The Lottery By Shirley Jackson Analysis

"The Lottery" takes place on June 27, a beautiful summer day, in a small New England village where all the residents are gathering for their traditional annual lottery. Though the event first appears festive, it soon becomes clear that no one wants to win the lottery. Tessie Hutchinson seems unconcerned about the tradition until her family draws the dreaded mark. Then she protests that the process wasn't fair. The "winner," it turns out, will be stoned to death by the remaining residents. Tessie wins, and the story closes as the villagers -- including her own family members -- begin to throw rocks at her.

"The Lottery", is a story about how people stick to tradition. It describes how painstakingly people do not give up tradition and would rather kill someone than give it up. In the beginning, all of the townspeople are gathered in the TownSquare just as they do every year on this day. All the man and women are

The Lottery by Shirley Jackson is a short story widely considered to be one of the greatest dystopian works ever published. In the text, Jackson explores many implied themes including the use of scapegoats by society, the dangers of mob mentality and the consequences of society strictly adhering to tradition. Jackson’s text was clearly influenced by the Second World War that had concluded a mere three years before the date of publication. The Second World War was the largest, bloodiest war in human history. It exposed a potential for evil within mankind that had never before been seen. The Lottery is a clear parallel of the events of the Second World War, the story serves as a warning to future generations to avoid committing the mistakes of the past and does so by making extensive use of parallelism and symbolism to convey its message.

Despite their differences in their approach to characterization, both Joyce Carol Oates and Shirley Jackson managed to craft haunting short stories, whose characters quickly bond to your brain before they are quickly ripped away.

In the short story The Lottery an idea is portrayed that in a lot of parts of the world tradition comes before logical choices, hanging onto the idea that all the families follow this tradition. The majority of the town does not like enduring this tradition but still follow it. Everyone had a tradition in there household or community and respecting this tradition has show to come before in line of there personal beliefs and values. Shows the idea that not a single person can overcome society but as a whole to abolish the lottery.

Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is a literary exploration of society’s obsession with tradition, even when it crosses the line of morality. Jackson’s difficult family life becomes evident through the subjects of her writing, as well as her aversion to traditional family dynamics. Jackson’s outlook on society was heavily influenced by her personal life experiences.

“The Lottery”, by Shirley Jackson is a short story about a disturbing social practice in a village. Besides, there were about three hundred citizens in the small village where the setting took place. The introduction of “the lottery” is about an event that takes place every year on 27th in the month of June, where the community members of this tradition organize a lottery. Everyone in the village including small children to adults is expected to participate. Besides, when this story was introduced at the very first in 1948 by Shirley Jackson, many people were upset. This is because this story was so strange to undertake in modern enlightened times.

Author Shirley Jackson uses symbolism, motif and great detail throughout the story, “The Lottery” in an effort to portray a ritualistic behavior that the townspeople call their “tradition”. The reader is left with the decision as to whether or not this “tradition” is ritualistic or inhumane. The townspeople congregate in the town square for traditional purposes where the Lottery will occur. The short story opens to a serene scene. “Clear and sunny’ morning, it sounds as if it is going to be a peaceful day but takes a sudden turn for the worse. The symbolism in this story is important to the message being conveyed. The townspeople’s ritual comes before any other aspect in their town even family. Family is one of the most important things in

Grace Hopper said, “The most dangerous phrase in the language is, ‘We’ve always done it this way.’” This quote comes to mind when reading “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson because of one of the themes in her story being traditions and following them blindly. There are three different characters that stand out in this story. The children, Old Man Warner and Tessie Hutchinson. Each one of them represent a different consequence that comes with following traditions blindly. The corruption of innocence, closed mindedness and being a lost cause.

In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” the story conducts a “lottery” that involves the families of the town to go into a drawing. Once the drawing is done, the winner of the lottery is used as a sacrifice in the town and is pelted by stones thrown from the community, including children. Furthermore, the basis of “The Lottery” has to do with psychological problems and influence. Psychoanalysis is built upon Sigmund Freud’s theories of psychology, which asserts that the human mind is affected by their “unconscious that is driven by their desires and fears” (Brizee). Analyzing the concept of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” through a psychoanalytic lens convey how society reflects on the consciousness, how the denial of the mind can avoid the

The setting of “The Lottery” is a small suburban town with a population of approximately three hundred. This is important because it makes the town seem utterly normal. This allows for the reader to appreciate to the fullest extent the townspeople turning on and

How can the villagers kill a person they know for a long time every single year just because of a silly tradition that has been alive for generations? It is pretty bizarre how the villagers still cope with traditions that can kill themselves any year. Almost everyone who participated in this lottery was extremely nervous showing their fear of death. A tall boy in this crowd drew for his mother and him, he risked his life with a higher chance of getting killed. This shows the love he has for his mother. Mr. Summer said “Glad to see your mother’s got a man to do it”, foreshadowing the death of the tall boy’s father. The tall boy might have thrown pebbles on his father, leading to his demise and a tough future for

Furthermore, the lottery also made the villagers have a lack of sensibility. For example, Mr. Summers is the man who conducts the slips for the villagers and basically begins the preparation of one of their deaths. However, it’s ironic how he has been conducting this tradition for many years in the village and he is anticipating the deaths upon the villagers. The main reason why the story signifies person vs. society because the villagers all attacked and killed Tessie because of a tradition which involves sacrificing. In addition, another interesting character in the story was Mr. Adams because he is aware that the tradition is not as exciting as it seems, however, he stills participates in it. He is aware that the lottery is primitive and inhuman because of his actions, for example, in the story it implies how nervous he was to grab the paper out of the black box and he felt like he couldn’t speak or himself because if he does he

“Every group feels strong, once it has found a scapegoat” (Mignon McLaughlin, 1913). A scapegoat is someone who is blamed for all the faults and corruptions that others have committed. In history, there are lots of scapegoat examples, the most popular being; Jesus Christ and the Jews in the Second World War. In the short story “The Lottery”, Shirley Jackson used persecution and tradition to demonstrate how scapegoating justified unfair killing. Both of these aspects relate to the World War that preceded only a couple years before the story was written. The persecution was blind and done once a year as a tradition that everyone expected to happen.

Paragraph 1 The Lottery, a short story by Shirley Jackson, was published in 1948 in the magazine The New Yorker. The plot is that It starts in a small town with 300 people on a sunny day June 28th people gathered in the town square with lots of farmers 1st the slips are prepared 1 for each family. head of the family draws and draw notes the ones with black dot draw again. but it’s the family the family member with the black dot gets stoned to death. The theme of the story. The theme was blindly following tradition. First, When people gather in the town square for the lottery because it’s tradition and they don’t want to break it. Second, When people throw rock nobody apise because they think no one will stand beside the to help. Next, fear