What Are Some Examples Of Foreshadowing In The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

The Lottery is a short story by Shirley Jackson that describes a small town’s “lottery.” In the story, paper slips are placed inside a roughed-up black box around the middle of the town. The kids are picking up rocks while adults are normally socializing. One could only assume that the lottery is a great event that everyone enjoys due to the jovial-like nature they exude. Later, after all the ballots have been counted for, everyone leaves. The citizens of the small town eventually come back for the pulling of the ballots, some are happy and some are not. There were a couple distinct characters, one being the Old Man Warner stuck in his old ways. In contrast, the young adults tended to view this lottery as “not correct” due to many other towns

An example of foreshadowing in the short story were the rocks. In the beginning of the story, the adults are gathering and the kids are collecting rocks. According to Sparknotes, “In the second paragraph children upt stones in their pockets and make piles of stones in the town square.” Little does the reader know what the rocks are for, and just assumes that kids are being kids, collecting rocks. However, later in the story, the rocks are used on stoning the lucky individual who won the lottery. It is known that the kids enjoy throwing the rocks and collecting the rocks. Little do the kids know, that their fellow citizen will actually die due to such behavior. This is a basic understanding of the human brain. Kids generally do not know what death is until a certain age. Another aspect of foreshadowing was the roughed-up black box. The box shows wear from the time that it has endured. Except for the fact that the box is not the original artifact. It is known however, that the box is older than even the oldest man in the town. The black box shows foreshadowing as one would not expect that a lottery of a different sorts would be that decayed. Another usage of foreshadowing was a small conversation between a man and a woman. The man told the woman “Thought we were going to have to get on without you, Tessie.” The woman replied “Wouldn’t have me leave m’dishes in the sink, now, would you,

There are usually three parties within the choice of keeping tradition. To keep the tradition the same and to not change it, to not keep the tradition at all, and to have a middle ground. In the Minute Book Reports, The Old Man Warner “represents the ideology that current tradition is the best and that if it isn’t broken don’t fix it,” even if it may be wrong. The middle ground are the kids, they do not care if it stays, and they do not care if it goes. The opposing party in this story is the woman. Except, in the beginning the woman was for the lottery. She was late for the lottery which shows her little dedication to the event. Yet, she still showed dedication for the event, but eventually she changed to the opposing side once she was picked. This shows hypocrisy, a very flawed human trait. While many the opinion of the reader is most likely on the opposing party today, there are still people that believe in tradition. According to SixMinuteScholar “the internal logic is just that it’s tradition” and nothing else. This shows that tradition is not always the best thing to keep. With a tinge of disagreement and agreement, the middle ground would most likely have the best response in this case. The tradition in the story use to be used in other towns, but most have decided that it was immoral. Tradition within this story was a great way to show exactly why “not fixing what isn’t broke” is not always the best