Jack Torrance

I love ‘The Shining’, or more specifically, I love Stanley Kubrick’s adaption of Stephen King’s classic novel (I’m still reading the book). From the opening scene, you have a feeling of uneasiness wash over you as you watch the Torrance family drive up the mountains to the Overlook Hotel accompanied by a haunting and overwhelming theme with unintelligible whispers that make your skin crawl. Immediately you know, this is not a fun, family vacation film. Even as the camera cuts inside the car, the small exchanges between Jack, Wendy and Danny are filled with uncomfortable pauses and short direct answers. This is not a close family, and you can only imagine what horrors are going to happen when they reach their destination. Not to spoil anything about the film, but I chose to draw an iconic scene of Jack Torrance that happens once the family does reach their destination. For me, the most difficult part about capturing his face was the stubble. Without it, the face looked weird and didn’t capture the disheveled Jack that appears in the film. I used a brush pen to build small strokes as his stubble and was quite happy with the finished product. His mouth was also a bit difficult to render since the reference photo I used had him smiling and in the middle of speaking. Paying attention more to the shape of the mouth rather than trying to render something realistic, I think, ended up capturing it quite nicely. Finally his eyes and overall face. I think I could’ve used a smaller brush to render his eyes to really emphasize the crazy in them but being able to capture at least a likeness was most important to me. Strangely, my favourite part about this piece is capturing his large forehead and the shading of his face. I feel as if I hit a perfect median between light and dark so that each does its job in rendering the piece, and the hair flip really is a cherry on top that ties his face together (at least for me). The wooden panels on each side of his face were nothing to really focus on, since Jack is the subject, but a quick scribble of marker while leaving enough negative space creates the illusion of a physical object. Overall, at this time in Inktober 2020, I’d been happy with every piece I had finished so far and I think my love for ‘The Shining’ was a big inspiration in making this piece.

Continuing the theme (at the moment) of classic horror movies and characters, drawing Jack Torrance was a no brainer. My fiancé had been slowly introducing me to the world of Stephen King and we had finally gotten around to watching ‘The Shining’. I was captivated, and I’m not one for horror films at all. It’s much more than a family goes to a haunted place and has to survive, it’s a character film. The supernatural elements are just a back drop to the damaged family that prey and warp their negative emotions, and we see this most with Jack. Drawing a bit from the book to really understand Jack Torrance, he is a man of self-loathing. He’s an alcoholic whose marriage has silently come to an end due to his behaviour, with his biggest regret, breaking his son’s arm. Something that Wendy has never forgotten, and always quietly blames him for. This self-loathing causes Jack to be filled with anger and his explosive temper has become well known. The trip to the Overlook comes at a time where Jack is jobless and he’s trying to make amends in his marriage. It’s supposed to be a hopeful trip. A trip of new beginnings and a chance to have the happy family life he and Wendy once had, but instead the opposite happens. The Overlook filled with its many ghosts of the past possess Jack and he’s consumed by his anger.

This is the danger of self-loathing that I can really relate to in Jack Torrance. Wanting to make amends for the wrong you’ve done to people you care about but the guilt of what you’ve done to them is so overwhelming that it’s almost impossible to ever have a proper relationship again. This anger that festers out of guilt because you can’t forgive yourself and the anger that festers out of insecurity because how can you be sure the other person has truly forgiven you? It’s a never ending cycle of self-torture that leads you to hate yourself and in turn, the person you’ve wronged. How can they still be with you after all your failures? After all your mistreatment? Are they stupid? Do they not see that they deserve someone better than you? These types of questions have consumed me at a time in my life and it blinded me to ever truly trying to fix myself. Like a family trip to the Overlook Hotel, any attempts at trying to recapture the previous feelings of a failed relationship are just band-aids over a deep, and gushing wound. The damage has been done to both people and unless surgery is done to stitch close the wound, nothing can ever be the same again. You’ll both just keep bleeding out until eventually, the relationship dies and you’re both walking corpses staying together because of a child (in this case using Danny Torrance as the example). More in my experience, it’s more because both parties are unable or unwilling to sever the relationship. Whether out of necessity or fear, both people are just walking shells, waiting for a doctor to stitch them together and perform a blood transfusion to give them both the life they need to sever the relationship and move on with their lives. In my case, I had to be cut-off like a festering sore the way Jack Torrance had to die so that the people that didn’t deserve my anger and could live. The only difference is that I’m still alive and trying to make amends and overcome the weight of my actions, and this makes freezing to death in the mountains infinitely more appealing.

Surviving as an abuser, it’s a deep fall into misery. If you’re truly sorry for the things that you’ve done to another person, the regret and guilt is crushing. As large majority or people will agree, you’re better off dead. I mean, how can you do something like that to another person and still exist? The answer, in my case, is you don’t. You let that part of you die and leave it buried in the mountains. You don’t do anymore band-aid trips to distract yourself from your flaws. You sit with yourself and take responsibility for your actions day by day and make the conscious effort to change. To approach situations differently rather than lashing out like you’d been disturbed while writing in the main entrance at the Overlook. This is what Jack didn’t do, and this allowed the Overlook to play at his self-loathing and consume him. Perhaps if Wendy had the courage to separate herself from Jack when she first wanted to, he would’ve been able to become someone better on his own. This is not blaming Wendy for Jack’s behaviour, but maybe Jack might’ve been able to turn his life around if he had genuine consequences for his actions.

Anger is blinding. You see nothing and in your blindness you destroy the people closest to you. I’ve learned these consequences the hard way and I have been blessed enough to have a second chance with my fiancé, Amber. Knowing what I’ve done, knowing what I’m capable of doing if I ever dig up the past buried in the mountains, it’s the motivation I need to hold this relationship close to my chest like a precious jewel, and make sure that I don’t succumb to my self-loathing, insecurities and anger. We all have a choice in everything we do and even though we make mistakes, stumble and occasionally hurt others, choosing to drown in self-loathing will only make you repeat those same actions until you’re left buried in snow, frozen to death alone.