Department of English

This thesis explores Stephen King’s novel The Shining through the intersecting lenses of disability studies, trauma theory, and horror literature. Arguing that horror is a uniquely generative genre for representing experiences of invisible, unhealthy, and unpredictable disabilities, this project challenges the longstanding discomfort within disability studies surrounding metaphor, suffering, and trauma. Drawing on theorists such as Tobin Siebers, Susan Wendell, Eli Clare, and Ria Cheyne, it examines how The Shining uses its metaphorical, supernatural elements to communicate the internal experiences of disabled characters who resist straightforward diagnosis. The novel’s central figures—most notably Jack, Danny, and Dick Hallorann—are all portrayed as disabled and traumatized in distinct yet interconnected ways. Their inner lives reflect social stigma, isolation, and internalized ableism, while also offering a space for disabled solidarity and shared experience. By reading Jack’s alcoholism and mental illness, Danny’s psychic condition the shine, and Hallorann’s empathetic role through a cripistemological lens, this thesis argues for a broader recognition of trauma as a disabling experience and for horror as a literary mode capable of expressing the unspeakable. The project resists the desire for sanitized or “positive” portrayals of disability in favor of complexity, discomfort, and human truth. Ultimately, The Shining reveals that monstrosity and vulnerability are not opposites, but reflections—and that horror can provide a space for their voices to speak back.