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Analysis the lottery by shirley jackson
Analysis the lottery by shirley jackson
Analysis of 'The Lottery' by Shirley Jackson
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“The Lottery” is a short story written by Shirley Jackson. The story revolves around the residents of this humble town who have concluded that a human life must be sacrificed annually in order for their crops to grow abundantly. This becomes problematic for protagonist Tessie who is chosen, helplessly begs for her life, but is inevitably killed due to town superstition. Consequently, Tessie’s failure to persuade her antagonists otherwise, highly regards Tessie as the most ineffective protagonist in a story. Tessie Hutchins would have been a more effective character had she realized that the town’s system was faulted in the first place.
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.
In the short story, “The Lottery”, by Shirley Jackson shows the theme of The Duality of Human Nature. The character Tesse Hutchinson did not agree with “The Lottery” she thought it wasn’t fair. In the story Tesse Hutchinson husband got picked to be killed and that was when she said it wasn’t fair.
“The Lottery” mentions the black box, tradition and being nervous so much that the reader can't help but realize that that tradition is important in their community. The author uses contrast and contradiction in the story to also show that in the beginning Tessie didn't really think twice about tradition but in the end when she was in the position herself, people close to her began only then realizing that following blindly should not be the reason that you are keeping a
People present an image to the world of what they want others to see them as. This image is usually different than who they really are, but glimpses of the real person sometimes shine through in their actions. This is shown perfectly in “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson when Tessie Hutchinson’s “image” gives out and everyone sees that she is a selfish person. She starts off presenting her “image” and being okay with the lottery, even joking about it, saying to her husband “You wouldn’t have me leave m’dishes in the sink, now, would you Joe?”
As well, Jackson uses Tessie Hutchinson to create a symbol for how individualism is sacrificed when identifying within a society. Tessie stood out from the crowd with her poor punctuality, antics and her sharing of opinions, sort of how individualism can mean to stand out from the crowd. Before being murdered Tessie Hutchinson states, “It isn’t fair, it isn’t right,” symbolizing that although individualism should be embraced no matter what it will not overpower conformity within society. Jackson also uses Old Man Warner as a symbol of conformity that the lottery brings. Old Man Warner states, “Seventy-seventh year I was in the lottery,” inferring that as long as the lottery has been around so has the conformity of the town to go along with tradition.
Old Man Warner is responsible for Tessie’s death because he is an elder with a large influence on the town, but does not speak up. the idea of the lottery in his view is not a bad thing. While conversing with Mr. Adam, Old Man Warner called the people in the north “Pack of crazy fools” when Mr.Adam told him that the people in the north are considering to give up the lottery. In another event, Old man Warner tells the town “Seventy-seventh year I been in the lottery… Seventy-seventh time.”
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.
In Shirley Jackson’s story “The Lottery,” the anger after losing causes the main character, Tessie Hutchinson, to try and get others hurt to save herself, demonstrating how awful sportsmanship can cause us to hurt others and ourselves. Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery” takes place in a village on June 27th- the day of the lottery. Tessie Hutchinson is one of the village people. Her husband, Bill Hutchinson, drew the marked slip of paper. This outcome angered her and caused her to try and get her other family members to take their chances with them.
Shirley Jackson's, “The Lottery,” portrays the tradition of a small town in which a member of the community must get sacrificed in order to allow for a good agricultural season. The ways in which they do so is a fair lottery where citizens draw and see if they are the “chosen one” which they end up stoning to death. All citizens must partake in the lottery, including children and the elderly. Through Jackson’s development of the story, the people seem to be in a state of excitement and thrill when being part of the lottery. The citizens are constantly gossiping, laughing, and kids playing, waiting to see who is next to be stoned.
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
The extreme tradition in Shirley Jackson's, "The Lottery," produces no positive difference, but rather only a negative difference. The traditional belief upheld by the agrarian village in Jackson's story is human sacrifice, which aims at satisfying their gods so that they may have a copious harvest. When the lottery session determined that Tessie Hutchinson won the lottery, she said in response, "it isn't fair." (Reading Literature and Writing Argument) Tessie believed prior to winning the lottery that she was going to lose; however, she became a victim of her overconfidence.
This shows that she is trying to change the rules to benefit herself now that she knows that she is the chosen one. At first, the reader doesn’t see why it’s so bad to be chosen because their thinking is of a modern day lottery, when the winner will receive a huge cash prize, but not in this case. It is later revealed that the “winner” of the lottery will be stoned to death by everyone in the town. This can connect to the beginning of the story, when the children are collecting rocks and playing with them. The reader doesn’t see that it is foreshadowing until the ending of the story, when Tessie is slaughtered by the town members.
Protagonist Although Jackson’s “The Lottery” is filled with many different outspoken characters, she utilizes characterization to turn an ordinary housewife into the conflicted protagonist. When Tessie Hutchinson is first introduced to the reader as a flat character, Jackson describes her as just an ordinary citizen “Mrs. Hutchinson came hurriedly along the path to the square, her sweater thrown over her shoulders” (Jackson, 1948, para.8).
She realizes that this is an unpleasurable and outdated tradition and should be forgotten only because she got chosen. However, if her family’s name wasn’t drawn, she would have blindly followed the ritual, thrilled to have escaped a gruesome, sacrificial death. As a reader it is easy to empathize for Tessie since she or others don’t have a voice in their community or are even able to look at the bigger picture and see that the lottery is unnecessary. Not only does the dramatic irony of the lottery allow the reader to understand Tessie’s view, it creates a similar feeling towards Bill Hutchinson. For example, “Bill Hutchinson went over to his wife and forced the slip of paper out of her hand.
