"The Lottery" In "The Lottery" Shirley Jackson presents us with a shocking story guaranteed to outrage the reader. The author brings together the residents of a small village as they are gathered for an annual event referred to as the lottery. The families of the village are represented by their names on small pieces of paper, which are placed in a black box. The appointed townsperson oversees the drawing to determine who pulls the slip of paper that "wins" the drawing. The characters seem ordinary enough, and they appear to be pleasant mild people participating in an innocuous activity. There is a huge shock when the story turns violent. The peaceful village people are choosing which person in their community they are going to stone to death. "The Lottery" illustrates the danger and potential violence of a society that ignorantly follows a tradition without considering the harm they are causing. There are many examples of society following violent traditions. A look at professional sports is a good example. In most sports it is a referees job to stop or restrain an athlete who tries to harm another athlete during the game. However, in the National Hockey League players frequently drop their gloves and engage in fistfights on the ice. The referees actually back away and allow the fighting to continue. I have often wondered why they would allow this kind of brutality. The answer is found in the kind of thinking represented in this story. In the story when someone remarks that some towns have given up their lottery's, an elderly old man called Old Man Warner, snorts and calls them "crazy fools and blames it on the young folks wanting to change everything" (81). He defends the tradition with one simple premise; "there ha... ... middle of paper ... ...radition steeped collegiates and the brawling athletes. All of these people exemplify what happens when a tradition is perpetuated through generations without regard to the consequences. I think all of these people are afraid to admit there is anything wrong with continuing these traditions because the subsequent conclusion would be that they were wrong all along. Every society has the responsibility to examine its traditions and rituals. We have to question the morality of our history before we allow it to set the precedent for the future. An intelligent society cannot allow loyalty to tradition to perpetuate ignorant and violent behavior. Work Cited Jackson, Shirley. "The Lottery." Literature and the Writing Process. Elizabeth McMahan, Susan X Day, and Robert Funk. 5th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice, 1999. 74-79
“The less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it” (Twain). The Lottery begins during the summer. A small, seemingly normal, town is gathering to throw the annual “Lottery”. In the end, the townspeople—children included—gather around and stone the winner to death, simply because it was tradition. The story reveals how traditions can become outdated and ineffective. “I suppose, I hoped, by setting a particularly brutal ancient rite in the present and in my own village to shock the story's readers with a graphic dramatization of the pointless violence and general inhumanity in their own lives” (Jackson). As humans develop as a race, their practices should develop with them. Shirley Jackson develops the theme that blindly following traditions is dangerous in her short story “The Lottery” through the use of symbolism, foreshadowing, and irony.
“The Lottery” is a short story about an event that takes place every year in a small village of New England. When the author speaks of “the lottery” he is referencing the lottery of death; this is when the stoning of a village member must give up his or her life. The villagers gather at a designated area and perform a customary ritual which has been practiced for many years. The Lottery is a short story about a tradition that the villagers are fully loyal to and represents a behavior or idea that has been passed down from generation to generation, accepting and following a rule no matter how cruel or illogical it is. Friends and family become insignificant the moment it is time to stone the unlucky victim.
Shirley Jackson takes great care in creating a setting for the story, The Lottery. She gives the reader a sense of comfort and stability from the very beginning. It begins, "clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green." The setting throughout The Lottery creates a sense of peacefulness and tranquility, while portraying a typical town on a normal summer day.
The title, “The Lottery” is significant because each villager’s life is at risk because there is no discrimination towards whom is chosen, nor is that person being punished for a crime. The story is about innocent victims involved in foolish traditions. Deaths of innocent people can be blamed on the culture a person is surrounded by. If we grow up in a society where violence is a usual occurrence, then it can be assumed that a person’s values are adapted to that style of living.
Can one individual change a large group of people? Can the effort of one person be enough to break up a faulty tradition practicing by a society? In most cases the answer would be ‘yes’ and in some ‘no’. Many individuals try and succeed but many fail just like the main character Tessie Hutchinson in Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery”. When someone hears the word “lottery”, he or she may think that someone will be rewarded with prize. But “The Lottery” By Shirley Jackson is different than what one thinks. In the story, a lottery is going to be conducted not like Mega Million or Powerball one play here. In the story, the person who wins the lottery is stoned to death instead of being rewarded with the prize. Tessie Hutchinson, the major character in the story, is wife of Mr. Bill Hutchinson and also a mother of three siblings and a married daughter. Jackson presents Mrs. Hutchinson as a strong rebellious character. Mrs. Hutchinson plays two different roles in this story. She is excitedly participating in the lottery ceremony at the beginning but her character shifts when her husband picks the winning lottery of death for their family. Mrs. Hutchinson is presented as a blind follower of old tradition, a strong rebellious character and a selfish and careless person in the society.
Written by Shirley Jackson, “The Lottery” is a short story about a town that hosts an annual lottery that decides which person is stoned by the rest of the town. Jackson slowly and subtly builds the suspense throughout the story, only resolving the mystery surrounding the lottery at the very last moment, as the townspeople surround Tessie with their stones. The symbolism utilized helps demonstrate the overall significance of the story, such as the lottery itself. The lottery shows the way people desperately cling to old traditions, regardless of how damaging they may be. In addition, it can show how callous many will act while staring at a gruesome situation, until they become the victims.
I was watching an episode of “The Simpsons” on TV the other day, and there was a craze around town because the Springfield Lottery was up to 130 million dollars. Bookstores were selling out of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”. Homer quickly threw the book into the fireplace when he realized that the book could not tell him how to win the lottery, that it was a book about time old traditions, barbaric, but still practiced nonetheless. If Homer had read the book, he would have discovered that Jackson was projecting a subtle message through the minor character of Old Man Warner that the human race can be quite feeble-minded when it comes to following others and outright ignorant when it comes to thinking for one’s self. She uses Old Man Warner because he clings to your memory above all the other minor characters. He is seen as the antagonist, and therefore commands attention, even to his limited role. You then think about him more than any other minor character, and the more you think about him, the more the message comes through. He symbolizes the sense of invincibility, distrust, fear, and eternal youth.
"The Lottery" is a short story that shows just how disturbing the human mind can be at times. As the story proceeds it builds the reader up till the end where what you thought was going to happen did not turn out that way. But is that not how our lives are portrayed? Do we not build ourselves up to society believing what they say and do until the matter is put into our hands? Mrs. Hutchinson was a follower of society just like we are. Everyday was the same routine and every year she played the lottery just like all of the other town people. But this year would be a very different year for Mrs. Hutchinson because her chance at the lottery was about to happen. Now as a reader in this day, we would think of the lottery to be a great prize to receive but not during the days of these town people.
In literature there are many different critical views, in which all of them have very distinctive ideas and beliefs. The value of these critical views is decided by the reader and may be different to each one. When a reader approaches a work of literature they bring their own views and experiences with them, so each reader will read each story differently. And even the same reader will never read the same story the same way twice due to things that may have changed in his or her life. In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” (509-15) and Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path” (568-74) one reader my feel sympathy while another does not fill anything. So what is the “correct” response to these stories?
In the short story The Lottery tells about tradition in a village that have a lottery where the lottery culminates in a violent murder each year. It’s a strange ritual that suggests how dangerous traditions can be with certain religions, ethnicities,
“ The Lottery”, written by Shirley Jackson, shows the corruption in a village whose people treat life with insignificance. Through the use of literary devices, Jackson portrays how practices in traditions can be barbaric;ultimately, resulting in persecution.
Winning vast amounts of money can make anyone slaphappy, but unfortunately this type of wager won’t be discussed in Shirley Jacksons “The Lottery.” Jackson catches the reader’s attention by describing a typical day by using words such as “blossoming, clear and sunny skies” to attract the reader into believing a calm and hopeful setting which eventually turns dark. In this short story Jackson tells a tale of a sinister and malevolent town in America that conforms to the treacherous acts of murder in order to keep their annual harvest tradition alive. Jackson exposes the monstrosity of people within this society in this chilling tale. She allows the reader’s to ponder and lead them to believe that the lottery is actually a good thing; till she implements foreshadowing, to hint at the dreadfulness behind the lottery and its meaning. My goal in this paper is to discuss why Jackson’s “The Lottery” is a portrayed as a horror story, and the importance the townspeople used to glorify ritualistic killings, to appease to an unseeable force in return of good harvest for the upcoming year.
It is funny how life works out sometimes. You never know what you are going to get. ‘The Lottery’ is a story about a small village that holds a lottery drawing in the middle of the town square. The “winner” of the lottery is then stoned by the town’s people. This piece of literature provides a clear example that things in life are not always what they seem.
The story of “The Lottery” is a dark tale that gives the reader a window into a community blighted by an tradition propagated by ignorance; sending a message that reverberates with many events, ideas, and observations throughout the annals of time. Written by the great Shirley Jackson, this fable exemplifies how delusion and illogical thinking led to the terrifying and morose ending of Tessie Hutchinson's existence. Shirley Jackson was well known in her lifetime, but not necessarily as the literary master she is hailed as today. Jackson had great interest in the culture of witchcraft, and deeply incorporated this knowledge into one of her first short stories: “The Lottery.” While this influence greatly improved the haunted tone of the story, it also spawned various rumors regarding Shirley Jackson herself, being a reclusive bookish woman interested in the dark arts. However, just as the “witches” of Salem were mercilessly murdered for ambiguous reasons, so too was Tessie Hutchinson. Shirley Jackson saw the reflection of these poor souls within our very lives, and channeled their sorrowful essence into a meticulous story that is as moving as it is disturbing.
Having read Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" (1948) several times now; the biggest thing I've learned is that just because something is tradition, that doesn't make it right. In our lives it's easy to get in the habit of doing things because that's how our parent's or grandparent's did it. It is important to make sure we are in God's word, examining our actions to make sure that they line up with what God wants of us.