Blindly Following Tradition Depicted In Shirley Jackson's The Lottery

Shirley Jackson is often regarded as one of the most brilliant authors of the twentieth century. Born in San Francisco in 1916, she spent the majority of her adolescence writing short stories and poetry (Allen). While she is known best for her supernatural stories, one of her most popular works is a short story called “The Lottery”. The lottery takes place in a small village in which once a year on June 24th, the town population is gathered. After the gathering, there is a drawing to see which family is chosen, after the family is chosen, another drawing takes place to see who is stoned to death. In the New Yorker's magazine book review hailed “The Lottery” as “one of the most haunting and shocking short stories of modern America and is one of the most frequently anthologized” (Jackson). This review stems heavily from Jackson’s brilliant use of irony, symbolism, and foreshadowing. However, perhaps what truly stands out is how Jackson is able to wrap all of those elements together as a way to show an overarching theme of the corruption that exists in human nature. While the real source of “The Lottery’s” inspiration is unclear, there has been heavy speculation that the roots lie heavily in the actions of the holocaust and the actions that took place during World War II. Regardless of the source material, a general consensus can be made that the plot of the lottery is a dark reflection of human actions.

There are many things that people do every day without questioning why they do them. These are our habits and traditions, and though for the most part they are unimportant they can be a crucial part of our culture and our interactions with each other. Sometimes there are traditions that can cause harm or are morally unacceptable. What should be done in this case? Edmund Burke, a nineteenth century politician and author, argues that it is best to stick with tradition rather than causing dramatic changes in people’s behavior. This is a key component in his argument against the French Revolution in his essay “Reflections on the Revolution in France.” In this essay he argues that the revolution will only lead the

Shirley Jackson, born on December 14, 1916, devoted much of her life to the writing of short stories and novels. Some of these include The Haunting of Hill House 1959 , The Sundial 1958 ,and We Have Always Lived in the Castle 1962 . Jackson's stories are inspiring and influential to most as well as controversial to some. Her most controversial story, published in 1948 in The New Yorker, is "The Lottery." The intentions of the story varies depending upon the reader. Whatever the intentions may be, "The Lottery" remains one of the most famous stories today. Despite the controversy, readers notice the symbols and underlying themes that are prevalent throughout the story.

There are so many stories that glorify how humans strive to be great, how they strive for perfection. In reality, people gravitate towards normality and focus on how they can fit into the grand scheme of things, rather than stand out of the crowd. Even though some find the occasional urge to break from the cycle, the majority gets sucked back in, whether it is due to traditions or the current societal norms. With the 1900s came a challenge against these traditions – technology, new ideas, and drastic international events gave rise to a counterculture movement that clashed with traditional restrictions like temperance and modesty. Modern thinkers believed that such ideas were outdated, that their meaning had been lost in this age of rapid development.

The Lottery, a short story by author Shirley Jackson, is a representation of our somewhat conformist society as a whole, within communities, not only in America, but around the world. Jackson, utilizes small town settings and symbolism through her creative writing style. The Lottery, was written in 1948, approximately three years after the liberation of the World War II concentration camp Auschwitz. Not surprisingly, some people still deny that the Holocaust ever happened. Jackson illustrates that even a small towns, tight knit population, can discount evil, and evil is still prevailing in our current society (for example: the terrorist attacks on September 11; the massacres in France.).

Sometimes when a certain group of people have a tradition, no matter what the tradition is, they follow it. They don’t know how it started or who started it, which is the main reason why that is a tradition. For example, why is turkey the main food at Thanksgiving dinners? Why not other meats like, beef, or lamb? We follow this tradition every year because that's how it's always been.

Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is the story of a town where they hold an annual lottery within the town, where the winner is stoned and killed. In the time span of the story, a woman named Tessie is the winner of the lottery, but earlier in the day was following this tradition blindly. She only protests when her family is picked. The overall message in the story is that tradition is not always good, and you should stop what is not right.

The word lottery is often associated with winning prizes and money. Those who participate will sometimes visualize themselves winning and are disappointed when they don’t; they pray that their number gets called up or that their ticket has the winning number in order for them to win the grand prize. But imagine in an alternative world where people pray their card doesn’t get called up; that instead of winning a prize, that person will be killed in the cruelest way possible. In “The Lottery,” written by Shirley Jackson, it focuses on a small town who conduct a lottery every year, bringing the whole community together, and instead of winning a prize, the name drawn gets stoned to death. This story takes place in the present, so finding out that a village conducts this horrifying tradition every year is bizarre.

People love to win lotteries, right? Well, probably not so much in this small farm town, who treats their winners a little different. In this small town, not all lotteries are for the good of the people. The townspeople perpetuate unnecessary traditions and with these traditions, punish those who do not deserve the punishment. Through the depictions of the nervousness of the adults and children, as well as her descriptions of the objects associated with the lottery, Shirley Jackson, in her short story, “The Lottery," suggests the horror of the violence that concludes the story.

Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” A lottery sounds like a drawing of a prize that is given away at the end of the drawing to the winner. At least that is how it works today. In today's society a lottery is used as a mean of selling numbered tickets and giving the cash or prize to the winners of the tickets. In Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery” the term lottery is somewhat similar but used in a very different manner.

The Lottery In the story, “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, it’s about a village tradition where they come together to do a lottery. It’s been a tradition that was created by the villagers’ ancestors and since the creation, it has been a yearly get-together. The villagers repeatedly go to the lottery yearly, without even knowing the reason behind the fact that it was created or why it feels like they need to go. They never question themselves on the reason they go, what they are doing during the lottery, or what they do to “celebrate” the person that wins the lottery.

What is Shirley Jackson saying about traditional rituals in “The Lottery”? Think of some ritual in our present society that you think ought to be dropped or modified. Some you might consider are: proms, weddings, Christmas gift exchanges, dating conventions, beauty pageants, boxing matches, funeral services, graduation ceremonies, fraternity/sorority pledging, etc.

The Lottery’s society is based on a sacred tradition that cannot be abandoned. Their society forced each and everyone in the town to persecute innocent human beings. The people were blind from the truth of what is actually happening. They were brainwashed into thinking that their tradition was normal. Children were taught to kill their parents. At a young age, they witnessed death right in front of their eyes. Their society made everyone participated in their friends and families death, without having the guilt of murder. No one had a voice in this town. Everyone just followed what the mob was doing. If one opposes to this vicious act, their opinion doesn’t affect anyone. People were afraid to rebel because of the power that their society holds.

As the reader begins to read Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, we see nothing but an innocent town that is full of people beginning to present a ritual or traditional ceremony. We see that they present themselves to be a small town who loves each other and wants to have a good time, as well as a town who follows closely to each other no matter what. While reading the story it presents two very different questions, why people in this town work solely on tradition and follow it roughly even if that means that they must kill their own and why the people of the community are so quick to kill someone even if they are guilty of nothing, a unfortunate fact even in the real world today with the death rates. Could it be that Shirley Jackson was presenting the readers with a mirror experience to show that at times we can be blinded by the gratification that tradition leaves us, the feeling we

The Lottery written by Shirley Jackson was mainly a short story that informed us about Lottery day, which was an event that happened once every year. Also would let us know how unlucky someone would be if they had got the black dot and then how it could really lead to death.