Conformity in Society Exposed in Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery
The Lottery, a short story by the nonconformist author Shirley Jackson, represents communities, America, the world, and conformist society as a whole by using setting and most importantly symbolism with her inventive, cryptic writing style. It was written in 1948, roughly three years after the liberation of a World War II concentration camp Auschwitz. Even today, some people deny that the Holocaust ever happened. Jackson shows through the setting of the story, a small, close knit town, that even though a population can ignore evil, it is still prevalent in society (for example: the Harlem Riots; the terrorist attacks on September 11; the beating of Rodney King.)
In The Lottery, year after year, even since Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, was a child, the same ritual has gone on. It is as if the community never learns from its previous mistakes. As long as no one in the town speaks up about such a twisted yearly event, nothing is ever going to change. If Martin Luther King or Malcolm X wouldn’t have raised their voices against the prejudice that they had experienced their entire lives, we might still be living in a segregated world, which was once thought to be “okay.” This is similar to The Lottery, in which the townspeople are brainwashed into believing that this ritual is normal. For example, Old Man Warner is outraged when he hears that the north village might give up the lottery, calling...
Tradition is a central theme in Shirley Jackon's short story The Lottery. Images such as the black box and characters such as Old Man Warner, Mrs. Adams, and Mrs. Hutchinson display to the reader not only the tenacity with which the townspeople cling to the tradition of the lottery, but also the wavering support of it by others. In just a few pages, Jackson manages to examine the sometimes long forgotten purpose of rituals, as well as the inevitable questioning of the necessity for such customs.
In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” the theme of the story is dramatically illustrated by Jackson’s unique tone. Once a year the villagers gather together in the central square for the lottery. The villagers await the arrival of Mr. Summers and the black box. Within the black box are folded slips of paper, one piece having a black dot on it. All the villagers then draw a piece of paper out of the box. Whoever gets the paper with the black dot wins. Tessie Hutchinson wins the lottery! Everyone then closes in on her and stones her to death. Tessie Hutchinson believes it is not fair because she was picked. The villagers do not know why the lottery continues to exist. All they know is that it is a tradition they are not willing to abandon. In “The Lottery,” Jackson portrays three main themes including tradition, treason, and violence.
Yearly rituals are accepted by most people and the reasons behind the celebrations are unknown to most people. Americans practice different annual traditions such as Fourth of July, Easter egg hunt, Halloween, Veterans Day and more. Likewise for Shirley Jackson, a wife, mother, and author of six novels, two memoirs, and a collection of short stories including “The Lottery.” Jackson’s short twisted story, “The Lottery,” portrays a ritual almost as old as the town itself, especially for the fact that there’s no remembrance from the villagers or the oldest man, Old Man Warner, the real reason for the ceremony. Jackson’s story describes a brutal custom in a small village that punishes the winner of the lottery; however, Jackson uses irony, characters and symbolism to support her story. Jackson’s purpose in The Lottery is to demonstrate that conformity can be helpful in some situations but damages those who choose not to conform.
In “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, there are certain traditions that are upheld by the characters in the story. These characters that Jackson created are not even sure why they are following the traditions. This story shows the reader how mankind will react to different situations that they are put into. Even when something is going bad or is wrong, people will not be a leader and stop it. The characters in this story should not have tolerated with the inhumane tradition that was held every year.
Tradition is huge in small towns and families and allows for unity through shared values, stories, and goals from one generation to the next. Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” carries that theme of tradition. The story follows a small town that performs the tradition of holding an annual lottery in which the winner gets stoned to death. It (tradition) is valued amongst human societies around the world, but the refusal of the villagers in “The Lottery” to let go of a terrifying long-lasting tradition suggests the negative consequences of blindly following these traditions such as violence and hypocrisy.
Today, we pride ourselves as being a fair and just society. We take advantage of the liberties and freedoms given to us each day. The traditions that lie in our cultures, beliefs and customs, provide us with a sense of security and happiness. However, there is a much different consensus conveyed through the cruel and barbaric customs subsiding in Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery." The unsubstantial ritual of this society reveals te traditions and blind obedience of a small village town. Moreover, the characters stress the importance of questioning what is put forth to an individual as opposed to what an individual contemplates. While a disturbing evilness exists and is concealed out of the norms of this society, Shirley Jackson shows how colness and lack of compassion in people can exhibit in situations regarding traditions and values.
"The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson is a story of an unusual town caught in whirlwind of tradition, even when it is not in the best interest of the residents and society. Shirley Jackson uses symbols throughout the story that helps the reader clearly understand her purpose. By doing so, she creates significant connections to the theme using old man Warner and the people in this ghost town of tradition.
In “The Lottery”, an outdated tradition puts one person at eminent irrefutable death per year. What are some outdated traditions that exist today? Do any of them relate to the extremity of this tradition? “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson is based on outdated traditions. The biggest idea of this story is that one person is sacrificed per year because it is the tradition. In the black box, there are blank slips of paper but only one has a black dot. Tessie Hutchinson chose the slip of paper that had this dot which meant that the rest of the town stoned her to death, for it was part of their tradition. This story includes biblical references such as comparison to the specific story of "The Adulterous Woman", connections to the Bible in Mrs. Delacroix's
There are many short stories that exploit the human nature, and Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is no exception. This short story takes place in a small town that has a tradition of having a lottery draw every year. However, no one would have expected that the winner of the lottery would actually be a loser. The man of the family goes up and draws a paper for their family, if the paper has a black scribble in the middle of it, that person’s family was chosen. Then, everyone in that family, excluding daughters who were married, drew a paper. Whoever drew the black scribbled paper would have “won.” In this case, Mr. Hutchinson drew for their family and got the black scribbled on paper. Immediately, Mrs. Hutchinson started complaining, which was strange, who would complain about winning? Of course, everyone in that family of five drew a paper. Mrs. Hutchinson ended up drawing the paper that was scribbled on, and her “prize” was that everyone in the town would now pelt her with a bunch of pebbles or stones.
Shirley Jackson made quite a commotion when her short story was first published in the New Yorker in 1948. The twist ending shocked many who first read it, readers criticizes her on how she could she write about a primitive village, this kind of violent behavior is below them after all. Quite ironic consider that it happens during WWII, one of the bloodiest events in human history. Jackson, herself, woven in many ironies into her story “The Lottery” as she shows the readers that human being is more evil to each other than we want to believe.
“The morning of June 27th,” is how “The Lottery” starts, but another equally important date is September 1, 1939 (par. 1). This is the day that threw the world into chaos; this is the day when World War 2 starts. Many people relate “The Lottery” to World War 2, specifically the Holocaust, and many symbolic ties to the atrocity. From the opening paragraphs to the final sentence, one can see how Shirley Jackson is “poking fun” of the Nazi party. The story focuses on how one town blindly follows a tradition that makes the whole community turn cruel and savage in a heartbeat. Shirley Jackson is trying to show the reader how barbaric the Holocaust was by writing “The Lottery.”
"The Lottery," a short story written by Shirley Jackson, is a tale about a disturbing social practice. The setting takes place in a small village consisting of about three hundred denizens. On June twenty-seventh of every year, the members of this traditional community hold a village-wide lottery in which everyone is expected to participate. Throughout the story, the reader gets an odd feeling regarding the residents and their annual practice. Not until the end does he or she gets to know what the lottery is about. Thus, from the beginning of the story until almost the end, there is an overwhelming sense that something terrible is about to happen due to the Jackson's effective use of foreshadowing through the depiction of characters and setting. Effective foreshadowing builds anticipation for the climax and ultimately the main theme of the story - the pointless nature of humanity regarding tradition and cruelty.
In Shirley Jackson’s "The Lottery," what appears to be an ordinary day in a small town takes an evil turn when a woman is stoned to death after "winning" the town lottery. The lottery in this story reflects an old tradition of sacrificing a scapegoat in order to encourage the growth of crops. But this story is not about the past, for through the actions of the town, Jackson shows us many of the social ills that exist in our own lives.
The author of “The Lottery” wrote this story “to shock the story’s readers with a graphic demonstration of the pointless violence and general inhumanity in their own lives” (Jackson 211). This story reflects human behavior in society to show how although rules, laws or traditions do not make sense, people follow them. Throughout the story the three main symbols of how people blindly follow senseless traditions were the lottery itself, the color black, and the hesitation that people had towards the prize.
"The Lottery" is a short story by Shirley Jackson that was published in 1948 and gave a good example of the definition of the term sociological theory. This theory is a set of ideas on how people behave and how institutions operate. The analysis of this short story and the of the work of Emile Durkheim shows the relationship of the two in the field of Sociology. There are many well defined intertwining theories that Durkheim gave to society that are also included in "The Lottery". Solidarity is the theory that will be analyzed.