Blind Obedience in Shirley Jackson's The Lottery

In “The Lottery,” Shirley Jackson conveys that tradition destructs society through a long-established random selection process that leads to the disgusting execution of Tessie Hutchinson. For instance, in response to news that a village over north relinquishes the traditional lottery, Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, exclaims, “Pack of crazy fools . . . Listening to the young folks, nothing’s good enough for them. Next thing you know, they’ll be wanting to go back to living in caves, nobody work any more, live that way for a while” (Jackson 3). Old Man Warner immediately dismisses new, “young” ideas, regarding them as stupid and absurd because they are unorthodox. Incorrectly concluding that change further regresses

The lottery is usually associated with beating the odds and winning something extravagant. In Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery”, the reader is led to believe the story is about something cheerful and happy given the setting of a warm summer day and children out of school for the summer. Jackson turns winning the lottery into a bad thing. Of 300 villagers Tessie Hutchinson shows up late, claiming she forgot about the annual lottery drawing, but seems very excited to have made it on time. When Tessie was in no danger she is gossiping with neighbors and encourages her husband to draw for the winner. Jackson curiously builds up the character of Tessie so that it seems she is blinded by tradition until she becomes a victim of it

In the short story "The Lottery," Shirley Jackson uses figurative language, symbolism, and irony to reveal her theme that things are not always what they seem to be. In this shocking short story, she reveals the corruption of human nature by telling of the ceremony they call “The lottery”.

The symbolism behind the stones is clear; they are not only murder weapons, but the first tools ever made by men were made of stone, which denote the savage and violent customs of ancestors.

In “The Lottery” Shirley Jackson writes about the game lottery, which makes the story very ironic. Unlike all of the other Lottery games, in this traditional version no one wants to be chosen, because that brings them the end of their life. Jackson explains how keeping up with some traditions that are part of people’s life, may not be the best choice to embrace a particular culture. Jackson uses the Lottery as an example to express her idea about the ethical issues such as; violent murder, harming people, forcefully following a tradition, and lying. All of these ethical issues are created by blindly following tradition in “The Lottery.”

The author of “The Lottery” Shirley Jackson decided it was important to write this short story in order to inform the readers about another dimension, where a certain common tradition gets prized with something obscure. Some readers can be shocked when reading this story, because they might be surprised and even shocked with the themes that play along in the storyline. This short story “The Lottery” was so controversial at the time, because in the date it was published in June 24, 1948 there were so many themes from the stories that could relate to past events or even event that were taking place at the time.

According to Fromm, “Human history began with an act of disobedience, and it is not unlikely that it will be terminated by an act of obedience.” (362). Jackson’s short story gave examples of how humanistic conscience and obedience can affect people’s actions. Obedience in this short story is demonstrated on three different levels as well having an overall obedience to the tradition or belief they have as a community. The townspeople in “The Lottery” act the way they do because the lack of humanistic conscience.

“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson and “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell are both stories about humans hunting humans. Jackson’s approach to this is by staging a lottery to choose a citizen to be sacrificed, whereas “The Most Dangerous Game” has a man who hunts humans on his private island. While both Jackson’s “The Lottery” and Connell’s “The Most Dangerous Game” show that humans have little to no empathy until they’re the ones suffering through dramatic events, Jackson’s characterization of Mrs. Hutchinson and surprise ending demonstrate mankind’s tendencies toward self-involvement much more effectively.

In the story, The Lottery, by Shirley Jackson, we are introduced to a story where traditions can be dangerous. It is a warm sunny day, and the time is approaching for the event to occur, the people gather in the town square and prepare for what they know happens every year. Slowly but surely, one by one they draw from the black box and the one that draws the right one, is chosen. The other villagers stone the chosen one to death. Although some readers may think this is just a normal story about a parable, it represents much more than just that. The author portrays a story about an attack on a small-town America. Shirley Jackson gives the reader this understanding by using the elements of irony, foreshadowing and symbolism.

When the word lottery comes to your head you assume it is good but not in most cases. This is the case in The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. The Lottery is about a family named the Hutchison’s. All the families in this small village participate in the tradition, the lottery. It is not a normal lottery.

“The Lottery” is a short story written by Shirley Jackson. The story takes place in a small conservative town where annually the citizens perform a ritual called the lottery. The author uses her story to highlight the effects of traditions on societies, and what general belief can cause people to do. In this story, Jackson uses several literary devices to develop the plot. This is evident through her various uses of irony, foreshadowing, and imagery.

Many readers in the beginning would assume that the lottery would be good thing, even assume it a lottery of money. However, the lottery is the fate of life. The story setting took place in a town where the lottery takes place. There were multiple lotteries that occur though out the story.

In Shirley Jackson’s short story entitled “The Lottery”, obedience is expressed as members of this fictional society participate in an annual stoning. Villagers assemble on a beautiful summer’s day, caring out conversation as they await the annual lottery. Once the drawing concludes, the true nature of the lottery is revealed and a randomly selected member is then stoned to death. American psychologist, Stanley Milgram, conducted controversial social psychology experiments on obedience during his professorship at Yale University. The Milgram experiment measured the willingness of study participants, a socially diverse range of male applicants, to obey morally conflicting acts instructed by an authoritative figure. Participants were under the impression they were assisting an unrelated experiment, in which they administer electric shock to a “learner” as a form of corrective action. Fake electric shocks progressively increased to fatal levels of electricity if actually administered. Unexpectedly, the experiment found that a majority of participants would reluctantly obey the instructions of fatal harm. Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” and Stanley Milgram’s behavioral study of obedience suggest societal influences drive individuals to conformity, findings of the Milgram experiments reflect Jackson’s characters’ behaviors.

One of the most interesting points of “The Lottery" is the exploration of the reason the lottery in the story exists. The choice of the author to not explain this is one of the most important choices in the story. Perhaps the most interesting of the theories on the lottery's meaning is the simple idea of the scapegoat. The basic idea of the scapegoat has existed since the early days of Judaism. In that tradition it was literally a goat, but the idea is to sacrifice a single person for the sins of the society is generally how it has been used metaphorically.

“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson is a short story written in 1948. Due to World War II ending around this time, her story took some strong criticism. The people at that time wanted uplifting stories, and this story is the very opposite because of its underlying theme of tradition and conformity. “The Lottery” shows that no matter the tradition or belief, people will not stray from their daily routine because humans are creatures of habit, and are scared to wonder from what we know. Jackson writes by providing the reader with little details at first.Then making the reader put the information all together to come to the conclusion that people will never change. Jackson then creates symbols of tradition and conformity by adding details, using specific objects, and”The Lottery” itself.