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Death Depicted In Shirley Jackson's The Lottery

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The hush of deathly mutilation will always follow a downpour of stones. Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” ends in this grim death after being misled by the title. What seems to start out as a virtuous time in the story, a traditional gathering on a sunny day with green grass and children running amok, takes a severe turn when the friendly community is actually coming together to play the game of stoning roulette. At the assembly, the head of each attending household will pull a card, either blank or marked with a dot. Of course, if the card is blank, the entire household is in the clear of facing their doom. But if the dot-marked card is pulled, each family member draws from an equal amount of slips to decide which of them is to never see another day again. Every year this takes place, someone chosen to die, and no one has ever questioned it. Jackson uses an ironical setting, symbolism, and character development to show that fear-induced conformity can be overridden by the democracy of people. The setting of the story comes into play starting with the first sentence. Jackson writes, “The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were …show more content…

This character, Tessie Hutchinson, also hides in the conformity in the beginning, even making humoredly comments such as, “Wouldn't have me leave m'dishes in the sink, now, would you,” as it’s followed by the laughter of other villagers (292). When she arrives for the lottery, she exchanges words with one of her acquaintances, Mrs. Delacroix, which also plays a key role in the theme later. After a long anticipation, the winner of the lottery is chosen, being Hutchinson. Her attitude quickly changes, exclaiming that it wasn’t fair, as the rest of the village closes in on her for the stoning. Even Delacroix selects a stone so big, she must hold it with two

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Kalee Von Alvensleben Professor Emily Malsam ENGLISH 50 10/20/17 Not Your Ordinary Lottery In Shirley Jackson’s short story, The Lottery, a lottery takes place in a small village where the town gets together for an annual tradition. It's not your normal, everyday lottery; but a lottery where you don't want to be pronounced the winner. In this lottery, if your name gets called, you are chosen to be stone to death.

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Shirley Jackson a very popular author well known for her short story called “The lottery” which always leaves the reader thinking. “The Lottery” was published on June 28, 1948 which is just weeks after it was written. Some other pieces written by Jackson are “The Haunting of Hill House”, “We have always lived in the castle” as well as “Life among the savages”. Jackson tends to write about horror and mystery and has many other pieces with supernatural themes. Many pieces written by Jackson have a small-town setting that end with horror.

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Using the the setting of men talking about their daily lives, Jackson conceals the horrific ending. Also Jackson describes the setting of the day to be pleasant and soothing. Shirley Jackson illustrates"The morning of June 27th, was clear and sunny" and indicates "flowers were blooming profusely and the grass was richly green". Jackson describes the day as winsome and typical. Jackson also specifies the day the of the tradition was June 27th, which also induces the reader that the tradition is ordinary.

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Conformity is a powerful and influential behavior that can drastically affect a society’s circumstances. The morality and wellbeing of the individuals’ in a society are shaped by the everyday traditions and customs of that culture. Shirley Jackson, an award-winning author for her works in horror and mystery, unveils the perturbing effect of conformity on a society and its people in her short story “The Lottery.” In her thought-provoking story, a village situated in a warm area of England prepares to partake in a traditional crop fertility ritual that involves a paper drawing to elect a ‘winner’ who will be stoned to death. The societal conformity to continue this brutal tradition causes the life of a person to be insensitively taken away each

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There seems to be a connection to cruelty and beauty in some degree. The two compliment, create, and destroy one another. Without cruelty and suffering, there could not be a beautiful and admirable existence. Shirley Jackson, author of “The Lottery”, suffered from mental illnesses called agoraphobia and depression (Heller, 2012). In spite of her struggles with these incurable diseases, Jackson channeled her dark thoughts into her writing; one out of 75 short stories, “The Lottery” was published in 1948 (Jackson, 1948).

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Drawing “The Lottery” out of the box for a human sacrifice is a tradition in the book that the village does every year. Ancient society and religious groups around the world have human sacrifices to prove themselves worthy to whoever they worship. Such as the Aztecs, Mayans, and Egyptians. Another element this storyline is shown as an allegory this the fact that Tess Hutchinson’s death was ruled by stoning. “Mr. Dunbar had small stones in both hands” ( Jackson 7).

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The Lottery Throughout our existence we have always been frightened by death and its randomness. We ask questions like, “Why did he die and not her?” or “How could this have happened?” In the short story, The Lottery, Shirley Jackson uses plot, setting, and symbolism to advance the theme that we all have a fear of death and its capriciousness.

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“The Lottery” is an realism/horror story written by Shirley Jackson. The story is about some villagers of a small New England town who follow the tradition of making a lottery every year. When it comes, they like to celebrate it with the correct rules and the correct objects so they can feel more comfortable. Everyone need to take a slip of paper from a small black box, and the paper with a black dot in it means that the family is the winner, then they raffle again; Bill Hutchinson, who was the husband of the protagonist Tessie Hutchinson picked a paper with a black dot in it, that meant that Tessie was the winner of the lottery, then she starts complaining because the drawing was not conducted properly. At the end, the townspeople moved off to a cleared spot outside the town and they begin stoning her to death (Jackson).

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The Lottery itself represents a primal example of loss of innocence; portrayed through the young boys who gather at the town square to collect rocks for the horrors soon to follow. An illustration of how traditions can lose their true meanings and come to represent violence and warfare. Furthermore, “The Lottery” also represents the decaying characteristics of traditions, as symbolized by the town’s black box, in this case where every year, someone’s name is drawn out of the black box and they are stoned to death, by other members who may or may not end up to be family. Nonetheless, it ends up to be the villagers who

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In “The Lottery,” Shirley Jackson uses foreshadowing when the children are collecting stones from the river and putting them into piles. It hints that something bad is going to happen because it is unusual for boys to be grabbing stones and randomly put them into a pile. For example, while the towns people were getting ready for the lottery the narrator states, “Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his example,selecting the smoothest and roundest stones; Bobby and Harry Jones and Dickie Delacroix, eventually made a great pile of stones in one corner of the square and guarded it against the raids of the other boys.” (Jackson). This quotation shows that the boys in the village are finding the smoothest and roundest stones and putting them into a big pile.

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3/8/2017 The lottery essay Anan Istetieh Anticipation mingled with uncertainty, better known, as suspense, is an inevitable quality of human nature. Suspense is occasionally a great mechanism. It allows the author to keep the readers alert and leads up to the element of surprise, which is a successful writing tool that makes a story more enjoyable. The story “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson builds up suspense through the foreshadowing of a horrible moment, creating a character that stands out from the crowd all while withholding the true nature of the story. The author of “The Lottery” foreshadowed the horrible climax of the story by explaining how the children were recently released from school for the summer, but they felt discomfort, “and

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871 Words | 4 Pages

While real life traditions are rarely so extreme, Jackson’s exaggerated fictional example emphasizes her point to great effect. By the end of the story, the audience is convinced that the town is wrong to uphold the lottery tradition, but Jackson is not really writing about a lottery; she is writing about how damaging it can

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1220 Words | 5 Pages

Human nature can be characterized as being positive, capable of altruism and goodness which sets humankind apart from savage animals; however, human nature possesses a dark side, namely cruelty, and it is capable of barbarism like any beast. In “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, cruelty is part of human nature, and the participants of the lottery demonstrate human cruelty through violence towards one another; markedly, by exhibiting desensitization to violence and the acceptance of violence resulting in internal dysfunction which is perpetuated yearly. Participants of the lottery belong to a close-knit community, and every year the community hosts an enigmatic lottery draw. The conclusion of the lottery draw is only mysterious until the outcome

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“The Lottery”, a short story by Shirley Jackson, is about a lottery that takes place in a small village. The story starts off with the whole town gathering in the town square, where Mr. Summers holds the lottery. Once everyone gathers, every family draws a slip of paper out of an old black box, and the family with the black mark on their paper gets picked. After that, each family member older than 3 years of age re-draws a slip of paper again and this time, the person with the black mark on their paper gets picked as the “lucky winner” of the lottery. In this short story, after the Hutchinson family gets drawn, Tessie Hutchinson is declared “winner” of the lottery, with her reward is being stoned to death.

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The Lottery The short story, The Lottery by Shirley Jackson proposes an annual lottery drawing in a little village set in New England. However, unlike any usual lottery, the winner is stoned to death by their fellow townsmen, women and children included. The lottery seems to have been a custom around the area for over seventy years.

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