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Traditional Rituals And Free Thinking In The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

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Essay 1- The Lottery The Lottery Author Shirley Jackson who wrote the short story The Lottery outlines the dangers of participating in traditional rituals and free thinking. This short story is set in a small southern town where a lottery pick happens every year, and the winner is stoned to death by the civilians of the town. The public execution is not known until the very end of the story. In this essay, we will dive into the dangers of following traditional rituals and free thinking. The dangers of blindly following tradition, the mental impact, the societal role in continuing negative traditions, and alternatives to these practices. Traditional rituals have been a part of history since the beginning of time. The definition of a ritual …show more content…

Another example would be the movie The Purge. In this movie, there are similarities between the world of The Lottery and The Purge world. In this film once a year you can engage any and all crime that is legal except harming government officials; no one really bats an eye at this because it is so normalized. In this case, comparisons with the government would be Old Man Warner and the legalized crime would be the annual stoning of a singular person. Since The Purge and The Lottery are so dystopian coded people think it is bizarre to consider any nonviolent act a threat to their “flawless” societies People need to use their brains when thinking about some of the traditions they might wish to participate in so they don’t find themselves in potentially lethal …show more content…

In a scene in The Lottery where Mrs. Adams says “Some places have already quit lotteries, “nothing but trouble in that,” Old Man Warner said stoutly. “Pack of young fools” (Jackson 200). This shows when the thought of something untraditional is brought up it is immediately shot down, along with being ignored Old Man Warner was the only person to respond to Mrs. Adams. Another small excerpt from this story includes the quote “The children had stones already, and someone gave little Davy Hutchinson a few pebbles.” “It isn’t fair…A stone hit her on the side of the head. Old Man Warner was saying, “Come on, come on, everyone.” (Jackson 203). Again, Old Man Warner is the internal voice of this town and he is the only one who is answering and responding to these “out of place” comments the townspeople are

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Bradbury’s use of metaphors and the short story “The Lottery” supports this concept. Old Man Warner from “The Lottery” states, “‘First thing you know, we’d all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns. There’s always been a lottery,’ he added petulantly” (Jackson 4). This town has no reason for participating in the lottery other than that it has always been a tradition. Once again, fear has consumed society into dismissing any notion other than tradition.

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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.”

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In the story, a few villagers discuss the fact that other villages have recently begun dropping the tradition of the lottery. One villager known as Old Man Warner opposes the idea, insisting that they should keep it just because “there’s always been a lottery”(32). Old Man Warner is shown to support the lottery, with his reason being the sole fact that it has been in practice for so long. He believes that they should keep the lottery just because it has always existed, so much so to the point where he does not question the nature of it and defends it. Additionally, Old Man Warner does not state anything to further support his argument; he merely dismisses the idea of removing the lottery by stating how long it has been in effect for, revealing how he rarely thinks about or questions the tradition.

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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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In The Lottery by Shirley Jackson she uses a theme of traditions and shows it through the story in a unique way, Jackson also changes the mood throughout the story so the reader also changes perspectives and understands the story in a different way as the story goes. From my point of view the theme of The Lottery is that sometimes societies have certain traditions that people follow without questioning why they do it? , is it right or wrong? , should we maybe consider not doing it anymore?. A lot of times people know that that’s wrong but they don’t do anything about it because they don’t want to create disagreements or go against what society says.

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In her story "The Lottery", Shirley Jackson implies the negative consequences of blindly following tradition through the acceptance, by the villagers, of the tradition of the lottery. Jackson suggests that the people of the village are afraid to give up the little tradition they have, even if it is not good. Every year after the lottery, the conductor of the lottery, Mr. Summers suggests that they should build a new box but, “No one [likes] to upset even as much tradition as [is] represented by the box.” (Jackson, 1). The black box symbolizes ritual and tradition.

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Cultural rituals, close mindedness, unwillingness to change or speak out and do what is right in the face of one’s beliefs or cultural norms. In the short story “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, the characters are faced with a custom that has been handed down from generation to generation, some question the current significance, while others blindly accept the outcome. Shirley Jackson, begins her story with show and narrative, it is a normal day, just like any other in the town, children playing and filling their pockets with stones, but for what? Both children and adults are slowly assembling at the town square yet, from the beginning you can feel a sense of hesitation though it is non-verbally communicated.

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“Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his example, selecting the smoothest and the roundest stones”(304).The ritual and traditions of the lottery in Shirley Jackson’s story seem to be just as old as the town itself, especially since most of the residents do not recall any of the old rituals, even the Old Man Warner, who is “celebrating" his 77th lottery. This helps illustrate how the people of the village just went on with the lottery without even questioning it. Like during the shock testing in Lessing experiments. The subjects blindly followed orders to obtain information even if it meant killing the person. Even in today’s society we are in social groups that define who we are and we do whatever we can to conform to

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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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At a time when basic religious beliefs and traditions were being questioned by academia, author Shirley Jackson penned a poignant attack against those who blindly accepted values and traditions in her short story, “The Lottery.” The Lottery is presented as an event that has always occurred throughout the region's history without any opposition. Nonchalantly, the entire village commits homicide at the finale. Finally, aspects of the traditional lottery evolved without notice or were forgotten by the villagers. Within “The Lottery,” author Shirley Jackson embeds the theme of blindly accepting traditions as illustrated by the actions of the villagers.

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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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The villagers are reluctant to give up their beliefs because they think that they might lose their distinction that separates them from others. Old Man Warner strongly disapproves of people who want to quit the lottery. He says, “There’s always been a lottery”3 so for him, these people are “crazy.”4 However, for the readers, his reluctance means that he is afraid to change his place within the society. He has gained the title of Old Man not only because he is the oldest man in the village but he has also been in the lottery for 77 years.

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