Analysis of The Power of Tradition in “The Lottery”. In her short story published on June 26, 1948, in the New Yorker titled “The Lottery,” author Shirley Jackson transports us to a small village with an annual tradition called the lottery. In the story, the lottery is an event similar to a ritual that culminates with a member of the village being stoned to death. This is done as a sacrifice to ensure that a good harvest occurs in the new year. The essay offers its readers a useful reminder to continuously question established customs and to avoid falling prey to a mob mentality. Jackson illustrates the dangerous force of unquestioning traditionalism and explores this darker aspect of human nature in her story by utilizing metaphors. One way that the figurative device of metaphor is …show more content…
He demonstrates the mentality of the public by blindly following the ritual without questioning or taking note of the moral aspects of what they are doing. His resistance to examining and stopping the custom exhibits the thought process many of the villagers have, who insist on following a tradition because it has always been done. This can be seen when Old Man Warner says that there “ Used to be a saying about ‘Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon.’ First thing you know, we’d all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns. There’s always been a lottery,” exemplifying how he feels about the tradition (Jackson, 7). When another villager mentions that other places have stopped this tradition, he replies, “Nothing but trouble with that,” yet he does not explain why it’s a problem to halt this tradition (Jackson, 7). This can be applied to reality, where many groups of people follow practices without truly understanding why they are doing so. Another metaphor used in “The Lottery” is the eventual stoning of the person who ‘wins’ the lottery. The stoning of the person is used to demonstrate mob mentality, conformity, and how easily swayed