Dangers Of Tradition In Shirley Jackson's The Lottery

Throughout centuries, traditions and rituals have had the ability to control one’s behavior. In Shirley Jackson’s, “The Lottery”, she tells the reader of a small village. On the surface, this community may seem relatively normal. However, despite the picturesque appeal, this falsely serene village has a distinct deceitful flaw. On June 27th, every year, a lottery takes place.

Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is an account of a tradition gone awry. In this short story the villagers of this town have a tradition where they have a “lottery” to see who gets stoned to death. The characterization and symbolism used in the story makes the reader feel as if society has crumbled with the inhumane tradition that ultimately lost its meaning. Throughout the story, Jackson uses characterization and symbolism to imply a message to society about the meaning of tradition. Through the use of characterization and symbolism Jackson establishes that blindly following traditions can be hazardous

Conformity can make people do cruel things without reason. Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” highlights a village that continues a senseless tradition of stoning the winner of a lottery. Although all the villagers initially seemed innocuous and welcoming, as soon as the winning ticket was drawn, everybody quickly turned against the winner, Mrs. Hutchinson. Through a stark, cold tone, Jackson brings attention to the dangers of unquestionable loyalty to old traditions. Jackson starts the story with antiquated characters that contribute to the blunt tone.

The short story “The Lottery” is written by Shirley Jackson. This story takes place in a small village where everybody knows each other. In this story all the villagers gather around town for their annual lottery. Everyone in the village is compelled to follow this tradition even if the outcome ends up with someone dying. In “The Lottery”, Shirley Jackson uses conflict, theme, and irony to develop this suspenseful short story.

While real life traditions are rarely so extreme, Jackson’s exaggerated fictional example emphasizes her point to great effect. By the end of the story, the audience is convinced that the town is wrong to uphold the lottery tradition, but Jackson is not really writing about a lottery; she is writing about how damaging it can

In the short story “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson there are many different types expressed throughout. Immediately, there is Dramatic Irony with the title of the story because we associate the Lottery with the winning of a grand prize that will improve the life of that person. Although in the story the winner is stoned to death by the village catching the reader off guard. Over the course of the story we are alluded to believe this occasion is a joyful time with children playing in the village, “square dances, the teen club, {and} the halloween program” (pg.1). Additionally, it is ironic that when Mr. Hutchinson is ask come upstage his wife is eager and encourages her husband to chose which in reality leads to her death.

Traditions have been sought after and passed on for generations; with no questions asked, whether humane or not, traditions are hard to break and diminish as they are often what a culture or community stands for. In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, a story about the tradition of a small village, is painted in impeccable details of peace, and serenity on a warm summer day, as everyone follows the tradition they have known since a long time ago despite the true intentions and meaning of it forgotten. The Lottery taking place annually is like no other lottery, it paints the true picture of the horror that epitomizes the tradition that none of the villagers dare to question, despite it creating separation between gender and families and ruining

‘The Lottery’ is a story about tradition and sacrifice. However, even though the NY times article is about sacrifice, they are for different things. Such as money vs. good luck. ‘The Lottery’ talks about this small, peaceful village that have no problems and has mainly positive dialogue. But this village has this really weird tradition. This tradition is based on a lottery. There would be this lottery and every family has their name on it by force since it is a tradition and the family that gets picked would have to do another lottery to see which one in the family dies. To know which person in the family dies every person in the family gets a paper and the paper with the black dot dash. In the lottery someone picks out a family name and the family name that year was the Hutchinsons. The Hutchinsons were pretty mad and mostly Tessie Hutchinson, who started shouting that this is unfair. Then they proceeded to the final lottery, which was the one based on who will die. Every person in the family got a paper and the person with the black dot was Tessie Hutchinson, who then started shouting this is unfair and everyone started throwing rocks at her until she died. The whole story is ironic itself because the tone of the story is a place that’s perfect. The dialogue is mainly positive. The title “The Lottery” also gives the reader a positive perception of the story, that the lottery is a contest, not an execution, but it is in fact an execution at the end. In the article it talks

The world is currently affected by the foulest illness of all: conformity. Many people are nervous to stray away from tradition in fear of being an outcast, even if that means following customs like racism and sexism, which causes chaos among the country. Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” displays this morbid reality when a town of villagers gathers to obey their annual tradition. Although this event appears at first to be pleasant and festive, it soon becomes clear that the prize is not something of value. The “winner”, it turns out, will be stoned to death. The story closes as the villagers begin to throw rocks at a person from their own community. Jackson uses tone, symbolism, and irony to convey that conformity can cause destruction.

The story of “ The Lottery ” by Shirley Jackson is a very surprising story especially towards the end. It causes great consternation and shock when we learn that the winner of the lottery - Tessie Hutchinson, does not win an award, rather finds herself stoned to death. This somewhat shows the role that superstition played years ago. It was widely prevalent and as we progressed in terms of science and technology, we have come to break apart from such harmful traditions. It is precisely due to these superstitions, often many an innocent life has been taken without just cause.

Shirley Jackson’s “The lottery” is a story based on tradition. When hearing the word tradition, most people think of team rituals before games, or something families do together annually. However, Jackson is obviously not like most people. She builds up a fair amount of tension around this ritual that is taking place to make readers wonder what is going on. She uses many different techniques to show that sometimes, traditions are not always meant to go on forever.

Many people would die to win the lottery; in the short story “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson you would do anything NOT to win this lottery. This annual lottery reveals the negative aspects of this town’s Tradition, Savagery, Barbarism, and cold-heartedness. In this paper I will show why this town blindly follows these customs, not because it’s a tradition but because of the accepting wickedness that can be shown. Why does the town follow this foolish tradition? Throughout “The Lottery” the narrator tells that the people do not remember how the lottery began, and that some of the older people believe the lottery has changed over the years, that now people just want to get it over with as fast as possible.

The author Shirley Jackson wrote “The Lottery;” a village conducts an inhumane lottery to pick out one individual. The quote unquote “winner,” in this case, Mrs. “Tessie” Hutchinson, gets stoned heartlessly to death by all the 300 villagers, including her kin. This lottery began as a ceremony long ago to choose a villager to be sacrificed to Earth in exchange for a large harvest. Now, it became an annual tradition, a tradition that is too deep to be changed.

This essay contends that the convention of the lottery speaks to the discriminatory stratification of the social order along lines of gender and financial position. The story sets put in a residential community in New England. Consistently a lottery is held, in which one individual is to be randomly decided to be stoned to death by the individuals in the town. The lottery has been practiced in excess of seventy years by the townspeople. By utilizing imagery, Jackson uses names, items, and the setting to hide the genuine importance and expectation of the lottery.

The villagers on “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson are afraid to let go of their tradition, the lottery. They are concern of unknown consequences that will happen if they change their old customs. So, for every year, the villagers gather at the square to do the lottery at 10 AM .