Theme Of Evil In The Lottery

In the lottery we follow an eerie set of events that is set in an idyllic rural town where everyone knows each other and where life is swell. Or at least that's what it looks like in the begging. During the story the author depicts the dangers of blindly following traditions.
The author builds a slow mounting dread in the reader by the slow pace and the normalness of how all the villagers seem to treat it more like a chore than an event. Then when the event starts the author describes how old the tradition is with this passage. “The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago, and the black box now resting had been put into use even before Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, was born.” The villagers follow through with this grim tradition every year seemingly just because they've done it every year since before anyone can remember so why stop now? This is the danger of blindly following traditions.
Another theme is the nature of evil. In the short story we see that evil does not come from the outside but from within all of us. The townspeople are not shown to be evil monsters or villains but as ordinary people who are no different from you and me although they are capable of committing atrocious acts when blindly following tradition. An example of the story's precautionary tale is Tessie

The black box, a physical representation of the “Lottery”, represents the history of the lottery. Showing how old and how embedded in the culture of the town the tradition is. “There was a story that the present box had been made with pieces of the box that preceded it, the one that was made by the first people settled here.” This example helps the reader understand the reluctance to change it let alone abandon the lottery system as seen in this excerpt “Some places have already quit the lotteries,” Mrs. Adams said, “Nothing but trouble in that,” Old Man Warner said stoutly. “Pack of young