Symbolism In The Lottery

There is no actual purpose in today’s society to observe this custom. It has just continued to be observed because of past traditions. There is no logical reason to continue this fête, as it holds little or no value. With the passage of time the actual reasons have been lost or distorted, such as in the case of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery.” Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery,” focuses on an outdated tradition, similar to the holiday of Thanksgiving; the town in her story observes a custom which holds little or no reasonable purpose in society. The lottery is performed every year, and the winner – instead of winning money or a prize – gets stones thrown at them by the other town members.

The first piece is the black box. The shabby black box represents both the traditions of the lottery and the illogic of the villagers’ loyalty to it. No one in town remembers the original box, so the current box they are using, which is also old, worn, is a replacement box. “The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago, and the black box now resting on the stool had been put into use even before Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, was born. Mr. Summers spoke frequently to the villagers about making a new box, but no one liked to upset even as much tradition as was represented by the black box.” (pg 141.

They are completely deprive of perception because the practice of stoning a human being for winning the lottery is viewed as accustomed. Since it has been performed for so many decades. In "The Village," the habitants are misleaded because the younger population is not aware of what they call" those we do not speak of" do not exist. The villagers are not aknowledge of the fact that the imaginary creature that lives in the woods is a false ...

Whenever a person is questioned about why they do something unusual, their usual answer is something along the lines of "Because I do it all the time." This shows ignorance on their part because they cannot even back up what they do with a valid reason, as with the townspeople in this story. Anot... ... middle of paper ... ... states this when she says, "Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones" (238). Even though the villagers forgot what the whole lottery was about, they still only remembered that they had to stone someone to death in the end. Shirley Jackson persuasively presents the story of a town of villagers that lets ignorance run their lives.

When breaking news is being told the majority of the population just accepts what they hear and do not bother to research facts or more information about the issue or subject. In the village, the same type of cycle happens. Although the towns folk question the lottery, none of them bother to speak out since everyone is fixed on tradition, leading them to blindly follow in this cruel act every year. Jackson shows that the townsfolk don’t really have a strong knowledge as to how the lottery came to be, but they try to preserve the tradition anyway. This is the same way humans tend to listen and are naïve to new things they hear.

There proves to be a pattern of tendency to be trapped by tradition. By further description of the author, the items involved in the ritual and the villagers’ specific reactions to changing them further downplay the conventional nature of the lottery. Even though the “original paraphernalia for the lottery has been lost long ago” (Jackson 134), the townspeople still use the worn down, old black box for drawing out the slips of paper. The box is older than the oldest man in town, Old Man Warner, but no one dares to discuss the replacement of the black box. Conjuring up a brand new box is discouraged as “no one liked to upset even as much tradition as was represented by the black box” (Jackson 134).

Through the characters and the ritual of the lottery Jackson demonstrates how people blindly follow their traditions without knowing their history. Most of the original rules of the ritual were long forgotten so the town just created their own way to proceed. Throughout the book it talks about how they skipped over the original chants and speech before the names were

The town doesn’t even realize what they’re doing is wrong and cruel – they just follow orders because they’ve always had a lottery and they can’t imagine life without one. “‘Some places have already quit lotteries.’ Mr. Adams said. ‘Nothing but trouble in that,’ Old Man Warner said stoutly. ‘Pack of young fools’” (Jackson 4). Although other towns are quitting the lotteries because they realize they’re wrong and unjust, this village refuses to stray from tradition.

In The Lottery the villagers were pretty free living except when it came to the lottery itself, there was no way of getting out of that situation. Since the characters in both stories did not have free will, the conformed to the ways of the law. In The Hunger Games, there were strict rules to abide by, it was follow or die. No one would speak out against President Snow because of fear. In The Lottery, all villagers followed the routine of that day the people do not speak out just accept what it to be.

They haven’t got nothing fit to burgle and everybody knows it.” (Dr. Gibbs)The Citizens of this community are so afraid of change. And in their case change would be a good thing. The life style of living in an old fashioned way is not good at all. My Concern is that if the town as a whole doesn’t want to upgrade to a better or more advance way of living will they ever grow and learn how to live and make mistakes as they come. Another big problem in Grover’s Corner is Privacy.