Category: The Lottery

How much would you anticipate in a game of chance where logic and reason surrender for fate to reign? It is exactly your guess that Shirley Jackson portrays in her story, “The Lottery”. The setting of the story is a small population in a very small town that portrays an enormous opportunity for growth and development.

The clear and sunny morning adorned with flowers blossoming profusely and richly green grass simply affirms splendor and hope for days to come. The turnout for the lottery symbolizes unity and cohesion among the villagers.

Entrusting Mr.Summers with the responsibility of conducting the whole affair demonstrates leadership that enjoys the peoples’ faith and confidence. Ironically, this supposed hope turns into disillusionment characterized with anger, mistrust and disunity and a prematurely ended day.

The title of the story creates a playground where optimism and pessimism are the major players. This kind of technique manipulates the reader’s mind leaving them guessing the outcome without necessarily being biased.

The title of the book “The Lottery” alone is a great example of how Shirley Jackson topples reader expectations (Smith, 2011). The extremes of the consequences of lottery normally create anxiety and dissatisfaction amongst the participants.

Little wonder then that the villagers descend on Tessie after she emerges the winner, “…and she held her hands out desperately as the villagers moved in on her …a stone hit her on the side of the head”. The title therefore sets the pace of the story, and interestingly keeps the story alive throughout.

Jackson further perfects this captivating tact by creating suspense at least in every paragraph. In fact, the title in itself is suspense. This urge to want to read more and more opens up the reader’s mind and exposes them to the reality of life. Consequently, the title is a justification of the unfolding events – after all it is a lose-or-win situation, in which the winner takes it all.

The choice of characters for plot development is superb, although there may be need to introduce more characters to sustain the story thereafter. This is because more themes are generated as time goes by. For instance, themes such as arbitration, justice, change, among others would require new characters to develop.

Tessie faces ‘mob justice’ no sooner has Mr.Summer declares her the winner. There are also possibilities of Mr.Summer himself facing the wrath of the villagers.

If that would be the case then his family and close allies such as Mr.Grave would not fight in his support. This would exacerbate the situation thereby causing many more casualties, hence, the need for dialogue and arbitration.

The writer tactfully creates conflict of interests among the villagers. First is the difference in ideology between Mr.Adams and Old Man Warner. The former is trying to sell an idea to the old man who strongly and heartily holds onto traditions. His sentimental attachment to the old-style norms prompt him to even call people names, “Pack of crazy fools”.

On the other hand, Tessie questions the credibility of the lottery process, which in essence is directed to Mr.Summer. She describes it as ‘unfair’ and succeeds to convince Mr.Summer to employ a ‘fair’ method.

Unfortunately, the supposed fair method finally plays against her by making the crowd turn against her. There is likelihood that more conflicts of interest would still arise in future.

This can be attributed to the individualism factor that lottery implants and nurtures in the villagers. In fact the way they join forces to stone Tessie, a lady, without consideration of the consequences paints a picture of a rooted norm. This is a good test for their unity, and for sure it fails to stand the test.

Jackson intellectually provokes the reader to ask a number of questions: Is it a coincidence to have the stones available in the lottery square? Do all the villagers approve the lottery as a sign of bountiful harvest? Is there need to embrace new ways of life? Does everyone understand the rules of the lottery?

The answers to these and many more questions would arrest the confusion and disillusionment that arise from this communal rite. Such questions may be championed by characters such as Mr.Adams who has realized that their neighbors are considering abandoning such practices, “…that over in the north village they’re talking of giving up the lottery.”

The space of the woman in the society is also portrayed in the story as a compromised one. They are the last to arrive at the lottery square. Tessie Hutchinson arrives even later because she was still performing some domestic chores. Tessie, a woman, is also the same one at the receiving end of the villagers’ wrath.

The picking would rather be done by their older sons instead of them, “Don’t you have a grown boy to do it for you, Janey?” Mr.Summer asked Mrs.Dunbar. This shows that women play a second fiddle to men.

Such a society is likely to suffer from inequality and inequity, hence an upsurge of hatred and contempt. Again this portends more fights as the women would at some point need more space, which men may not be willing to relinquish.

The perpetual reluctance to replace the black woodenbox with a better one, and the usage of the pieces of the box that had preceded the black one, all point at one thing: resistance to change by the villagers.

The hypocrisy that mars the lottery event seem to be deep rooted; the Old Man Warner ascertains that he has witnessed the ceremony seventy seven times, “Seventy-seventh year I been in the lottery,” “Seventy-seventh time.” Along with hypocrisy, “the Lottery” presents a weakness in human individuals.

“Listening to the young folks, nothing’s good enough for them. Next thing you know, they’ll be wanting to go back to living in caves, nobody work anymore, live that way for a while. Used to be a saying about ‘Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon.’

First thingyou know, we’d all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns. There’s always been a lottery,” he addedpetulantly. “Bad enough to see young Joe Summers up there joking with everybody…

In summary, it can be deduced that a game of chance such as lottery creates uncertainty and anxiety to the participants. This leads to fear, and with fear there comes underutilization of resources, hence slow rate of development.

Choices made are determined by one’s level of optimism and pessimism, and in either, one has to remain very courageous. Jackson has succeeded in conveying one message: human hypocrisy knows no gender, no age and no time. Given that we are not told whether such a death has occurred in the previous years, we may insinuate that it would be a turning point for the villagers.

Works Cited

Kosenko, Peter. A Reading of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”. Spring, 1984.

Lori, Voth. Analysis of “The Lottery”, a Short Story by Shirley Jackson. NY: Contributor Network, 2005.

Smith, Newman. Analysis of “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson. Quirk Books, 2011.

Introduction

In society, some people derive joy from seeing other people suffer. The above-mentioned fictional stories have a rather sadistic point of view. A specific group in each story derives its comfort in watching its fellow human beings suffer. One of the groups that could be excused are children who often derive fun in extreme and weird situations. However, in the fiction written by Shirley Jackson, the characters involved are adults.

These two fictional stories were both published in the early 1950’s and late 1940’s at a time when there was liberation and mockery during the end of World War II and undesired segregations. The authors’ ideas might have developed due to the situation at the time when the fictional stories were written.

“The Lottery” takes place during a fruitful month of summer, when flowers are blooming and grass is richly green yet the event that followed was utterly unexplainable. Why would anyone want to stone someone on such a beautiful day just because the lottery suggested that it was his or her time to be stoned?

As for “the Destructor”, the scenery is a spontaneous car park, the spot of the most recent bomb of the first bombardment. Next to the car park stood the house of ‘Old Misery’ -a name that had been given to him by the gang. However, his real name was Thomas, a nice person who even more than often tried befriending the gang.

The contrast is that, in “the Destructors”, it is children who are considered to be naive and clueless to the harm they cause to others and themselves but as for “the Lottery”, a whole community just decides to stone one individual. The community which comprises of adults is in support of the idea. In “the Lottery”, the mood is hasty, everyone is eager to wind up and go back home to their daily routine.

The author uses several sentences and describes the events around to lure the reader into presuming that it is a normal community. In developing the plot of the story, the author foreshadows the story’s ending by talking about the black box and the black dot at the end of the story, which symbolized the person to be stoned (Jackson et al).

Irony is employed in the same story in other instances. The beginning tells us of a happy normal hardworking community, but the end contrasts the character highlighted at the beginning. The author in this story also uses the names of the characters to create different styles like allusion, symbolism and irony. Names like Graves symbolize death, but this is ironical because Graves and his family evade death, which befalls Tessie of the Hutchinson’s.

On the other hand, in “the Destructors”, there is very little or no symbolism created in the names used. Irony has though been used to describe the driver who began to laugh instead of sympathizing with Thomas when he learnt that the old man’s house was in shambles (Greene et al).

“The Destructors” shows Blacker as the team leader. Seemingly, Trevor wanted this post for quite some time. The reader would expect him to go for it as his name, Blacker, suggests it. However, Blacker gives in, and lets Trevor be the leader after he came to the realization that Trevor would lose the gangs’ trust. Furthermore, he had helped him at times. Despite his darkened name, he had a soft spot, which showed some sort of irony intentionally or unintentionally done by the author (Graham et al).

The contrasting bit of these two stories is the fact that the setting of one gives an illusion of a different ending with happiness. What comes out is the stoning of one of the members yet the other one just shows destruction which is eminent at some point. “The Lottery” satirizes a number of social issues, including the reluctance of people to reject outdated traditions, ideas, rules, laws, and practices as well the effects associated with them.

The perspective of Mr. Thomas guards the traditional ways and the archaic trust in the power of elders. He believes he has the ability to control what the boys do and forbid them from taking part in some things simply because he is elder. (Jackson et al). The author demonstrates the lower class and represents it by the gang. The lower class is not content to see the upper class take pleasure in valuable property. Instead, they destroy the property and somehow manage to create equilibrium between the wealthy class and the poor.

Works Cited

Greene, Graham. 21 Stories. New York: Viking Press, Questia, 1962. Web.

Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery. Classic Short Stories.n.d. Web.

The short story may be one of the writing formats best suited for creating a feeling of suspense in readers. The limited number of pages and a restricted ability to show characters in different situations can give authors an opportunity to focus on a single small event and its environment. In 1948, Shirley Jackson utilized this aspect of short stories and created “The Lottery.” The story can be considered an example of a tension-building narrative with a surprising reveal at the end, as Matek has highlighted Jackson’s ability to intrigue her audience through foreshadowing (70). However, “The Lottery” also has some themes that deserve analysis due to their connection with people’s daily experience. In her short story “The Lottery,” Jackson explores the problems of traditions and shows people’s attachment to the established order in a negative light.

The story does not follow a protagonist but instead resembles an impartial description of an event. The author begins by stating the date and time. It is notable that the particular date, June 27th, seems essential for the author to include (Jackson 1). Here she gives the readers a first small clue to the story’s contents. She also mentions the weather and describes the scenery in great detail. All events of the story happen in one place – the village’s central square. People of all ages start gathering in the square for a lottery, which is regarded as an important annual tradition in many places, including this one. As Mr. Summer arrives to lead the lottery, men, women, and children find their families and stand in anticipation. Mr. Summers starts the usual procedures. He creates a list of families, checks for absentees, and asks who will be drawing the papers from a black box.

Mr. Summers begins to call out families, who send their oldest men to take their papers. Then, as each person reveals the contents of their paper slip, the readers learn about the “winner” – the person who has drawn a slip of paper with a black dot, Mr. Hutchinson and his family. They pick papers again, which reveal Tessie, Mr. Hutchinson’s wife, to be the final winner. As she starts screaming about the lottery’s unfairness, the villagers stone her to death.

As was mentioned, Jackson provides her readers with many details about the location and time. The author also describes the characters and gives a name to each of them. For example, the Hutchinson family has Bill, Tessie, and their children: Bill, Jr., Nancy, and Dave. It is possible that each character is given a name so that it seems that each has an equal place in the story. Each villager is recognized as a part of the narrative, and thus no one is explicitly highlighted. Such attention to detail gives readers an impression of the story’s realness (Thomas 7). They see distinct individuals with connections and ties living a regular life in a familiar setting. The events of the story seem more real and plausible because of it. Therefore, when the story ends with a gruesome and illogically violent scene, the audience may be more affected by it, as other parts of the narrative resemble real life so closely.

Through the description of clothes and behavior, the author establishes one character and foreshadows the ending at the same time (Anderson and Kröger 76). Tessie arrives at the square later than everyone else and tells everybody that she completely forgot about the lottery. She is tired and disheveled, and her manners are different from those of the quiet and placid women of the village. While her relationship with everyone seems normal, this distinction sets her apart from the start.

Another person who is different from the rest of the crowd is Old Man Warner, who has been participating in the lottery for seventy-seven years. He is a symbol of long-lasting traditions and customs (Bailey 38). He recalls old sayings and opposes any possible changes to the lottery. Moreover, Old Man Warner claims that this ritual makes people civilized and believes that it is tied to the outcomes of the harvest season. In the end, while Tessie’s screams about the lottery’s injustice are ignored, Old Man Warner’s beliefs are reinforced once again as the crowd does not even stop to think before they throw stones at their neighbor, friend, and relative.

The central theme that Jackson discusses in this story is conformity to tradition and unwillingness to change. People in this community do not want to change anything and are used to blindly following the ritual even though it leads to one community member’s death. Even Tessie herself only starts protesting after “winning” the lottery (Holdefer 274). It is unclear whether she would be against the rules if somebody else had the winning paper. Perhaps she would join the crowd in these different circumstances. This way of thinking is what Jackson tries to reveal to the audience. The members of Tessie’s family do not change their minds about the tradition even when their mother’s and wife’s life is taken. The acceptance of old and unnecessary traditions is highlighted as absurd and dangerous. Thus the author tries to show that each custom and belief needs to be questioned because the lack of a viable justification can lead to a gruesome end.

In addition, the motifs of group conformity and baseless prejudice against others may also be themes of the short story. Everyone in the village is expected to participate in the lottery regardless of his or her age and occupation. One man is absent only because he broke a leg and could not come. The family hierarchy is also seen as a necessity for each household, as men take the position of a leader while women are expected to have no authority without any apparent reasoning behind it. Similarly, the chosen person is killed because of an invented justification that does not follow any logic. The persecution of a seemingly innocent person is promoted by the villagers and especially Old Man Warner not because of their cruelty or a lack of compassion, but because of their upbringing.

The black wooden box used for the lottery can serve as the short story’s primary symbol. Jackson describes it as shabby and “no longer completely black but splintered badly,” which means that it is incredibly old (3). In fact, the box is made from the wood of the previous version, which was built by the village’s first settlers. The box is an example of how tradition is supported and enforced, while innovation is neglected.

The lottery in Jackson’s short story can be viewed as a symbol of any old and unreasonable tradition that people refuse to let go of. The author clearly considers such customs baseless and attempts to show that the reasoning behind upholding such traditions is completely absurd. The violent ending is contrasted with the mundane lives of the villagers and their perceptions of the annual ritual. The author foreshadows the conclusion through small details and creates a feeling of unease to increase the effect of the final message.

Works Cited

Anderson, Melanie R., and Lisa Kröger, editors. Shirley Jackson, Influences and Confluences. Routledge, 2016.

Bailey, Ted. “Sacred Violence in Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery.” B.A.S. British and American Studies, vol. 20, 2014, pp. 37-42.

Holdefer, Charles. “Another Kind of Hell: Fundamentals of the Dystopian Short Story.” Journal of the Short Story in English, vol. 64, 2015, pp. 263-275.

Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery. The New Yorker, 1948.

Matek, Ljubica. “Teaching Horror Literature in a Multicultural Classroom.” ELOPE; English Language Overseas Perspectives and Enquiries, vol. 12, no. 1, 2015, pp. 61-73.

Thomas, P. L. “Adventures in Adaptation.” Teaching towards Democracy with Postmodern and Popular Culture Texts, edited by Patricia Paugh et al., Sense Publishers, 2014, pp. 7-19.

Ismael, Zaid Ibrahim, and Sabah Atallah Khalifa Ali. “Human Rights at Stake: Shirley Jackson’s Social and Political Protest in ‘The Lottery.’” International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature, vol. 7, no. 6, 2018, pp. 28-36. doi:10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.7n.6p.28.

In this article, the authors focus on Shirley Jackson’s interest in human rights and their violation in a civilized society. Ismael and Ali examine the author’s humane message of the rights of people to live in peace from the perspective of the Holocaust. The story was written after World War II, so the images of murder and mass destruction were still fresh in human memories. Ismael and Ali conclude that Jackson’s message was misinterpreted by the early readers. However, the themes of inequality and dignity of women in a patriarchal society are evident today. This source can be used to address Jackson’s message and analyze the story through the lens of political and social criticism.

Nugraha, Intan Siti, and Sutiono Mahdi. “Transitivity System on Building Character of Mr. Summers in The Lottery by Shirley Jackson.” A Journal of Culture, English Language Teaching, Literature and Linguistics, vol. 7, no. 1, 2020, pp. 35-43.

Nugraha and Mahdi address Jackson’s story using the transitivity system of the Systemic Functional Linguistic approach. They describe the author’s choice of words and phrases for the construction of her main character, Mr. Summers. The researchers argue that Mr. Summers is mostly associated with verbal and material processes, which characterize him as an active “sayer” who has a strong impact on his audience (39). The character is also goal-oriented, and the words associated with the material process confirm this statement. The authors conclude that Jackson dominantly utilizes verbal processes to create the characters’ identities through their verbiage. This source can be used to analyze the short story from the perspective of linguistics.

Robinson, Michael. “Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” and Holocaust Literature.” Humanities, vol. 8, no. 25, 2019, pp. 1-20. doi:10.3390/h8010035.

Robinson examines Jackson’s short story through the lens of literature, philosophy, and anthropology. Each of these approaches explores “The Lottery” from the perspectives of the Holocaust, scapegoating, and anti-Semitism. The author argues that Jackson’s depiction of death selection can be related to the Holocaust discourse. Robinson adds that “The Lottery” reveals the themes of Nazi genocide and ethnic cleansing through imaginative abstraction. The author also reads Jackson’s story in terms of patriarchal power structures. Although Jackson did not identify herself as a feminist, her judgment of gender inequality is evident in the story. Robinson concludes that “The Lottery” was mistakenly read as an ahistorical novel while it should be examined through the lens of the Holocaust and its impact on literature. This article is useful for the analysis of Jackson’s short story because it reveals its historical context and explains why it should not be regarded only as a feminist horror tale.

Rubenstein, Roberta, and Ruth Franklin. “Writer, Housewife, Witch.” The Women’s Review of Books, vol. 34, no. 3, 2017, pp. 18–19. JSTOR.

The author of this article, Roberta Rubenstein, is a professor of Literature at American University. She reviews Franklin’s book, dedicated to Jackson’s biography as a writer, housewife, and witch. In this review, the author examines deep connections between Jackson’s life and the literary subjects in her short story. For example, her husband Hyman continued to see other women without any guilt when they get married (18). Such an attitude to his wife can be identified with the themes of gender inequality and female dignity in Jackson’s story. Another interesting fact from Jackson’s life is that she earned more money than her husband, but he controlled her and forced her to write more novels for money (19). This and many other biographical moments can be used for the analysis of Jackson’s literary works in general and “The Lottery” in particular.

Sari, Fani Alfionita, and Ajar PradikaAnanta Tur. “Reshaping the Society Face through the Culture of Horror Told in Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery.” Journal of Linguistics, Literature, and Culture, vol. 1, no. 1, 2019, pp. 1-7.

This article focuses on the perlocutionary acts used by Jackson’s characters in her short story “The Lottery.” Sari and Tur utilize the descriptive qualitative method to examine the sense of the culture of horror stories through the lens of such acts. Perlocutionary acts are acts of speaking or writing, the aim of which is to persuade or convince somebody. The authors analyze each conversation in the story to identify whether it has an implicit meaning or not. The results of the study show that the goals of perlocutionary acts were to convince, persuade, deter, surprise, and mislead the characters in order to emphasize the horrific violence in the story. This source can be used to analyze Jackson’s story from the perspectives of linguistics and culture.

Title: The Lottery

Author: Shirley Jackson

Year of Publication: 1948

Foreshadowing

I cannot say that I was surprised by the ending of this story. While there were some attempts by the author to divert the attention from the overall nervousness, such as the depiction of the casual conversations among the gathering crowd, the atmosphere was depressing (Jackson, 1948). Jackson uses the images of carefree children playing around and wives gossiping as distractions. However, it was possible to guess the worst starting from the second paragraph when there was a hint towards some repressed negative emotions.

Setting

The story takes place in a small town, where everybody appears to know each other closely. This location makes the process even more surrealistic, as these people are willingly following the traditions that lead to pointless manslaughter. Moreover, in this setting, many other towns nearby the one from the story are mentioned and, apparently, have a similar ritual (Jackson, 1948). Since Mr. Summers notes that those towns that stopped doing the lottery are wrong because of the youth and their idiocy, the author shows her main argument through the setting (Jackson, 1948). The description of the scene made it more apparent that the ending will include an archaic tradition that might be superstitious to the point of being ridiculously unreasonable.

Irony

Beginning with its very title, this story is permeated with irony. The lottery implies that there is a valuable price for winning it. Other examples include the descriptions of the setting and the people in charge of the lottery. For example, Jackson (1948) describes the person organizing the draw that will lead to someone’s death as “a round-faced, jovial man.” In the final scene, Jackson mockingly puts the words of late realization into the victim’s mouth, as Tessie’s last words are “It’s not fair.” This grim irony increases the impact of the story’s horrifying plot.

Reference

Jackson, S. (1948). The lottery. The New Yorker. Web.

In Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery,” the story illustrates how people can get so completely caught up in following the customs and practices of their culture that they lose the meaning of the action. The history provided of the lottery within the story is sketchy at best as people begin gathering around a black box and organizing in a strict patriarchal hierarchy. The discussion of the lost original paraphernalia emphasizes the degree to which much of the original history has also been lost: “At one time, some people remembered, there had been a recital of some sort, performed by the official of the lottery; a perfunctory, tuneless chant that had been rattled off duly each year … but years and years ago this part of the ritual had been allowed to lapse” (119). While there is a subtle hint that perhaps the lottery is tied up with ancient traditions of fertility and the harvest, this is as close to the history or usefulness of the lottery as the story gets. Although there doesn’t seem to be much of the original materials, practices or meaning of the lottery available to the reader, the degree to which people have become slaves to tradition is emphasized in the idea that the villagers themselves also seem unsure of the tradition. As the drawing gets underway, there is some talk in the crowd that there are other villages thinking about getting rid of the lottery. Mr. Adams brings up the subject to Old Man Warner who immediately scoffs at the foolishness of such new ideas. According to Old Man Warner, there has always been a lottery and this is, apparently, reason enough for it to continue. No tangible or spiritual reasons are offered for its continuation while it would seem the emotional attachment to a meaningless practice would be far outweighed by the emotional losses of mothers, daughters, husbands and sons as the lottery is played out. While people within the village have questioned the reasons for the lottery, they remain dedicated to its practice as the victim is finally selected. “Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones” (123) as Tessie is stoned to death.

Although today’s world is no longer accustomed to using physical stones as a means of beating a sacrificial offering to death, it remains true that people in the modern world continue to devote themselves to meaningless ceremonies and practices that can often have detrimental impact on the family unit or social relationships. Today’s world is increasingly globalized, meaning various people of different cultures and belief systems continue to come into closer contact with each other. As this continues to happen, individuals begin to understand that many of the things they’ve always taken for granted as a ‘natural’ way of doing things is not necessarily considered so natural in other parts of the world and forces us to begin questioning what makes us so sure that our way of doing things is the ‘right’ way. This concept is perhaps most evident in the arena of religious practices although it is by no means exclusive to this arena nor universally applicable. In encountering people of other beliefs, it is sometimes the case that the individual will adamantly defend their faith as the only one and true faith without ever having examined why they believe this to be so. In much the same way, there are people within the business world that have firmly held beliefs regarding how things should be done who find it difficult to question the efficiency or effectiveness of their efforts or to change the status quo. However, just like in “The Lottery”, there are a number of ways in which the traditional ways of looking at things are requiring a new approach. While there is nothing wrong with believing in a particular faith, it is important today to understand why you believe these concepts so that you are not sidetracked into some warped version of the original just as in the business world, when something isn’t working or could perhaps be done better, it is foolish and ultimately self-defeating to refuse to examine the issue and consider change.

Introduction

The Lottery is a 1948 story written by Shirley Jackson. The story is about a small town in the United States that maintains a lottery tradition every year. One resident of this town is chosen randomly by drawing lots, and the rest throw stones at him (Jackson). The first publication of this work caused a broad resonance among readers. In this small work, several urgent and severe societal topics are raised at once – this is the search for a scapegoat, herd feeling, and blind adherence to traditions.

Analysis

Among the town residents, there is an opinion that the person who “won” the lottery pays for all the evil that has accumulated over the year. The power of tradition and habit stands above the common sense of every inhabitant, except for the victim. Fatal consequences and the settlement of justice takes place with the help of a gambling drawing of lots. The author wanted to show that the strength of the crowd, coupled with a strong sense of habit and tradition, so much clouded the mind that only the victim, left alone against the entire crowd, can realize all the injustice and cruelty of such a tradition.

The work raises questions about how faithful to follow traditions in general and when they need to be revised. Of course, cruelty is brought to the absolute in this story, but the question remains relevant. The society in work is not taught by experience that one randomly taken person can pay for the crowd’s mistakes. The relief that residents feel when they stretch out an unmarked paper completely stops all thought in the direction of injustice. Perhaps a momentary fear of a moment when nothing is known yet would cause a revision of traditions (Nebeker, 101). However, society has gone so far that even the pain of the victim does not stop them.

Conclusion

The work touches on a vast number of topics that project society’s ills, elevated to hyperbole. The heavy and resonant acceptance of this story by readers only proves its literary power. An individual or society as a whole cannot be recouped by randomly drawing a scapegoat. The strength of the crowd must always be regulated by common sense, which is sometimes spoken by the mouth of the victim of the crowd.

Works Cited

Jackson, Shirley. The lottery. Harvard University Press, 2013.

Nebeker, Helen E. “‘The Lottery’: Symbolic Tour de Force.” American Literature 46.1 (1974): 100-108.

There are many elements of literary devices, imagery, style, and tone that contribute to the creation of the overall spirit of works in literature. They shape the reader’s perception of the plot, the main characters, and the overall message of the literary piece. These elements are often used in their direct meaning, thus enforcing a direct effect on the reader; however, there also are cases when they are used controversially, making the impression from the read piece stronger and even more emphatic. This paper’s main goal is to compare and contrast “The Lottery” and “The Rocking Horse Winner” and examines themes, characters, settings, and literary devices of the two stories.

Stories’ Tones and Plots

The tone of the work is significant in its terms as well because it creates the fleur of seriousness, light-mindedness, sadness or cheerfulness, introducing the reader to the world of the literary work, and even making him or her the participant of events. Symbols are the fruitful addition to the literary stylistic devices, since they add the third dimension of the plot and message, showing what cannot be expressed by words, and making the work lively.

All these issues have found their direct and at times, sophisticated realization in the works of Shirley Jackson and D.H. Lawrence. These two works are remarkable from the perspective of investigating the impact of tone, style, and symbol in a literary work. Thus, for example, the topic of the question of tone becomes extremely topical in Jackson’s work “The Lottery” that in itself represents a contradiction, controversy, and conflict.

The opening lines of the short story presuppose some cheerful scenario, some picturesque place, and a holiday-suggesting lexicon: “The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green” (Jackson, 1949, p. 5). The beginning clearly suggests a lovely landscape, a beautiful day, and a similarly pleasant continuation of the plot.

Nonetheless, the short story’s essence, plot, and message are quite different from the beginning, setting people in a positive tone and perceiving the lottery as something rewarding and exciting for the villagers. The only fact that the ritual is of vital importance does not cause any doubts since there is much attention to every detail, to every participant of the events, to the black box, and the responsibilities of the lottery’s chairman as well.

The meaning of being the chosen, picking the black spot from the box, is not evident until the end of the work, though the tone comes to its correct form by the end of the short story. It changes rapidly after the choice falls on Mr. Hutchinson, and the fierce protection he gets from his wife, Tessie, the ultimate victim of the medieval, bloody tradition.

Irony in the Stories

In Lawrence’s story, “The Rocking Horse Winner,” the tone is plain and unhappy. Moreover, the story is much more consistent in terms of plot, and style. However, though the mood of the story is quite pessimistic, gloomy, depressing, with short sentences and broken phrases, there is much irony at the beginning of the work. The irony shows that the author himself does not consider the hardships faced by the family so hard and awful as they are depicted. From his point of view, the problems are over-exaggerated.This irony may be quite well felt in the phrases such as:

“…there must be more money. The father, who was always very handsome and expensive in his tastes, seemed as if he never would be able to do anything worth doing. And the mother, who ha a great belief in herself, did not succeed any better, and her tastes were just as expensive” (Lawrence, 1926, p. 552).

The irony is striking – people who cannot find any money to let their children study well can afford expensive tastes, and at the same time, they call themselves “the poor members of the family” (Lawrence, 1926, p. 553). They buy expensive toys for their children, use the services of a taxi, but they remain poor because they do not live up to their wishes and ambitions.

The talk of the mother with her son Paul is also quite ironic, though it also contains some symbolism of the concept of luck. Their family traditionally ties luck with money, but Paul dies a young and rich person, which cannot be considered luck at all. Hence, the crisis of belief, understanding, and morale in the family is shown through an ironic representation of their so-called ‘poverty’ and the dramatic effect of that perception imposed on Paul at an early age.

The irony is also present in “The Lottery,” though it is quite far from being ironic in its complete sense. The talk between Old Man Warner and Mr. Adams is very ironic – Old Man Warner compares the refusal from the lottery in other towns to degradation – “they’ll be wanting to back to living in caves, nobody work anymore” (Jackson, 1949, p. 14).

However, it is clear that the ritual is a remnant of the dark, medieval, illiterate, cruel, nearly pagan times when people believed that killing one chosen person was useful for their harvest – “Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon” (Jackson, 1949, p. 14). There are multiple examples of imagery in “The Lottery,” meanwhile “The Rocking Horse Winner” abounds with metaphors.

Symbolism in the Stories

Contrasting the works according to their style and tone, one should surely note that they can also be compared concerning the symbolism in works; besides the proverb about the good harvest, the symbol of the black box is powerful in Jackson’s story, and the symbol of the rocking horse also occupies the central place in the work “The Rocking Horse Winner”.

It is evident that the mistaken perception of luck compared directly with money leads to further misconceptions, and the boy draws a parallel between his luck and the rocking horse. Hence, these symbols distinguish both works and allow a reliable comparison between them. From this comparison essay, symbolism in “The Rocking Horse Winner” and “The Lottery” is evident.

As it comes from the present comparison and contrast, the stylistic devices such as tone and style are vastly used by writers to enhance the impact on the reader, to create the spirit of the unexpected, to surprise him or her, and to make the work highly emphatic.

Symbols are also widely used equally to the characters of the stories, as they produce the impact on the characters only by their presence, by the profound meaning they have. If to compare and contrast “The Lottery” and “The Rocking Horse Winner,”it is possible to say that both authors have skillfully used the discussed techniques, though each of them in their own way.

References

Jackson, S. (1949). The Lottery. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus.

Lawrence, D. H. (1926). The Rocking Horse Winner. In D.H. Lawrence. Full Score: Twenty Tales by D.H. Lawrence (2008). Rockville, MD: Wildside Press LLC.

Introduction

This essay contains a literary analysis of “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson. It is known as one of the most horrible but still realistic short stories about human life, traditions, and interests inherent to society. From a Marxist perspective, it shows the objectification of social relations. Due to such unusual ideas and attention to violence, Jackson’s story undergoes considerable critics and analyses of many sophisticated writers and thinkers for a long time. For example, Bernice Murphy attempts to evaluate the domestic horror and causality that become the core of violence and the death of innocent people.

Main Themes of “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson

According to this and many other critiques which analyze The Lottery, it is possible to admit that this story is full of symbolism that perfectly describes violence through everyday traditions and human imagination. There are numerous themes in “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, but the most evident are the ideas of violence, devotion to traditions, and fear to change something due to the concurrence of circumstances.

There are numerous essays on the symbolism of “The Lottery”. Many critics underline the idea that the work by Jackson is “hinged upon the symbolism of the notorious tale” (Murphy 5). It is not very difficult to discover how skillfully and maturely the author can demonstrate a perfect use of symbols to describe all those issues many people are afraid of but still cannot evade.

The evident symbol of the story is “a three-legged stool,” and the box that is “made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it” (Jackson 7). It is not only the symbol of something predictable or inevitable; it is also possible to recognize the idea of the trinity that usually has some religious roots. The Lottery itself symbolizes all that cruelty, violence, and death which exist in the world and cannot be avoided by ordinary people.

Though the Lottery is something “so-called normal and ordinary” (Murphy 248), this symbol represents some strange, terrible, and even horrible event that is unfair towards the citizens as it is stated by the main character Tessie Hutchinson when “the stone hit her on the side of the head” (Jackson 21).

Her sacrificed murder is not supported by the author as well as in some of the literary criticism. Her death is as stupid and unnecessary as many traditions and customs people like to follow and believe in. It causes bewilderment and questions. While the vast majority of people in the story cannot comprehend the necessity of this Lottery, they also cannot understand how miserable and cowardly their faith may be.

This violence, inhuman attitude to each other, and the belief that someone’s death may change and improve the current state of affairs and human future are the central ideas in the story. Human weakness is the fact that people cannot comprehend that they sacrifice their present and lives to have a chance for some future.

However, Jackson cries how unfair all this is through the words and emotions of Mrs. Hutchinson. However, even if “it isn’t fair, it isn’t fair” (Jackson 21), nobody can interfere in the situation even those who take your hand several minutes ago and say that everything will be okay.

Conclusion

This essay is a literary analysis of “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson. It describes the story’s themes, interpretations, symbolism, and the main literary devices used by the author. In summary, The Lottery is a compelling and symbolic story about life and demands which have to be met by every people in a particular community. Among the variety of aspects described in the story, the reluctance of many people to reject cruel traditions and stop violence seems to be the most powerful. That’s because people are so absorbed in the idea of destroying violence that they become weak due to this power and its charms.

Works Cited

Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery. Mankato: The Creative Company, 2008.

Murphy, Bernice. Shirley Jackson: Essays on the Literary Legacy. Jefferson: McFarland, 2005.

The appearance of moral values is not accidental in the history of human civilizations – this cultural element allows individuals to interact with each other on the same basis. Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery” investigates the notion of moral values and how a community can let a violent side of human nature eclipse a more empathic one. Although written more than half a century ago, the short-story resonates with readers by discussing themes pertinent to a lot of cultures, even at the contemporary stage of development. “The Lottery” is a reading that provides insight on the most unpleasant aspects of culture, depicting corruption of values and violence of a community that blindly follows traditions established long ago.

The premise of the short story is that a rural American town has an annual lottery, the winner of which is lapidated to death by other participants. The town’s residents view this ritual as a necessary sacrifice that will bring them fruitful harvest (Jackson 15). Human sacrifice is a tradition that used to be practiced in a number of pagan cultures. Nonetheless, in Shirley Jackson’s work, the tradition is revived and employed as a symbolic representation to comment on such cultural and moral issues as reluctance to rethink, even potentially abandon old traditions and oppressive conformism. The town’s residents do not question the event – the complete compliance to thinking of a group is overwhelming (Jackson 16). Despite the looming threat of death that permeates the daily-life during a whole year, the protagonist’s, Tess Hutchinson’s, behavior is casual when she is selected as the winner. Her demeanor changes gradually, exposing an animalistic fear hidden by obedience to the community and its convention.

Shirley Jackson’s short story seems to be a critique of human nature and the state of the culture, in general. Ideas, customs, and social behavior adopted in the town, where “The Lottery” occurs, can be traced in contemporary societies, although the notions are hyperbolized in this piece of fiction. The short story may serve as a cautionary tale, communicating to the reader the hidden risks of cultural conformity. The Hunger Games trilogy is similar to the story under consideration, as both texts refer to similar themes and have to a degree similar plot elements. The concepts of tradition and sacrifice play a crucial role in the progression of both stories, and the effect produced by it is also comparable. “The Lottery” and The Hunger Games concur in the commentary on culture and social behavior that can be deducted from the texts. Both works seem to denounce indifference, violence, and complete submission to authorities. Culture is not depicted as the height of evolution in the texts in question, and values produced by it are shown as too volatile to be a reliable moral orienteer.

“The Lottery” is a thought-provoking and captivating text – the themes that it evokes are crucial to understanding in-depth less positive sides of contemporary cultures. Even though functioning properly in a society requires a degree of compliance, Shirley Jackson’s short story demonstrates the absurdity and danger of following traditions indiscriminately. The necessity to revise old values and customs is emphasized in the text. On the whole, “The Lottery” provides insight into the cruelty of human nature, which may seem like the original point for the event around which the short-story revolves.

Works Cited

Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery and Other Stories. Harper Perennial Classics, 2016.