Throughout Niel Gaiman’s “Don’t ask Jack” there are several different meanings of what the jack-in-the-box stands for. On the surface of the text the toy is just a toy that the children don’t like and can’t get away from. However, there is also a central message that Gaiman is pointing at with several different interpretations of the jack-in-the-box and how it resembles the children’s lives. The Jack-in-the-box explains why the children never want to go into or see their childhood home again because the fear that the children have for the toy is the same fear they have for the house. The meaning of the box throughout the text resembles the childhood that the kids had and the hatred for the house they grew up in and their years trapped inside.  

The first time the reader encounters the Jack-in-the-box the author is describing what the box looks like. Gaiman illustrates this when he says, “It was a box, carved and painted in gold and red. It was undoubtedly attractive and, or so the grown-ups maintained, quite valuable-perhaps even an antique” (Gaiman 1). This quote by Gaiman shows why the children’s parents like the toy as an antique show piece, however, the children do not show the same appreciation for the toy. While this section of the text shows why the children’s parents keep the toy around it also shows that the parents cause their children to be unhappy by keeping what they dislike around them at all times. The use of the box in this case represents the children and how they grew up in a place that they considered to be their undesirable and ugly box that was controlled by their parents. 

Again Gaiman is able to give insite into how the children view the Jack-in-the-box when he says that the children who lived in the home thought that the box held an evil wizard and that it was similar to Pandora’s box. Gaiman is able to convey this message when mentioning in greater detail why the children are afraid of the toy, “another (I am certain that it must have been one of the girls) maintained that Jack’s box was Pandora’s Box and had been placed in the box as a guardian to prevent the bad things inside form coming out once more” (Gaiman 2). While the children say that the toy is Pandora’s box they also say that Jack is a guardian inside the box that is keeping the evil wizard contained inside and will not let him out. In this case Jack is what is protecting the children form what is inside the box just as someone is protecting them from the wizard inside their home. With this use of the jack-in-the-box it shows how the children viewed their home just as the box that held the evil wizard. The children’s wizard is none other than their own parents. Just as the parents continuously return the box to the mantle whenever the children grow the courage to remove it, represents how the parents make their children suffer in other ways. While the ways in which the parents make their children suffer is not specified the toy is just a small symbol that gives a very ominous feeling throughout the text for how the children were treaded. 

When the story continues the author describes what has happened to the children throughout their lives and where they are when they are older and no longer live in the house. One very important aspect of what happens when the children grow up is that none of them ever want to go back to their childhood home. Gaiman exemplifies this when he says, “the other children, who had once been girls and now were women, declined, each and every one, to return to the house in which they had grown up” (Gaiman 3). This is another sign that what the children went through when they lived in that home was so scarring that it has now caused the children to never want return to the house. The reason the children do not return is to avoid facing all of the horrible memories that bring them back to one of the worst times of their lives. The jack-in-the-box is still in the home and the author says the jack-in-the-box is going to wait in the house until he is once again found always being there waiting for the children. This shows that the box that holds the horrible wizard is also a representation of how the past can never be forgotten. While the children can avoid facing these memories they will always be there waiting to remind the children of the life they once had.

The continued use of the jack-in-the-box throughout the text serves as a symbol for what the children experienced in their early years of life. To this day the children cannot get rid of the memories from that time of their life and the jack-in-the-box which was once what the children were afraid of now holds all the memories and fears of the children from the life they lived. The toy was not actually Pandora’s box and did not hold an evil wizard however to the children the box was a symbol for their box, their home, and the evil wizard that lived inside of it with them. The box was only a toy and yet through several different uses of the symbol Gaiman was able to convey a much deeper meaning of the text that can only be seen when taking a much closer look into what the symbol of the jack-in-the-box means.  
