorann driving up Mt. Hood)
• 1670 (Hallorann listing “flour” right before “eye scream” (3663 visible), with Wendy running to find snowcat)
• 3196 (The opposite side of the final spiral cut, the whip pan from Danny entering suite 3 to the shot of zombie Jack, with Grady finishing saying “I’m sorry to differ with you sir”)
• 3197 (The opposite side of the final spiral cut, the first second of zombie Jack, and the start of Grady saying, “But you are the caretaker”)
• 3274 (“I am dad” after “I want you to like it here”, with “I have a wife and two daughters, sir”)
• 3619 (“I dreamed that I killed you and Danny” with Jack seeing the ghost ball)
• 3663 (Post-237 Danny passing the 23-33-7/Wendy comforting Jack back in his chair, with Wendy crying after Jack’s stormy exit)
• 3825 (Jack arriving at the bar to meet Lloyd, with “I’m sure he’ll be himself again in the morning”)
• 8451 (giant face Jack and Lake MacDonald)

Shot #5 Jack from Below

• 129 (Stumbling to die with Anne Jackson and Mt. Gould)
• 268 (“Sure I do” with Jack criss-crossing his path)
• 2375 (Jack studying the model maze, with Wendy calling out to him in the lounge)
• 3197 (The opposite side of the final spiral cut, the first second of zombie Jack, and the start of Grady saying, “But you are the caretaker”)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)

Jack and Grady

Shot #1 Jack Waking Up

• 27 (Passing Wild Goose Island with Overlook Hotel and July 4^th Ball)
• 118 (Mt. Gould with STONE, with frozen Jack face)
• 122 (Mt. Gould with Stone and Turkel, with Jack sitting down to die)
• 123?
• 129 (Stumbling to die with Anne Jackson and Mt. Gould)
• 170 (Establishing shot of hotel, with howling Jack)
• 184 (First second of Jack entering hotel with Bombo singing)
• 205 (Jack noticing the model maze and passing the kill spot, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 268 (“Sure I do” with Jack criss-crossing his path)
• 285 (“I guess so” (doesn’t Danny think the Overlook will be fun?), with Jack stalking face)
• 287 (“I guess so” (doesn’t Danny think the Overlook will be fun?), with Jack stalking face)
• 338 (“I’m a writer” chagrin face with Danny hiding from Jack)
• 523 (“I think about 8 and 10”, with Wendy’s reaction to Hallorann’s corpse)
• 570 (End of cabin fever explanation, Jack following Danny’s steps)
• 6-10 (Jack nodding and grinning about Ullman saying how some people can be put off by staying in a place where a murder suicide happened, with Danny staring first series of escapes)
• 805 (End of Wendy saying that Tony is Danny’s imaginary friend, with Dick’s death march, passing through where the stairwell should be coming down)
• 823 (“To my stomach”, with Dick passing the 2/3/7 photos)
• 1377 (“Yes, very cozy!” with Hallorann view through windscreen of Mt. Hood)
• 1412 (“The place was built in 1907” with Hallorann driving up Mt. Hood)
• 1439 (The transition between the snowcat and the Gold Room tour, with Jack giving his “word” that he’ll kill his family)
• 1620 (“You know, like in the Bugs Bunny cartoons?”, with establishing shot of the hotel, leading into Jack in the pantry)
• 1670 (Hallorann listing “flour” right before “eye scream” (3663 visible), with Wendy running to find snowcat)
• 2375 (Jack studying the model maze, with Wendy calling out to him in the lounge)
• 3196 (The opposite side of the final spiral cut, the whip pan from Danny entering suite 3 to the shot of zombie Jack, with Grady finishing saying “I’m sorry to differ with you sir”)
• 3197 (The opposite side of the final spiral cut, the first second of zombie Jack, and the start of Grady saying, “But you are the caretaker”)
• 3274 (“I am dad” after “I want you to like it here”, with “I have a wife and two daughters, sir”)
• 3330 (“I love it”, with “Grady?”)
• 3663 (Post-237 Danny passing the 23-33-7/Wendy comforting Jack back in his chair, with Wendy crying after Jack’s stormy exit)
• 3825 (Jack arriving at the bar to meet Lloyd, with “I’m sure he’ll be himself again in the morning”)
• 4214 (“Mid and upper 90s” from Glenn Rinker, with Hallorann’s eye scream face)
• 4628 (Wendy running to open the door for post-237 Jack, with Jack seeing Lloyd in the mirror)
• 4709 (“I think…he did it to himself”, with Gold Room Jack thrashing about)
• 4841 (Jack kicking the things he’s thrown around the lobby back halls, with the transition between Danny first emerging from 237 and the end of Jack’s nightmare confession)
• 5129 (“What?” (right before “You would never hurt mom and me would ya?”), with Jack and Grady passing the bloodrug, entering the impossible bathroom)
• 5404 (Jack reacting to Grady calling Danny talented and willful, with Dorothy from Summer of ’42 wondering how she can repay Hermie)
• 5617 (“Danny! Wake up!”, with Wendy entering Susie’s office (Stormy Weather/maze behind her)
• 8451 (Giant Face Jack, with the first shot of Beetle Jack going down beneath)
• 10390 (1039 = The end of Wendy saying “…injured Danny’s arm”, with the last of Jack’s axe chops through the door; 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”)
• 13161 (1316 = Danny’s reaction to seeing the Grady Twins in the games room, with Tony/Danny going for Wendy’s lipstick; 3161 = Transition between Danny leaving Summer of ’42 and entering Suite 3, with the end of Jack’s first reaction shot to Grady telling Jack he’s always been the caretaker)
• 25786 (2578 = Danny starting to leave 237 behind for the first time, with “Oh, about 5 hours”; 5786 = “How long ‘til we arrive in Denver?” with, “We’re gonna make a new rule.”; 257 = First second of Wendy and Danny in Boulder, with Wendy running to the snowcat; “That is…quite a story”, with maze Jack hollering threats; “Can you remember”, with Dick passing reception (with its 5:25 clock) on his way to death)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)
• 8-8832 (888 = Wendy’s relief about Danny’s health, with Dick entering the 2^nd entrance; 883 = “Mrs. Torrance, I don’t think you have anything to worry about”, with Dick entering 2^nd entrance, passing black umbrellas)
• 43000 (4300 = Last shot of Dick’s shine face with the shutting down TV, and first second of Danny shining Dick the 237 key with Jack asking which room he should head to; 430 = “Repairing damage as it occurs” with Jack giggling in the maze; 43 = Lake MacDonald shot with second last shot of Jack in the crowd)
• 102861 (1028 = “A hundred times with a child”, with “Here’s Johnny!”; 2861 = Wendy passing between the Aarne-Thompson paintings and Tony saying “Danny’s can’t wake up, Mrs. Torrance”)

Shot #2 – Jack and Grady Talk

• 27 (Passing Wild Goose Island with Overlook Hotel and July 4^th Ball)
• 184 (First second of Jack entering hotel with Bombo singing)
• 205 (Jack noticing the model maze and passing the kill spot, with Jack stumbling in the maze)
• 6-10 (Jack nodding and grinning about Ullman saying how some people can be put off by staying in a place where a murder suicide happened, with Danny staring first series of escapes)
• 823 (“To my stomach”, with Dick passing the 2/3/7 photos)
• 1439 (The transition between the snowcat and the Gold Room tour, with Jack giving his “word” that he’ll kill his family)
• 3663 (Post-237 Danny passing the 23-33-7/Wendy comforting Jack back in his chair, with Wendy crying after Jack’s stormy exit)
• 516-8 (“That’s right, sir” (responding to “Delbert Grady?”), and “I do.” (responding to, “Do you like it here?”))
• 25786 (2578 = Danny starting to leave 237 behind for the first time, with “Oh, about 5 hours”; 5786 = “How long ‘til we arrive in Denver?” with, “We’re gonna make a new rule.”; 257 = First second of Wendy and Danny in Boulder, with Wendy running to the snowcat; 578 = “That is…quite a story”, with maze Jack hollering threats; 786 = “Can you remember”, with Dick passing reception (with its 5:25 clock) on his way to death)
• 39000 (3900 = “I was afraid they were gonna be there ‘til next April”, with Hallorann’s first call getting blocked, 390 = “When the place was built in 1907”, with bloodfall, 39 = Lake MacDonald with giant face 1921 Jack)

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I realize some people will not want to slog through the next section, which details what I found by looking for AT codes and Thompson motifs for all the 133 applicable SKU numbers in the film. If this doesn’t sound like your cup of narrative tea, please click here to proceed to the next phase of this analysis. But if you have a cursory interest, I’ll put the especially interesting codes in bold, for swifter scanning.

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SPECIAL: THE AARNE-THOMPSON CODES

So there’s 133 ways that the SKU numbers in the Story Room can be broken up into 3- and 4-digit numbers. The first 52 will correspond to AT codes, the next 25 were Thompson motifs that specifically make up components of AT code stories, and final 56 are just Thompson motifs that aren’t listed as major components of any AT-level story (but this is likely incidental to the sources I was using).

For the record, each of the following numbers has between five and twenty different Thompson motifs they could describe. What I’m presenting here is my favourite one for each, sometimes especially because of a particular moment it’s from. And when we get into the motifs, I tried to include as many interesting variations as I thought worthy. I hope you’ll agree with my decisions.

Also, fun fact: while it’s true that every number had many variations of codes to choose from, one number grouping, 628, had only one code designation across the 20+ code types. It’s J628, which is for when a story involves “Dissuasion from suicide”. Also, it’s only visible in the shot of Jack lurching to talk to Grady. In the sequence of Jack being locked up, it’s always just out of sight. It struck me that the uniqueness of this number, and its inclusion in only one short part of one shot, might’ve possessed particular significance for Kubrick. Is Grady dissuading Jack from the suicide of eating nothing but spam, peanut butter and crackers, even more significant than every other story element being invoked? Somehow I doubt it. But it is neat.

There’s a few other little curiosities to point out before we delve in.

1) There were four 4-digit numbers that didn’t break down into any Thompson motif that I could find, and these were 4709, 5168, 5786, and 8883. They can all be broken down into their 3-digit halves, but the 4-digit ones don’t describe anything AT. I wonder if this was incidental, or if I’m missing something. As you can see, the one includes the Snow White code (709), so it feels weird that 133 should qualify, and these four (and only these four) should not. Oh, and by the way, AT code numbers only go up to 2400, so it’s not like these would have been shoe-ins, that happen to have been avoided. The only way they could’ve been like the others is if they’d appeared with a decimal (470.9, 516.8, 578.6, 888.3), and as you can see, the first three of these decimals are all fairly high up, meaning, in the case of 470.9 that there would have to have been at least 8 other derivatives before the .9 in order to realize this code.

2) I’m presenting these in numeric order, but please understand that they aren’t all equally interesting. One of my favourites, 101.2, which is for when there’s a flood made of human fluids, and which overlaps with an elevator in the shot it’s from, and which you won’t come across until way down the line. So I guess this analysis isn’t for the faint of interest.

3) As of this writing, I haven’t gone through to mark where each code appears, to help elucidate the significance of my inclusion/selection. I’m having to juggle a lot of efforts in an incredible time crunch. So if I never come back to this, my apologies to those keenly interested among you for the vagueness.

4) Appreciation of which animals are symbolic of which major characters would help for a deeper understanding. So, you can read the Four Directions analysis, or I can just tell you that Danny’s largely associated to birds and rabbits, Wendy to bears and canines, Jack to horned animals, serpents, and later canines, the Overlook to canines and elephants, and Hallorann to tigers, fish, horses and rabbits. There are other, subtler associations, like Wendy and Danny are connected to mice through Jerry (of Tom and Jerry) and Mickey Mouse. The Overlook also has an association to cows, through the Pillars of Hercules context.

Codes That Correspond to ATU Story Codes = 52 codes

• 100 = The Wolf is Caught Because of His Singing (Jack getting dragged in)
• 101 = The Old Dog as Rescuer of the Child – The dog refuses to help the wolf (Written on a box as Dick leads into kitchen, combined with 124)
• 102 = Dog Makes Clothes for the Wolf
• 103 = War Between Wild and Domestic Animals + Cat Claims to Be King and Receives Food From Other Animals (Jack Wakes Up)
• 105 = Cat’s Only Trick + Hedgehog’s Only Trick – Escape by shamming death (Appears near Dick and Jack. What’s the implication? That neither man really died?)
• 112 = Country Mouse Visited By the Town Mouse (Beside Danny’s Eye Scream. I like how Danny is the city mouse visiting Hallorann’s country mouse at first, but on the other side of the film, it’s more the other way around.)
• 122 = Able to Escape By Playing Dead
• 123 = Wolf and the Kids + 123B Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing Gains Admission to the Fold + 123E Wait for the Fat Goat (I’m not sure if this should count. It’s achieved thanks to a piece of tape being carefully placed over the last 2 on a box we elsewhere see is indeed 122. But it didn’t have the tape on it before, and the tape on it now creates the effect that it could be a 3. The tape is only there as Jack slouches over to talk to Grady.)
• 124 = Blowing the House In/3 Little Pigs = Written on a box as Dick and Wendy enter
• 126 = Sheep Chases the Wolf – Weak animal makes large one believe that he has eaten many of the large one’s companions (Beside Danny’s Eye Scream)
• 131 = Tiger as False Friend to the Cow – Tiger Eats Cow as soon as she’s hungry + = Written on Box Side as Jack rises (Since Dick seems perfectly friendly with Watson and Ullman, despite the former’s constant glowering, and Ullman’s association to Satan, this feels quite apt.) I want to note that this is also a Motif code for when there’s a Bird of Truth, in a story, which is an Arabian Nights thing, and a 237 thing, as we’ve seen.
• 137 = The Filthy Hog and the Clean Fish
• 161 = Farmer Betrays Fox by Pointing/Betrayed by the Pointing Finger + Bear With the Wooden Leg = Written on Box Side as Jack rises
• 162 = Master Looks More Closely Than the Farmhand – Master Sees the Hidden Stag
• 170 = The Fox Eats His Fellow-Lodger – Accuses another and demands damages (Jack getting dragged in) (I like what that says about Jack’s 237 experience, and how his follow up is to accuse Wendy for everything that’s occurring as a result of 237.)
• 200 = Why Dogs and Cats/Hares Don’t Get Along – The Ritz boxes have this as their gram count, so not sure if it should count the same way, but these appear right as Ullman walks up, which feels kind of perfect. And one of the other ways of classifying it is “why dogs look one another under the tail”, and there’s a Tony the Tiger behind Wendy’s “tail” in this shot.
• 214 = Donkey Tries to Caress His Master/Ass that behaved like a lap dog + 214A Singing Donkey and Dancing Camel + 214B Donkey in the Lion’s Skin – unmasked when he raises his voice (This is weird to be associated with Hallorann, but maybe it’s a comment on how, in the context of the story, the man does work for these people who are plotting to kill him.)
• 221 = The Election of the King of Birds – Wren becomes king (Danny’s eye scream)
• 237 = The Parrot Who Talked Too Much
• 285 = The Child and the Snake + Snake Stays in the Man’s Stomach + Man and the Wounded Snake + Snake Tries to Bite on a File (Maxwell House coffee, seen near everyone)
• 316 = The Nix (Water Spirit) of the Mill Pond = Water-spirits kidnap mortals and keep them underwater + B316 Abused and pampered horses (from 314 The Golden Haired Boy and His Magic Horse) = Written on Box Side as Jack rises – Also written across “Rey” in Golden Rey box behind Danny’s head during Eye Scream (unless that actually says 3 ½)
• 327 = The Children and the Ogre
• 333 = Little Red Riding Hood
• 361 = Bear-skin/The Man Who Did Not Wash For Seven Years – sells soul (appears on two different boxes – Texsun and something else) (Obviously Jack is a bit of soul seller, and has a connection to bears in the moment of killing Hallorann)
• 366 = The Man From the Gallows/The corpse Claims Its Property – Return from dead to punish theft of part of corpse (Appears near Jack and Dick. Jack talks to gallows man Grady, and I have a theory that the form appearing beneath the blood in the bloodfall may be Dick, since his corpse vanishes during the skeleton ball. His corpse was stolen by the hotel, and he returns in the bloodfall to let everyone know the true meaning of the theft.)
• 404 = = Blinded Bride AKA Snake Helper – Treasure falls from mouth – cruel stepmother, mutilation/putting out eyes – false bride takes true bride’s place on the way to the wedding – eyes brought back and replaced – recognition by unique manner of performing an act
• 412 = Girl Whose Soul was in her Necklace
• 451 = The Maiden who Seeks her Brothers/The Brothers Who Were Turned into Birds
• 462 = The Outcast Queens and the Ogress Queen – Cast-off wife abandoned in pit – Falsified order of execution
• 470 = Friends in Life and Death – Dinner with the Dead – Years thought days – Broad and Narrow road in the otherworld + 470A The Offended Skull – skeleton invited to dinner + 470B Land Where No One Dies – Returning from the land of the immortals – Journey to the land of the Immortals; D470 Material of object changed; (Jack is applying to join this land of immortals, and gorges himself before Grady releases him to make good on his application.)
• 516 = Faithful John (also 516C Amicus and Amelius AKA Saint James of Galacia) (Appears only in one moment, for the briefest of seconds as Jack leans back from the door to talk business with Grady, before he obscures it again with his bulk. In this conversation, Jack’s faithfulness is questioned repeatedly, and his reward for making it clear is magic release.)
• 561 = Aladdin (Appears near Dick and Jack. Perhaps there’s something to be said for the way Dick and Grady are like the opposite-poles genies released by the family getting as far as the story room, and entering it. The Aladdin story, of thieving a magic object that brings great-risk-for-great-reward is not unlike the Pillars of Hercules story.)
• 570 = Rabbit-Herd/*Pied-Piper or Rat-Catcher (Appears while Jack is being locked up) (There’s a lot of talk in the novel about keeping “rats” out of the Overlook. The subtle implication being that if Danny makes waves, Jack should know to lay out traps for him. And to punish him for being a “rat” (ie. for snitching))
• 610 = Not sure if I count this since it’s not a SKU, but a thing telling the reader how many cans per box (6×10), but it is on a lot of boxes during eye scream = ATU 610 The Healing Fruit AKA Fruit to Cure the Princess (Is eye scream a healing fruit? The first thing we see Wendy doing after showing Danny the maze is opening up a giant tin of fruit for the boy, and pouring it in a bowl. In the mirrorform, it looks like she’s pouring it all over him.)

• 612 = The Three Snake-Leaves – Helpful serpent – the faithless wife resuscitated – faithful servant – medicine shown by animal – promise to be buried with wife if she dies first/resuscitated wife by husband giving up half with remaining life
• 670 = Animals Teach Man How To Handle His Wife – Helpful Serpent – Nagging wife drives husband to prepare for Suicide – Cock shows browbeaten husband how to handle his wife – Secrets overheard from demon conversation
• 709 = Snow White
• 805 = Joseph and Mary Threaten to Leave Heaven When the Man who has always prayed to them is refused admittance
• 821 = Suit for Chickens from Boiled Eggs (Combined with a 217 beside Dick’s leg in shadow)
• 825 = The Devil in Noah’s Ark (Only appears in Jack’s half. Noah’s Ark is, of course, referenced in room 237, where the Overlook’s darkness dwells largely.)
• 830 = My crops will thrive here without god’s blessing + 830C If God Wills – boasting that one has no need of god’s help (Other Café Vienna box) (Appears near everyone, first in the shot of Dick opening the pantry door, and finally as Jack lurches to Grady. I mostly like what this says about Dick’s tone as he shows off the room. If you showed this scene to almost anyone from, I don’t know, the pre-1700s, it would seem like the most galling boast to act like you’ve got all your food problems taken care of forever.)
• 832 = The Disappointed Fisher/A Fish For Each Child – Small Catch of Fish for Child Murderers = On Vienna Box (Grady wake up and Hallorann show off) (I don’t know how this fable goes, but how perfect is that, eh? The box this is from also features the date Dec. 13th written on it. This is the day that Dick and Jack will die. So Jack’s small catch of fish (Hallorann) stings when compared to what he thinks he could’ve had by killing Danny.)
• 841 = One Beggar Trusts God, the Other the King (or “Praises”) (I like how this contrasts Dick and Jack’s approach to putting their support behind Danny and the Hotel respectively)
• 845 = The Old Man and Death
• 851 = The Princess Who Cannot Solve the Riddle – Not sure if this should count. It’s part of a faded SKU printed around the edge of a box, and it’s very hard to make out for certain. But I like how that obscurity speaks to the message in this code. The code only appears near Jack’s head after being locked up. And he is bested by Danny’s riddle.
• 883 = Innocent Slandered Maiden
• 888 = Wife Rescues Her Husband from Slavery (On Jack’s “death date” box. I like how this speaks to Wendy’s clubbing and imprisoning of Jack. She bonded him to free him from bondage.)
• 1012 = Cleaning the Master’s Child
• 1260 = The Porridge in the Ice Hole/a Whirlpool — Another way of expressing this: a numbskull strikes all the matches in order to test them, to see if they’re good enough.
• 1316 = Mistaking One Animal for Another AKA Mistaking Rabbit for a Sheep (contains Rabbit thought to be a cow) D1316.1 Stone reveals truth(!);
• 1377 = Husband Locked Out (Jack’s death day box, best seen as he wakes up in his prison)
• 1620 = The Emperor’s New Clothes (This strikes me as a variant on the 237 story. Telling the truth is cautioned against, only in this story its value is regarded differently for reasons of social standing. Also, if you remember me saying 445 is the code for this, it is, but only in the Thompson Motif K section. In the AT code, it’s 1620, so Kubrick was covering his tracks again.)

Codes That Refer to a Thompson Motif That’s Part of an AT STORY = 25

Just so you know, “ATU” is the modern way of talking about AT codes, since a man named Uther added his own layer to the classifications.

And a reminder: I’ll be considering more than one motif, if more than one seemed apt.

And if you see me highlighting a certain decimal number, that’s because the box it’s from has that as the other number in the SKU. So I focus on 362.4 in the 362 entry, because the box it’s from says 3624.

• 129 = U129. Nature will show itself – miscellaneous (3 variants: thieving nature of fox will show itself, prostitute will deceive new lover as always, washerman as minister thinks of washing and fails the king)
• 141 = D141 Transformation: man to dog (part of ATU 449 Sidi Numan, the Queen’s Dog and 652 The Prince/Boy Whose Wishes Always Come True)
• 143 = S143 Abandonment in forest (from A Predestined Wife AKA A Poor Girl to Marry a Rich Boy) + B143.1 Bird gives warning (Part of 517 The Boy Who Understood Birds + The Robber Bridegroom). Hansel and Gretel wasn’t listed, but I imagine this would apply to it.
• 145 = A145. Champions of the gods + Q145. Miraculously long life as reward +S145. Abandonment on an island. (Marooning.)
• 167 = W167.1 = Two stubborn goats meet each other on a bridge (Part of ATU 202—Two Stubborn goats)
• 181 (Written on box) = R181 Demon enclosed in bottle released (from 331 The Spirit/Demon in the Bottle) + S181 Wounding by Trapping with Sharp Knives (from ATU 432 The Prince as a Bird) + N181 Fortunes of the Rich man and of the poor man (from 735 same name) + H181 Recognition by unmasking (from 900 King Thrushbeard)
• 184 = (American Beauty boxes) B184.1 Magic Horse (from 550 Bird, Horse and Princess, or Quest for the Golden Bird)
• 217 = K217 Devil gets another soul instead of the one bargained for (part of ATU 360)
• 226 = S226 Child promised to devil for directions out of woods when father is lost (part of Hans My Hedgehog) (Jack wishes, eh?)
• 268 = S268 Child sacrificed to provide blood for cure of friend (part of 516 Faithful John, and 516C Amicus and Amelius/Saint James of Galacia)
• 281 = (Danny’s eye scream) Q281.1 Ungrateful children punished (from 982 Pretended Inheritence)
• 338 = Q338 Immoderate Request Punished (from 555 The Fisherman and his Wife)
• 341 = many variants come in ATU 934 Tales of the Predestined Death/Prophecy of Death (Death at (before, within) certain time; death by storm; death on entrance to the marriage chamber; death by wolf; death from snakebite; death by drowning; death by particular instrument) + B341 Helpful animal’s injunctions disobeyed (from 531 The Clever Horse)
• 362 = F362 Fairies cause disease (4 variants: including F362.4(!) Fairy causes mutilation (injury)) + B362 Animal grateful for rescue from drowning + K362 Theft by presenting false order to guardian (14 variants, including: 362.4 Theft by posing as master of the house and learning where goods are hidden (Wife deceived in the dark)) — (I like the “Fairies cause disease” one since there’s that Illness as Metaphor between Wendy and the doctor when they discuss Jack’s alcoholism. The ghosts cause Jack’s disease to recur (and this number only ever appears by Jack’s knees as he goes to talk to Grady), despite the fact that they were only serving him ghost booze.)
• 375 = B375.1 Fish returned to water: grateful (from 555 The Fisherman and his Wife + 675 The Simpleton Whose Wishes Always Come True)
• 382 = H382.1 Bride test: key in flax reveals laziness (from Key in Flax Reveals Laziness)
• 411 = C411.1 Tabu: Asking for reason of an unusual action (from 759 Angel and the Hermit AKA Divine Acts Vindicated) + E411.1 Murderer cannot rest in grave (from 760 The Unquiet Grave) (Appears behind Wendy as she drags Jack in. Wendy is constantly insinuating that Jack is being weird by not wanting to bring Danny to a doctor. Jack’s frustrations largely branch from the breaking of this “taboo”.)
• 421 = L421. Attempt to fly to heaven punished. Car supported by eagles + Q421. Punishment: beheading (12 variants) + X421. At the blessing of the grave the parson’s ox breaks loose: “Now the devil has him.” + F421 Lake-spirit (F421.1 Lady of the Lake) + G421 Ogre traps victim;  + J421. Subordination of weak to strong (This one is shockingly diverse in its applications. There’s even precedence for the Lady of the Lake bit for how it relates to the story behind the St. Maurice painting.
• 512 = B512 Medicine shown by animal (part of 303 The Twins of Blood-Brothers + 590 Faithless Mother/Magic Belt + 612 The Three Snake-Leaves) + G512.3.2.3.2 Ogre burned in his own oven (part of 327A Hansel and Gretel, also part of 327F Witch and the Fisher Boy and 327G Brothers at the Witch’s House where the ogre’s wife/daughter is burned in the oven) + K512 Compassionate Executioner (from 567A Magic Bird Heard and Twin Brothers) + K512.2 “substituted heart” (from 671 Boy who Learned the Languages of Animals (dog, bird and frog!) + 709 Snow White! + 883A Innocent Slandered Maiden) + N512 Treasure in underground chamber/cavern (from 954 The Forty Thieves (Ali Baba/Killing the Thieves Hidden in Casks) AKA 676 Open Sesame!) (This could seal my thought that the kitchen is subterranean.)
• 523 = H523 Test: guessing nature of devil’s possessions (from 812 The Devil’s Riddle) + B523.1 Spider-web over hole saves fugitive (from 967 Saved by a Spider’s Web) + F523 Two persons with bodies joined (Siamese twins, says note) + K523 Escape by shamming illness (5 variants) + N523 Treasure hidden in a stone + P523 Bringing suit in law courts (4 variants) + Q523 Humiliating penances (11 variants) + V523 The only king ever saved in spite of himself
• 578 = Pregnant man (from 705A Born from Fruit (Fish) AKA Miraculous Birth) (I have a thought that Grady spilling the egg-based advocaat on Jack is part of some subtle impregnation metaphor. His careful attention to then removing it completely (“It tends to stain!”) then seems like a rejection of this impregnation.)
• 642 = D642.7.7. Transformation to elude pursuers (from 310 Rapunzel). B642 Marriage to person in bird form (from 465 Man Persecuted for having Beautiful Wife). Also, from Thompson codes generally: B642 Marriage to person in bird form; C642 Tabu: Making peace with certain tribe; D642 Transformation to escape difficult situation; E642 Reincarnation as stone; F642 Person of remarkable sight; H642 Riddle: What is highest?; J642 Foolishness of surrendering weapons; K642 Free animal saves its captured friend; N642 Insane man accidentally cured by blow to the head; T642. Test of legitimacy of children: exposure to asps. Asps will bite only foreigners.
• 663 = F663.1 Skillful smith shoes running horse (from 654 Which Brother Has the Best Skill?) + F663.0.1 Skillful smith calls self master of all elements (from ATU 753 Christ and the Smith)
• 823 = F823.2 Glass shoes (from 510 Cinderella)
• 1412 = Lighting the road (or painting the house red) (from 1008 same name or Lighting the Way by Setting the Barn on Fire) (I like how this speaks to Danny’s lessons and escapes.)
• 2145 = A2145 Snake preserved in ark: to stop hole with tail (part of 825 The Devil in Noah’s Ark) A2145. Creation of snake (serpent) (6 variants, snake preserved in ark, stopping hole with its tail) + D2145. Magic control of seasons (7 variants: winter magically produced, local winter, summer produced by magic, summer magically lengthened, fruit magically grows in winter, vineyard in full fruit and so on during Christ’s nativity, tree blooms out of season)

Codes for Remaining Thompson Motifs = 56

• 25 = A25 Creator from below; A25.1 Creator emerges from lake;
• B25 Man-dog; C25 “Bear’s food”; C25.1 Child threatened with ogre; D25 Transformation layman to professional man; D25.1 Transformation to doctor; D25.2 Transformation into a cleric (monk); J25. Why great man plays with children; K25. Flying contest won by deception; Q25. Reward for carrying Christ across a stream;
• 27 = B27 Man-lion; Q27. Reward for faith: boy doomed to die saved (miraculously); (There’s a lot of talk in the novel about Danny wishing his parents could “believe” certain things.)
• 118 = A118 Self-created deity + C118 Violating Woman (also, Violating insane woman) + M118 Swearing on a skull + N118 Issues left to fate/luck (also, Ship’s course left to the winds that it might be carried where fate wills it) + S118 Murder by cutting (also: cutting adversary in two, cutting throat) + T118 Girl/man married to/enamored with a monster (also, Monster husband invisible, Marriage of dragon girl to orphan boy) + V118 Monasteries (includes Hell as a monastery (devil as abbot, sinners as monks), Monastery on otherworld island, subaqueous monastery, submarine oratory) (This one only appears next to Jack as he wakes on the salt bags, and only very obscurely. So it’s pretty fabulous how many of its derivatives speak directly to his experience.)
• 196 = A196 Deity’s limitations + W196. Lack of patience
• 197 = A197 Deity controls elements
• 205 = A205 Witch-woman of upper world + C105 Tabu eating one’s fill; F205. Little people from the sky; G205. Witch stepmother; M205. Breaking of bargains or promises (variants: kept in deed but not spirit, animal punishes broken promise, turtle carrying man through water topples, fish carrying man same, cat witness to betrothal punishes violater, curse as punishment, man breaks oath to a woman then can’t be king, king to care for man’s family); (Appears by Jack as he wakes next to his food scraps, before discussing his failure to take care of the “business” they discussed earlier.)
• 246 (not sure if it should count–part of a non-SKU number set) = E246 Ghosts punish failure to sacrifice to them + J246 Strength preferred to cleverness (2 variants) + M246 Covenant of friendship (5 variants, including Between animals) + Q246 Mortal’s attempt to defile goddess punished (also, Goddess killed for infidelity with mortal) + V246 Angel counsels mortal (5 variants)
• 257 = Animal funeral; E257. Ghosts seek firewood to roast man; G257. Charms to cause witch to reveal herself (variants: burning object, reading the bible backwards, turning table, taking tile from her house, put breeches over cow’s head and cow before her house); H257. Holiness of saint tested: asked to perform miracles; M257. Dying monster’s request and promise; T257. Jealous wife or husband; T257.8. Jealous husband objects to wife’s enjoyment of intercourse: thinks she has had previous experience. (Jack wants Grady to open the door for him, with this number right by his face.)
• 260 (Danny’s eye scream) = A260 God of light; E260. Other malevolent revenants; G260. Evil deeds of witches; R260. Pursuits; S260. Sacrifices; (Obviously, these are all fairly relevant.)
• 274 = E274. Gallows ghost; F274. Fairy physician; G274 Witch snared; T274. Wife cannot keep secret; (Say what you will about the virtues of Wendy’s guilelessness, she cannot keep the truth of her inner world from Jack. Even after he attempts to murder her.)
• 287 = A287 Rain-god; C287 Tabu: consuming feast without discovering a new wonder; T287. Why separation of a good woman from a bad man is a benefit; (This appears on a Maxwell House box that sits outside the freight elevator at what I think is the south end of the kitchen. It appears behind Wendy as the first SKU in the kitchen sequence, and, therefore, in the film, and it’s right at the moment where Hallorann is separating her from Jack. And by the way, Zeus creates Herakles while in his “rain-god” form: Ves. And that’s a story about the friction (to put it mildly) that comes from good women being with bad men.)
• 319 = B319 Helpful animal otherwise acquired + C319 Tabu: looking at certain person or thing – miscellaneous; P319. Deeds of friendship – miscellaneous; X319. Miscellaneous jokes about lawyers (Advocaat is a drink named for how “advocates” (lawyers) drink it to soothe their throats before orating on behalf of their clients.)
• 364 = B364 (.1-.5) Animal grateful for other rescue/from trap/fire/being turned over/saved from snake/rescue from mud; D364. Transformation: goose to person; E364. Dead returns to say farewell; M364. Various prophecies connected with saints (Appears next to Danny’s face during his eye scream shot. In the Four Directions analysis, Danny seems to correlate to Wild Goose Island.)
• 368 = E368 Pupil returns from dead to warn master of futility of his studies; F368 Human beings as game in fairy hunt
• 390 = D390 Transformation: reptiles and miscellaneous animals to persons; E390. Friendly return from the dead – miscellaneous; L390. Triumph of the weak-miscellaneous; M390. Prophecies — miscellaneous motifs;
• 428 = D428 Transformation: amphibian to object; J428. Association of tiger and crane; P428. Musician (428.1 Harper); X428. Enmity between priests and monks: chickens and eggs; (Part of Danny’s eye scream. Also, I just wanted to note how when I first saw this, something finally clicked that I’d been wondering about since forever: there’s all these little tins and things around the Boulder apartment with cartoon frogs on them, and I couldn’t for the life of me think why these were so conspicuously included. Almost nothing in the entire film feels incidental to me anymore, and maybe one day nothing will, but these frogs were a mystery. They’re from a 1970s line of Sears and Roebuck items featuring a “Neil the Frog”, but the character has no significance beyong that that I can see. So, since “Transformation: tiger to object” appears near Hallorann and his Tony the Tiger boxes, perhaps this Neil frog will prove to connect to some other “Neil” in the film. As of now I know of no other Neil. Although, I guess Neil Armstrong piloted the Apollo 11 rocket.)
• 439 = D439. Transformation: miscellaneous objects to persons; D439.5.1. Transformation: moon to person; E439. Other protection against revenants (there’s a ton of variants that follow including one about dwarves magically keeping ghosts from rising, and ghost will not return if door is removed and hung backwards – could that explain the lobby doors?); F439. Other weather-spirits (variants: rainbow spirit: draws itself to fisherman, helper on journey, as messenger); H439. Chastity index – miscellaneous; (Tatânga Mânî appears in the Colorado lounge, and his name is the same as the Norse moon goddess, Mani. And his portrait appears in the same room as the rainbow spirit in the Navajo/Zapotec mural.)
• 484 = J484. Enjoyment preferred to wealth; N484. Giant unwittingly reveals span of life to dwarf, who is thus emboldened to attack him; Q484. Husband fondles second wife in presence of first as punishment for adultery; (Kind of abstract, but if Jack loathes Wendy for choosing Danny over him, his sexual encounter with the 237 ghost could be something like this. And this code only appears as Jack is woken by Grady.)
• 540 = B540 Animal rescuer or retriever, B540.1 Birds throw some of their feathers to the hero in danger and he flies off, 540.2 Helpful horse rescues children; E540. Miscellaneous actions of revenants; H540. Propounding of riddles (variants: from supernatural creatures, queen of Sheba to Solomon, King Hiram to Solomon, from saint, from bridegroom at wedding feast); V540. Intervention of Providence saves person’s life;
• 617 = C617 Forbidden country; E617. Reincarnation as fish (variants: salmon, goldfish, shark, whale); F617. Mighty wrestler; H617. Symbolic interpretations of dreams; T617. Boy reared in ignorance of the world; (Appears before the revelation of “eye scream”, which is Dick’s invitation to lose his ignorance of the world, basically.)
• 619 = C619 The one forbidden place – miscellaneous; H619. Other symbolic interpretations; K619. Murderer or captor beguiled – miscellaneous (Appears before Danny’s eye scream and the shots of Jack being abandoned by Wendy, and stumbling into the boxes. And what Danny doesn’t realize is that there’s a “237” on the box right behind his head when Dick offers eye scream. And that’s the one forbidden place. And Jack’s being locked up because he went into the forbidden place himself, only to now find himself beguiled.)
• 624 = C624 Forbidden barrel; J624 Uniting against a common enemy (3 variants); K624 Abductors tricked into running race while captive escapes;
• 626 not sure if this should count (written in marker behind Danny’s head during eye scream, on a Willapoint clam box that is right near his ear–the box is also at Jack’s head level as he’s dragged into captivity) = J626 Prevention of hostilities by disarming the suspect – Later learned that he is a fugitive murderer; N626. Ass falls into water and catches fish in his ear
• 628 = J628. Dissuasion from suicide (Man dissuades simpleton from hanging himself by telling him that hell is a place of pain and torment) (This reminds me of something King derisively said about Kubrick who called him during production to ask if King really believed in an afterlife, positing later that this would be an ultimately optimistic viewpoint. King replied, with obvious incredulity, that it might be optimistic to think of heaven, but hell is a less optimistic forecast. Kubrick replied that he doesn’t believe in hell.)
• 686 = C686 Injunction: to forsake woman who arouses love (also, Tabu: to refuse help to a woman) (Wendy shows that she has Jack’s affection when she does her little dance in the Gold Room, and he bashfully doesn’t know what to say about it.)
• 716 = A716 Dispute at creation of sun; D716. Disenchantment by overcoming enchanted person in fight (contest); F716. Extraordinary fountain (variants: gives water on Wednesday and Friday, has taste of wine, musical in otherworld); H716. Riddle: how much is a certain crucifix worth? Twenty-nine pieces of silver; N716. Lover sees beloved first while she is bathing; N716.1. Man stumbles on bathing maiden; (This is only seen really clearly once–at the last moment of Wendy dragging Jack in, and dropping him–on the corner of a tiny box. The obscurest ones that have all these pertinent associations always seem extra significant to me. Wendy is disenchanted with the idea of Jack as someone to be deeply feared or loved. Jack was enchanted by drinking magic ghost booze on a Wednesday. The riddle about silver pieces is obviously a reference to Judas betraying Jesus, and Danny has some Jesus motifs that follow him around. And Jack sees the 237 ghost first while she’s bathing, and that’s the reason he’s being locked away now.)
• 786 = B786 Monkeys Always Copy Men; E786. Heart successfully replaced;
• 1012 = A1012 Flood from fluids of the body (variants: tears, Adam’s tears of repentence, tears of grieving lover, urine, loosing fairy horse and allowing it to stale, blood, slain giant’s blood); K1012. Making the dupe strong. The false doctor injures him. (also, by castration, scalding) (1012.1 – from The Gelding of the Bear and the Fetching of the Salve); X1012. Lie: person displays remarkable ingenuity or resourcefulness (Variant: Lie: axes ground on boulders rolling down hill)
• 1126 = A1126 Wind caused by wind-god’s movements;
• 1221 = H1221. Quest for adventure; X1221. Lies about bears;
• 1246 Not sure if this should count = D1246 Magic powder
• 1226 = A1226 Man created after series of unsuccessful experiments; H1226. Pursuit of rolling cake leads to quest (variants: rolling hoop, magic arrow, rolling golden apple, rolling ball of yarn); (Next to Danny during eye scream. And do I need to explain this one?)
• 1412 = A1412 Origin of light – miscellaneous; B141.2 Prophetic horse + B141.2.1 Horse weeps for master’s/saint’s approaching death; D1412 Magic object pulls person into it (variants: bag, pot, flames); F141.2 Mist as barrier to otherworld + 141.2.1 Storm (snow, hail) as barrier to otherworld; K1412. Lighting the road (or painting the house red). The house set on fire.; N141.2. Which is more powerful, wealth or wisdom?; S141.2. Father saves himself in storm and forgets his two children. They are abandoned in a boat.; Z141.2. Red as symbolic of martyrdom (Appears while Jack is abandoned, and when he lurches to Grady’s side.)
• 1439 = A1439 Acquisition of other necessities;
• 1670 = A1670 Characteristics of various people – in industry and warfare
• 2375 = A2375 Origin and nature of animal’s feet (10 variants, includes A2375.2.3 Why dog has hairy paws (stolen from rabbit)); J2375. Curiosity satisfied: riding the ox’s horns. As his ox, who has enormous horns, is asleep, the fool gets on the horns. The ox wakes and throws him off. When he comes to his senses, the fool says, “I had a hard time, but my curiosity is satisfied.” (This is behind Danny’s head during eye scream, but it’s obscured by his actual head. The number is only visible while Jack wakes on the salt bags later. In the novel, when Danny is creeping toward room 217, he thinks “Curiosity killed the cat. Satisfaction brought him back.” Cuz he’s a savvy 5-year-old like that.)
• 2578 = A2578 Why animal has long life + A2578.1 Why daddy-long-legs has long life + A2578.2 Why eagle has long life; T257.8. Jealous husband objects to wife’s enjoyment of intercourse: thinks she has had previous experience (Behind Jack’s head while he debates with Grady.)
• 3161 = F316.1 Fairy’s curse partially overcome by another fairy’s amendment (from “Fairy lays curse on child”); H316.1 Orange/Lemon thrown to indicate princess’s choice (or H316.3 a ball!); P316.1. Man knowing of murder plot against his friend disguises and is killed in his place; R316.1. Refuge on island (This is another major one, obviously. Especially how Jack throwing a ball is connected to the way the film language suggests Jack has now basically agreed to kill Hallorann.)
• 3196 = A319.6 Origin of blood (In the stack Jack crashes into, with his bleeding head wound.)
• 3197 = A319.7 Why the centre of man’s eye is black: blackened by spirits to make themselves invisible.; P319.7. “Friendship without refusal.” Friends bind themselves each to grant every desire of the other. (This reminds me of a cool moment from the mirrorform in which the black of Danny’s eye syncs up with Wendy’s gaping mouth. In both instances the character is seeing something brought on by a spirit.)

• 3274 = E327.4 Ghost of father returns to rebuke child; (This happens in the novel when Mark Torrance returns to chide Jack over the Overlook radio.)
• 3330 = Little Red Riding Hood; D333 Transformation: bovine animal to person (bull, calf); (Appears over Jack’s head waking on the salt, in a scene that transitions into Hallorann riding his red snowcat up Mt. Hood. Also, Jack is becomes the minotaur completely after Grady releases him.)
• 3411 = E341.1 Dead grateful for having corpse ransomed; M341.1. Prophecy: death at (before, within) certain time. (from Death prophesied; many, many variants) (Behind Wendy as she drags in Jack, and highly obscure as Hallorann closes the door on the pantry while Ullman walks up. As I said before, there’s a Café Vienna box with Dec. 13th printed on it. The day Dick and Jack will be dead.)
• 3619 = P361.9. Crow lets itself be caught so as to save king of crows
• 3663 = E366.3 Talking bones of eaten man advise hero;
• 3825 = E382.5 Chanting song of St. Nicholas drives fairy away (from Exorcising fairies)
• 4214 = D421.4 Transformation: tiger to object; E421.4 Ghosts as shadow;
• 4628 = V462.8. Ascetic immersion (from Asceticism: many, many variants) (also: 462.8.1 Saint confines himself in narrow pen during Lent; 462.8.2 Saint stands (asleep) while bird builds nest and hatches brood in his hand)
• 4841 = B484.1 Helpful caterpillar; an old meaning was D484.1 Grave equals five times length of any person’s foot: an offshoot of Stretching sepulchre (I love that this only appears when Jack’s been locked up, since it’s only after we get that reverse shot of Wendy dragging him in that we realize that the pantry is too deep for the doors on the wall around the corner to make sense. The deep freezes, with all their dead meat, should burrow into the side of this “grave” of Jack’s.)
• 5129 = G512.9 Animal killed ogre (dogs, birds) (from Ogre killed); J512.9. Lizard tries to make himself as long as snake. Kills himself.
• 5404 = H540.4 Saint as propounder of riddles (from Propounding of riddles) (How’d you like some ice cream, doc?)
• 5617 = H561.7 Druid as solver of riddles (from Solver of riddles) (Danny’s a druid now?)
• 8217 = F821.7 Clothes of light, worn by Adam and Eve (from Extraordinary dress) (There’s more than a few references to the Book of Genesis, but the storeroom is especially Eden-esque, with all its apple juice and plenty. I enjoy that this appears only once Dick and Wendy are secluded in the shot, away from Danny.)
• 8451 = C845.1 Tabu: Tabu: bringing head of slain enemy within village walls; D845.1 Magic object found in giant’s cave (from “found in underground room”); 
• 8832 = F883.2 Extraordinary letter (written on human skin) (from Extraordinary writings); J883.2. Man in cold consoles himself thinking of rich men in hell or prison (From the box with Jack’s death day on it. Is this an insight into what Jack was thinking as he finally went down in the freeze? That at least the lofty Hallorann would join him in hell?)

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