Point Of View In The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

In Shirley Jackson’s story “The Lottery,” she decides to use a third-person point of view with a large amount of clinical apathy; she narrates through the villagers in this way to mimic the moods and ideals of them to give us a sense of how this event plays in the villager’s lives. Due to this, we have access to what the villager’s point of view without any unnecessary emotions. The style of writing provides a substitute for character development and allows us to learn more about the village. For example, the apathy of the narration suggests that the villagers had accepted the lottery of stoning as an event that needed to happen, and conveys a sense of what their society and ideals are. Also, Shirley Jackson throws out unnecessary information

Shirley Jackson shows that the ceremony is a crucial part of the village, and that the villagers expect others to “celebrate” it. For example, one of the elder villagers, Old Man Warner rants, “They do say … that over in the north village they’re talking of giving up the lottery.” ... “Next thing you know, they’ll want 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. ’” From this, we can determine that the village believes in some superstition - where if they sacrifice a person every year, they will be rewarded with a good harvest. In fact, they believe all those who do not partake in the ritual were declining as a society. Warner even believes for those that did not take part in the ritual were inferior to his village. It is also clear that the village had done this for some time as well, given that there was enough time for him to remember when people used to live in caves. Thus, we can infer that the village is probably old enough to have tradition and ceremonies, but young enough that there wasn’t any scientific rebuttals and civil advancement. On the other hand, when one of the villager children subs in for his father, other villagers would praise him for his bravery by saying things such as, “Good fellow, Jack,” and “Glad to see your mother’s go a man to do it.” It seems the villagers respect

The lack of character development and plot was used as a strategy to dull the severity of the events that follow and acts as if the reader has already known what had followed, as if this story could be narrated by one of the villagers. Although it was never explicitly stated, it is assumed that Shirley Jackson only puts details that relate to the present actions in the story, and leaves out details that explain said actions. For example, she describes the lottery as: “The lottery was conducted -- as were the square dances, the teen-age club, the Halloween program -- by Mr. Summers, who had tie and energy to devote to civic activities.” Shirley Jackson wants us to believe that the lottery counted as a civic activity, or an activity that was made for the public with good intentions. We might believe that from just this the lottery was a giveaway of money; through the villager’s point of view, the stoning was civic as it promised a good harvest for the rest of the village. We would not be able to know this unless we knew the whole story, much like the villagers themselves. In addition, right before the lottery starts, Mr. Summers says, “Well, now, … guess we better get started, get this over with, so’s we can go back to work. Anybody ain’t here?” To us, we believe that he is saying that in order to make sure that the lottery goes in an