Essay Rituals

“The less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it” (Twain). The Lottery begins during the summer. A small, seemingly normal, town is gathering to throw the annual “Lottery”. In the end, the townspeople—children included—gather around and stone the winner to death, simply because it was tradition. The story reveals how traditions can become outdated and ineffective. “I suppose, I hoped, by setting a particularly brutal ancient rite in the present and in my own village to shock the story's readers with a graphic dramatization of the pointless violence and general inhumanity in their own lives” (Jackson). As humans develop as a race, their practices should develop with them. Shirley Jackson develops the

Rituals and sacrifices are still prevalent in several societies, and have been for hundreds of years. They are used to appease gods and secure a good harvest. Some still consider these outdated practices necessary to this day, and in Shirley Jackson’s controversial short story, “The Lottery”, she is here to prove those individuals wrong. In Jackson’s narrative, citizens from a small village gather in a village square to participate in an annual lottery. The head of each household is brought forward to choose a slip of paper from a cryptic black box. Once all of the citizens obtain a slip, everyone opens their slip of paper to see who has been selected. Bill Hutchinson picks the marked slip. The Hutchinson family then must draw

(Quotes: “Bobbie Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones and the other boys soon followed his example selecting the smoothest and roundest stones.” [pg147] “The pile of stones the boys had made earlier was ready. Tessie Hutchinson was in the center of a cleared space by now, she held her hands up desperately as the villagers moved in on her, ‘It isn’t fair,’ she said. A stone hit her on the side of the

Shirley Jackson also utilizes literary devices to good effect in “The Lottery,” especially that of symbolism. By keeping the setting devoid of any identifying details, Jackson frees the reader to imagine that it could be any place. The only constraints that the author places on her readers’ creativity are that the town is decidedly rural, perhaps narrowing the critique to the cultural scene most frequently associated with small town America. Other symbols include the box from which the lottery slips are drawn (an old and black object which heralds death), stoning as a method of execution (a particularly old and excruciating way to kill someone), and ritual itself (a series of often ill contemplated actions for which one needs no particular reason to follow). All of these, with their marked reference to age, clearly refer to tradition.

Shirley Jackson's “The Lottery” is a short story about the annual gathering of the villagers to conduct an ancient ritual. The ritual ends in the stoning of one of the residents of this small village. This murder functions under the guise of a sacrament that, at one time, served the purpose of ensuring a bountiful harvest. This original meaning, however, is lost over the years and generations of villagers. The loss of meaning has changed the nature and overall purpose of the lottery. This ritual is no longer a humble sacrifice that serves the purpose of securing the harvest but instead is a ceremony of violence and murder only existing for the pleasure found in this violence.

It is sad that misuse of rituals could lead people to death. “The Lottery” illustrates a rural town with small population doing a drawing yearly to pick one person and stone him (her) to death. People follow rituals to remember the elders or being moral; it’s not the way of

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.

The first example of symbolism that was found in this text was, the painting that was being painted in the beginning of the story. That was supposedly symbolizing the way that they were living. The next example is the title it is also a big part of the story, it is the number that you are supposed to call if you want to volunteer to die. So, it represented a lot of death.

In Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery”, it can be very dangerous to follow traditions blindly without knowing about the horrible consequences. When one follows traditions and laws and never questions or seeks to understand the reason for them, the inevitable outcome often brings sorrow. Indeed blind devotion to complying with rules that destroys the human spirit by removing choice, and continuing rituals with dark consequences, and punishing anyone who objects to following tradition. Complying with rules that helps lead to destroying the human spirit is dangerous because individuals should always have the choice to follow those rules. The blind devotion of the village participating in the town’s yearly lottery is the clear example why all rules aren’t always positive. Rituals can be looked upon as positive but they also can have a negative connotation when they lead to dangerous consequences. The village in the story has a ritual every year to hold a lottery, where the winner is stoned to death and this is a clear example how a ritual can be viewed negatively. Traditions are beliefs passed down between generations of a family or culture. They are things we do by choice because they are enjoyable and meaningful for the people involved. Traditions in the story have a dark side to it because the tradition in this village is to kill one of members of the village using a lottery system. The dark side of “The Lottery”, is substantial with many down falls of

Mark Pedelty said: “Ritual is, therefore, a primary site of contact between self and society, a place where our individual selves are transformed into collective selves.” As Pedelty suggests, rituals create a loss of individualism and an increase in conformity. Pedelty’s idea is clearly displayed with the fictional rituals in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery.” These two stories’ rituals are based on chance and are basically death sentences; in contrast, the rituals are viewed differently and were created for different reasons.

Griffin, Amy A. in his article “ The lottery” asserts that,” in shirley jackson’s “ The Lottery’’ A good harvest has always been vital to civilizations. After the fields have been prepared and the seeds sown, the farmer can only wait and hope that the proper balance of rain and sun will ensure a good harvest. From this hope spring ritual. Many ancient cultures believe that growing crops represented the life cycle, beginning with what one associates with the end death. Seeds buried,apparently without hope of germination, represent death, but with the life forces of water and the sun, the seeds grows, representing rebirth, consequently, ancient peoples began sacrificial rituals to emulate this resurrection cycle. What began as a vegetation ritual developed into a cathartic cleansing of an entire tribe or village. By transferring one's sins to person or animals and then sacrificing them, people believe that their sins would be eliminated, a process that has been termed the "scapegoat" archetype ( guerin et al. 158). In her short story "The Lottery" Shirley Jackson uses this archetype to build on man's inherent need for such ritual. (44).

Some symbolism in these is story is when they would get the black box, and open it up they would choose who would die, that kinda gives you a idea of idea of the black box symbolizing death.

Many times people do not want traditions to be changed even if they are not beneficial. Communities rely on traditions to keep the people in the town active for many more generations even if the rituals are not ethical. The story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson is an example of a community that knows there is a problem with “the lottery” but is unwilling to do anything about the situation. Jackson shows the readers how many characters never want the tradition to change because they are afraid of what might happen. This story gives the reader a better understanding of how much tradition means to a society even if the ritual kills people annually.

Annually traditions are something that is important to people all over the world. These traditions are certainly creating happiness amongst the people who participate. Therefore, people strive to maintain these traditions. These traditions are definitely something that the people of Shirley Jackson’s novel “The Lottery” take very seriously. In the novel there is an annual lottery draw in a tiny town. The lottery works randomly and every year a person is chosen to be stoned to death by the people in the village.

In Shirley Jackson’s, “The Lottery”, tells the story of a small town that gathers once a year to do a lottery. This isn’t your typical lottery. In this lottery the winner loses instead of winning. The winner is stoned to death as a part of “tradition”. The town people blindly follow this tradition and are unwilling to change. Tradition is one of the main themes in this story and it should be left alone.