Photo in the last scene of the shining?

There is no such scene with Jack Tauerence in an old photo from the Overlook Hotel, suggesting reincarnation in the book. Some other major differences in the Stephen King Novel are that Dick the cook does not get murdered by Jack, but infact helps Wendy and Danny escape, and the hotel explodes in the end. I always thought that the old photo suggested reincarnation but also hinted back to the conversation Jack had with the butler Delbert Grady in the Bathroom. Mr. Grady said some interesting things to Jack in that scene, he said, " You're the caretaker here sir. You've always been the caretaker here. I should know, for I've always been here."

Hello,

First thing to understand with the Shining is that the movie is entirely different to the book. Kubrick even went as far as to make the movie the INVERSE of the book. For example, there is a reason that Jack Torrence burns to death in a boiler explosion in the book, yet freezes to death in the maze in the movie. Kubrick was a genius...

...Now back to the quesiton. You have posted in BOOKS AND AUTHORS, however you talk about the photo. The photo does not appear in the book so reading the book won't help an awful lot in answering your question. So lets talk about the MOVIE..

The ghosts of the overlook - Lloyd, the bartender, Grady (Delbert/Charles) the caretaker - are malicious beings and they LIE. Nothing they say to Jack is true or ever happened. They are twisting him into killing Wendy and Danny for the next chapter of the Overlook's grisly history - just as the other answerer above explains nicely. Searching for the truth, you have to remember what Dick Halloran says to Danny:

"Remember what Mr. Halloran said. It's just like pictures in a book, Danny. It isn't real."

"Nothing. There ain't nothing in Room 237, but you ain't got no business going in there anyway"

See. Dick Halloran is a "good being" who cares about the welfare of the Torrences and he is telling the TRUTH here. Yet why do we not believe him when he says this? Why do we choose to believe the ghosts who manipulate and tell us impossible things - "you have always been the caretaker here" ??

So as for the photo - it may just be a projection placed there by the hotel, another lie, convincing Jack and the audience that he was indeed there in the 1920s. But he wasn't.

It means he was just the right kind of person to be sucked into The Overlook's awful history. When he came there, he was coming home. The Overlook. or what was there before was feeding off depravity and cruelty for as long as it existed. If you think about it this way then the photo makes perfect sense.