Differences And Similarities Between The Lottery And The Veldt

The Lottery written by Shirley Jackson is a text exploring a yearly tradition of death by stoning. The Veldt written by Ray Bradbury is a text analyzing the advancement of technology, and how it is controlling our behavior. Both these text convey their perspective on the idea that humans are the cruelest animal through themes such as premeditated acts of cruelty, adults and children are both equally capable of cruelty and dehumanized people are cruel, not normal people.
The Lottery and The Veldt explores the idea of purposeful cruelty by showing how people are capable of premeditated acts. Jackson portrays this theme by creating a society that commits terrifying acts of murder based on fixed traditions rather than reason. Everyone within the

Motives and circumstantial factors often lead to acts of cruelty, with both The Lottery and The Veldt presenting this idea in similar ways. The Lottery presents children who participate in the gruesome tradition of death by stoning. The children gathered at the ceremony “selecting the smoothest and roundest stones,” this demonstrates the very knowingly involvement of these children. Care and thought is evident through the children’s action to choose the perfect stone which would inflict the most pain. Similarly, The Veldt shows that children are capable of being cruel. However, the emphasis is on the children being the center of attention. In The Lottery, the spotlight is on Tessie Hutchinson, who is the victim of the tradition and selected to be stoned to death. Everyone in the village participates in this act of cruelty, even her own family and even her children. In The Veldt, the children participate in the act of cruelty through their self-will, and own motives as they could not possibly lose the nursery. The psychological trauma in both texts is visible, the traumatic experiences that will be carried throughout their lifetime will be indescribable. Vice versa, if the parents were put in the position to kill their own child, it would be disheartening. The Hadley’s are murdered by their own children because they finally decided to put a foot down. Throughout the

The Lottery, an established tradition that involves the sacrifice of a person is awful to the normal person. However, on judgement day, Tessie Hutchinson forgets about the ritual and instead was washing the dishes. She arrived at the practice late, not bothered about the circumstances. The town accepts the tradition, seemingly a normal practice that everyone upholds without questions. However, when Tessie was chosen, suddenly her outlook on this terrifying tradition changes. Restlessness is evident, she pleads for her life without success. The personal interest for survival jolts her out of this brainwashed society, not until the event becomes relevant to her that it suddenly becomes real again. Almost like being selected restored a part of her humanity back as she suddenly realizes the depth of the horror that is faced. In The Veldt, children who murder their parents are diagnosed with a sickness. This sickness causes change in their behavior and consequently, when faced with possibility of the nursery taken away, they resort to murder. Both the texts show that normal people are not cruel, but when they are dehumanized that is when they commit acts of cruelty. When this occurs, these people are unable to distinguish between moral and immoral things. Self-greed is what breaks them out of the tradition, but no one dares to