Analysis Of The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson was written in 1948. The story takes place in a village square of a town on June 27th. The author does not use much emotion in the writing to show how the barbaric act that is going on is look at as normal. This story is about a town that has a lottery once a year to choose who should be sacrificed, so that the town will have a plentiful year for growing crops. Jackson has many messages about human nature in this short story. The most important message she conveys is how cruel and violent people can be to one another. Another very significant message she conveys is how custom and tradition can hold great power over people. Jackson also conveys the message of

In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, the small village, at first, seems to be lovely, full of tradition, with the townspeople fulfilling their civic duties, but instead this story is bursting with contrast. The expectations that the reader has are increasingly altered. The title of this short story raises hope, for in our society the term “lottery” typically is associated with winning money or other perceived “good” things. Most people associate winning a lottery with luck, yet Jackson twists this notion around and the luck in this village is with each of the losers.

Throughout the story, it is told from the third person point of view. This gives the reader a sense of understanding between all of the town folks. It makes the logic and reasoning behind each town member easier to access. This point of view gives the reader an idea of what different town people think of the lottery. For example, Old Man Warren does not believe that the lottery should ever be stopped. While some other members of the town were talking about how “that over in the north village they’re talking about giving up the lottery”(413). If Shirley Jackson wrote this story another way the reader would not receive the information and knowledge from the other characters like they do in the third person point of view. This overall is a strength with this point of view for Shirley Jackson's story. The implication that is seen through this point of view towards the story is that it gives all members of the village to speak and express their feelings about the lottery. It allows the reader to truly understand how the people

As Tessie’s protests continue and the Hutchinson family prepares to draw again the sense of apprehension is one again mounting, this time fearing for whoever wins yet still not knowing what their “prize” will be. “The crowd was quiet. A girl whispered, ‘I hope it’s not Nancy’”, the silence and fear of the crowds manifests in the reader as the three children and their parents all draw slips of paper. Tessie “wins” the lottery and when the narrator explains “although the villagers had forgotten the ritual, and lost they original black box, they still remembered to use stones” (6) its suddenly shockingly clear to the readers what the winner is to receive. The drastic switch from a light and cheerful tone with talk of the beautiful day and children playing to the closing like of “and they were upon her” (7) is in part why this story is so effective. The unforeseen sinister end of the story makes the revelation of the tradition much more shocking and unsettling than had the reader known from the beginning what the outcome would be. Jackson very effectively builds a sense of apprehension and foreboding as she slowly cues the reader into the reality of the situation.

The first literary element of this story is the point of view, and how the writer uses a third-person narrative style to tell this story. This gives the writer the ability to give details, but not make any real judgments. When you read the story you feel as if you are there watching what is happening, looking over the shoulders of the crowd, but not able to know what the people are thinking. In this story we get an example of how the writer is detached in a way. We don’t get to know what the characters are feeling just what their actions are telling us, like when they choose to whisper instead of talking at normal volume, or how nervous they seem as the lottery progresses. This writing style leaves little if any room to get attached to a character. This however is a smart move by Jackson, because if the story was told from a villager’s point of view it could have been far less effective. When we read we just read about the events of the lottery unfolding. This narrative point of view adds to the shock factor when we find out

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.

Traditions are widespread among many different people and cultures; It is an explanation for acting without thinking. Not all traditions are a good thing, though, and blindly following them can lead to harsh consequences. The villagers in a small town in “The Lottery” gather together annually to participate in this tradition, where one person in the town is randomly chosen in a drawing to be violently stoned to death by citizens. It has been around for seventy-seven years and everyone partakes in it. People always attend, showing the importance of tradition amongst the society. However, in the short story, “The Lottery,” Shirley Jackson uses many literary devices to show that traditions are not always meant to be followed.

Point of view: The author uses third person omniscient to show the thoughts of all characters. Like how “Piggy was flushing pinkly with pride” while on the other half of the mountain we also knew that “Simon watching the black and iridescent green” was happening at the same

According to Helen E. Nebeker, most acknowledge the energy of The Lottery, admitting that the psychological stun of the ritual murder in a modern, rural small-town cannot be easily overlooked. Virgil Scott, for instance, says, “the story leaves me uneasy because of the author's use of incidental symbolism: the black box, the forgotten tuneless chant, the ritual salute to assure the entire recreation of the procedure of the lottery forget to serve the story as they may have.” At that point, they indicate fundamental weakness by acknowledging that Jackson has preferred to give no answer to her story, but it leaves the meaning to our imagination, allowing a good deal of flexibility in our interpretation, while yet demanding that everything in the story has been obtained to assure us how we are to 'take' the ending events in the story. Maybe the critical conflict depicted above comes from failure to see that The Lottery really intertwines two stories and subjects into a fictional vehicle. The obvious, easily discovered story shows up in the facts, wherein members of a small town meet to decide who will be the next victim of the annual savagery. The symbolic hints which develop into a second, sub rosa story becomes apparent as early as the fourth word of the story when the date of June 27th alerts us to the season of the summertime with all its connotation of ancient ritual. From the symbolic development of the black box, the story shifts quickly to climax.

Writing from different viewpoints allows the author, Tim O’Brien, to express himself in a more comfortable manner. Written in this viewpoint, the story is read as a tale instead of an autobiography and the author becomes more distant with the story like he is looking into it rather than writing it.

The reader might interpret the lottery as a good thing, but as they read they pick up small details on how it was an incorrect interpretation. In lines 15-18 it states, “Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his example, selecting the smoothest and roundest stones.” It shows foreshadow from this piece of evidence of what is going to go on at the end of the story. It was thought to be a good lottery by the reader at the beginning, but it was a lottery with the prize of death, you get stoned. Additionally, the author sets the characters’ perspective to be a neutral view on the lottery, many readers might think the lottery in the story is just not right.

In both stories, the innocent characters were fighting death at the hands of someone who found the idea of killing another human being to be a game. In “The Lottery” the game of death consumed an innocent life solely because a few individuals founded a tradition; and in “The Most Dangerous Game” the game of death consumed an innocent life solely because one person thought it was merely entertaining. Both authors portrayed the antagonist as friendly, warm and welcoming. In the Lottery, the antagonists were the families whom participated in the drawing of a name that lead to the stoning of another family member (which may or may not be their own family member). In “The Most Dangerous Game” the antagonist was a well-off general who opened his luxurious home to guests who have gone astray from their original destination. Death is the main theme of both short stories and both authors portrayed this dark and dreary idea as a game the characters are playing.

In The Lottery, the author decides to use 3rd person objective point of view in order to not give too many details away but slowly reveal them. In The Lottery the story is told from an objective point of view where the author becomes an observer it only captures what is being told not what the characters internal thoughts may be. 3rd person objective point of view is the appropriate point of view for this story because if a different one was chosen then the reader would know what was happening right away. Instead of the story starting with “The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a summer day”(Jackson 261) it could have started with the point of view of Tessie where she said, “the day finally came where one of us would die”. If the story had actually focused on one character such as Tessie the ending of the story would be revealed and it would make the story boring.

Perspective plays a crucial role in a story. When a story is presented from a character’s point of view it gives the audience only their version of the story. This can be misleading for the audience because they do not know if what they are reading is the truth. The poems “Those Winter Sundays”, “Forgiving My Father”, and the story, The Glass Menagerie, are told from one character’s perspective. Due to the poems and story being narrated from one character’s perspective, the story becomes one-sided, which negatively affects the relationship of the audience with the narrative.

In her short story, “The Lottery”, Sheila Jackson invites us into the square of a small village on a warm summer day (247). It is not just any day. It is the 27th of June; an annually anticipated day for this community (Jackson, 247). The scene is described to depict a pre-technology era, most likely resembling an early American town. They have postal service, a school, and a bank, but no mention of devices, such as telephones, or modern transportation is made. (Jackson, 247). It is possible that the author wanted to represent the very basic elements in our humanity when choosing the setting.