Similarities Between Charles And The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

Foreshadowing in “Charles” In the short story “Charles,” foreshadowing helps us realize that Charles is actually Laurie. For instance, everyday when Laurie came home from school he always had a terrible story to tell his parents about Charles. When Laurie tells his parents Charles hit the teacher his mother is concerned and asks for the child's name. In the text it states “Laurie thought. ‘It was Charles.”

What I learnt from the source was how the lottery doesn’t just use the standardize irony that is generally recognized by the audience. But in particular, Shirley Jackson uses dramatic irony. We are proposed by dramatic irony from the start of story. Before I had even read the story, I assumed that this would be one of those happy/cheesy stories with that amazing “Disney Pixar” ending where everyone lives happy and a good life. And I was yet to be proven wrong when I began reading the story as Shirley Jackson presented the setting as a beautiful day and everything seemed to be going smoothly.

Usually there’s a winner in a lottery, but not in Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”. This story intrigued me by it's suspenseful nature and it's chaotic events. In small town America, they come together once a year to perform an annual tradition. Mrs. Jackson demonstrates literary devices such as foreshadowing, mood, and conflict in “The Lottery”. Foreshadowing is used quite a few times in “The Lottery”.

The stories The Lottery by Shirley Jackson and The Rocking-Horse Winner by D.H. Lawrence share similarities in their stories. The difference is based on the three major areas in examining any story which are the character, plot, and setting. In general, the atmosphere is configured so that readers are attracted to fiction. A brief prose tale that can be read in one sitting, usually plot function as the driving force. The writer allows the reader to have a complete view of the story, based on the configuration.

Everyone has those family traditions that they follow blindly, but in most cases everyone’s family tradition does not result in a dead family member or friend. In the story ‘The Lottery” a small village town has an annual lottery that they host every year that results in one dead member of their village. They choose their winner by gathering all the towns people’s names into a black box and drawing first a family from the town and then a member from within that family. In the film known as The Hunger Games, the people of Panem also follow the annual tradition of a lottery where the winners die. Although both stories share similar properties such as symbolism, they differ when it comes to the society and protagonists of each one.

It gets the reader excited for the tradition of the lottery when reading that the people in the village are seemingly excited too.

When the twelve year old Nancy “[goes] forward switching her skirt, [taking] a slip daintily from the box,” the audience is struck by her innocence, making the subsequent death of her mother via the lottery outcome even more terrible and tragic. A still more effective example of Jackson’s appeals to pathos occurs at the end of the story, where “someone [gives] little Davy Hutchinson a few pebbles” to join the crowd in stoning his mother. This moment is incredibly poignant and elevates the disgust and pity that the audience feels as the nature of the lottery is revealed. Little Davy is too young understand what is happening, and it is reasonable to assume that the rest of the characters have long since lost touch with the purpose of the lottery, as the only explanation the audience is given for its continuation is Warner’s statement that “there’s always been a lottery.” This remarkably insufficient excuse in support of such a heinous crime secures the sympathy of the audience towards not only Tessie’s plight but also Jackson’s argument.

When the lottery was conducted by Mr. Summers, the writer began to reveal that something is askew, as the crowd got more anxious. As narrated in the story “most of them were quiet. Wetting their lips. Not looking around”. This shows that the villagers were nervous when the lottery began.

So then Tessie starts to complain that the drawing was not set up properly (Jackson). In “The Lottery,” Shirley Jackson uses the symbolism, characterization, and theme to develop this short story. The symbolism of

In her story "The Lottery", Shirley Jackson implies the negative consequences of blindly following tradition through the acceptance, by the villagers, of the tradition of the lottery. Jackson suggests that the people of the village are afraid to give up the little tradition they have, even if it is not good. Every year after the lottery, the conductor of the lottery, Mr. Summers suggests that they should build a new box but, “No one [likes] to upset even as much tradition as [is] represented by the box.” (Jackson, 1). The black box symbolizes ritual and tradition.

Using both her word choice and the tone in which it set, her use of language foreshadows the true intentions and outcome of the lottery and its devastating ending. When she states, “[The] feeling of liberty sat uneasy on most of them,” she creates an uneasy and negative tone when she uses these certain words ( Jackson 264). It creates the sense that the villagers’ liberty and freedoms were about to be threatened and it truly foreshadows the events that are to come. She also continues her negative tone and word choice towards the event and the black box when she says, “They stood together, away from the pile of stones in the corner, and their jokes were quiet and they smiled rather than laughed” (Jackson 264). This created an uneasy feeling in the readers mind and led to the foreshadowing that the towns people weren’t so excited to participate in the lottery.

One big similarity is foreshadowing. This took place in both articles, for, “Charles,” an example of foreshadowing is when he had to think who misbehaved and said than finally said, “Charles.” An example of foreshadowing in, “The Lottery,” is when Old Man Warner says, “ Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon.” This can indicate that the people of the village are sacrificing a human, which they are.

Shirley Jackson’s story, “The Lottery,” was written in 1948. It is about a town that gets together to play a game and at the end someone dies. D.H. Lawrence’s story, “The Rocking-Horse Winner,” was written in 1993. Lawrence's story is about a boy who wants to make his mother happy by doing what he can to please her, but she has such a huge obsession with money that the boy can not do anything to make her mother proud. In both “The Rocking-Horse Winner,” by D. H. Lawrence, and “The Lottery,” by Shirley Jackson, the authors use symbolism and themes to convince their audiences.

There are still some bad people in the world, and sometimes they aren’t who you would expect. Shirley Jackson uses different ways to trick the readers in, The Lottery, and, The Possibility of Evil. These two short stories involve two small towns and an ironic ending for the female protagonists. The stories are meant to use different types of irony to fool the readers or the protagonist.

Shirley Jackson has written many good short stories. These short stories include “The Lottery” and “Charles”. In these up coming paragraphs I will talk about all the differences and similarities of both these short stories. Both Charles and The Lottery have interesting Plot twists. The lottery’s plot twist being that the winner of The Lottery is sacrificed to ensure a better harvest.