I was watching a YouTube video of King talking to a large group of people in an auditorium where he said his original idea for “The Shining” was to have at the end the Torrance family being killed by being absorbed into the Overlook hotel. That’s the basic plot of “Burnt Offerings” by Robert Marasco which was written years earlier. I was kind of shocked about King being so unashamed about that.
shareHe didn't use it though.
shareHI Gedmend!
👋
Hey :-)
shareHow's it going?
So I'm not entirely hijacking this thread, I'll say I read The Stand and have seen Burnt Offerings.
I'm kinda hungry at the moment but otherwise it's going fine XD How about you?
shareNow that you mention it, I could do with a snack. I pretty much skipped dinner. There is NY cheesecake in the freezer! I'm willing to share. Want a piece?
What time is it where you are? Do I remember correctly that you're in the EU?
Things are going okay here :)
Uhh, The Shining!
I wouldn't mind some of that. It's around 11:00 am here. I'm resident in Sweden so your memory is fine. You don't like The Shining? :-)
shareI'm having a piece right this minute. It's great! I suppose it'd make a decent enough breakfast, so here you go ... 🍰
I've never been able to make it all the way through The Shining, so that should tell you something 😄. You?
I've seen it, i wasn't exactly stoked when watching but i enjoyed it, the setting and concept is interesting i think, i don't feel the need to watch again though. I would probably say Cat's Eye is my favorite King adaptation if i should pick one.
shareI loved the location. That hotel was amazing. I also liked the concept of the writer and his family staying by themselves, isolated in that huge grand hotel during off-season months. But I don't understand why so many think it's brilliant.
I've never seen Cat's Eye. Imma go look it up. My favourite King are Dolores Claiborne, Shawshank, and The Green Mile.
Cat's Eye is technically a compilation of 3 short stories but you could call it a single story because of they are tied together. It's definitely worth a check :-) Green Mile was good. I have yet to see Shawshank, i'm sure i would like it but i'm not sure if it can live up to my expectations though.
shareAmazon Prime doesn't have Cat's Eye. Oh well, some day I'll see it.
Shawshank was excellent, but I know what you mean about it having a lot to live up to at this point. There wasn't so much hype about it when I saw it. Go in neutral if you can :)
For one he didn't use it so he didn't actually steal it. Secondly, it's very possible that he came up with the idea independently. Just because someone had the idea before him doesn't mean they're the only ones to have that idea.
shareI find it hard to believe King wasn't aware of Burnt Offerings though. It was a best selling horror novel in the 70s and King was pretty knowledgeable and well read.
shareFor me it's one of the reasons to believe that 'Secret Window' is an autobiographical book.
shareHe blatantly stole his idea for “Under The Dome” from The Simpsons Movie, and nobody noticed or cared.
shareHe didn't steal that idea. Don't get me wrong--King did shamelessly rip off Burnt Offerings for The Shining. But that whole "under the dome" concept was a cliche sci-fi trope going back to the 1960s:
https://sciencefictionruminations.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/wif1_0009.jpeg
https://sciencefictionruminations.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/thrsfthctx1985.jpeg
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/da/cb/b1/dacbb175e41b71beaf0464f514329945.jpg
http://archeyes.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/montreal-biosphere-Buckminster-Fuller-archeyes-11.jpg
So, King ripped nothing off from The Simpsons Movie. Both sources revisited the domed city trope from when he and the Simpsons creators were kids.
This. Taking a trope like that and having a different take on it is one thing. The Simpsons didn't even do it first. It's like saying someone who writes a novel about zombies must be ripping off Return of the Living Dead.
Burnt Offerings is a little different though. A lot of the specifics are pretty similar to the Shining.
Yes, he definitely ripped off Burnt Offerings for The Shining. All he did was change some superficial details around, such as:
1. Gender swapping the dad in place of mom.
2. Changing the house type from small, quaint summer home to huge inn
3. Season swapping winter for summer.
4. Letting family live instead of die.
The stories were so similar that the adaptations for both The Shining and Burnt Offerings ends exactly the same way, with a photograph.
I always wondered how much he was influenced by Burnt Offerings.
Obviously a genre novel will have certain things in common with others in the genre. There were a lot of similarities between the two. The family dynamic especially. Small family, one child, a boy who's grade school age. Dad's an English professor (e high school teacher in the shining). Mom's a homemaker. Family is staying in a big, empty house/hotel, as caretakers. The house manipulates the father and taps into repressed anger he'd been harboring. At one point the father attacks the son.
The specifics are very different, but the basic arc of the stories are pretty similar. If the Shining had ended in the way you described, they still wouldn't have been quite the same. In Burnt Offerings [spoiler for 45 year old novel coming]
the mother takes the place of the old woman who'd been living there.
I wonder if King is aware of how clear the similarities are and avoids the subject. I've never heard him mention Burnt, but it came out in '73, shortly before Kings career took off. The timing is right for it to have influenced the Shining.