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What Are The Similarities Between The Lottery And The Crucible

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The Crucible Essay As Mark Twain once said, “The less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it.” Many communities, in fiction or in real life, are affected by traditional beliefs. In both The Crucible and “The Lottery”, Jackson and Miller communicate that many will stay true to their traditions rather than stay loyal to their community; however, they also show how these traditions may create a community. Throughout “The Lottery” and The Crucible, both authors introduce traditional objects to emphasize and strengthen their characters' beliefs. In “The Lottery”, Jackson includes that while “the original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago,” (paragraph 5) the village still does the tradition …show more content…

In Jackson’s story, “The Lottery”, the townspeople were all friends. This is shown by Jackson when Mrs. Hutchinson is running late. She stops to speak to her neighbor, and at the end, “she tapped Mrs. Delacroix on the arm as a farewell.” (paragraph 9) However, as the tradition goes, neighbors are forced to turn on one another. “[Mrs.] Delacroix selected a stone so large, she had to pick it up with both hands.” (paragraph 76) Even though both the women are friends, Delacroix still chooses to help stone Mrs. Hutchinson after the lottery is drawn. In The Crucible, the town of Salem has split apart. Neighbors are seen turning on each other throughout the entire story. Half of the town is being accused of witchcraft while the other half are the ones blaming them. Many people claim they “saw Goody Sibber…Alice Barrow…Goody Hawkins…Goody Booth with the devil” (page 48), however, they are lying to the community, making them believe in a false narrative. Those who have banded together to blame the townspeople are a group of young girls, controlled by Abigail …show more content…

In The Crucible, the young girls are found in the forest, dancing, which was prohibited during this time. Instead of getting in trouble for their actions, the girls used the town’s superstitious beliefs to turn the narrative. Even though Abigail had been the one to bring most of the girls into the forest to dance, she claimed “[Tituba] sends her spirit on [her] in church!” (page 44) Abigail leads the girls through their “performances” in order to startle the townspeople, leading to over 25 people dying over witchcraft. However, in “The Lottery”, Jackson exposes the children’s relationship to tradition differently. In “The Lottery”, the town is forced to draw names out of a wooden box each year, including the children. “Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his example.” (paragraph 2) The children participate in every part of the tradition, including stoning and the name

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(Jackson, p 51). The stones go on to suggest the cruelty of the people of the village as it provides a slow and painful death. “The Lottery” demonstrates how a tradition that drives the society can be completely forgotten through the years. While

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607 Words | 3 Pages

On account of the fear for her life, she falsely accuses innocent people of practicing witchcraft, and others soon follow suit. After she and the other girls were discovered in the forest dancing, she knew that they would be whipped and possibly hung. Abigail claims that they were bewitched, and begins to utter names of those who were 'with the devil'. The accused are forced to falsely blame other innocent people in order to angle the allegation to others to avoid punishment. This turns into complete chaos.

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As a coherent set of views manifested through interpersonal interaction, political ideologies become a significant aspect of the human experience which is susceptible to manipulation and interpretation. The ramifications of political and moral issues of Arthur Miller’s milieu are encapsulated in his1953 play The Crucible, an allegory of the Salem witchcraft trials influenced by his personal context of the McCarthy Era. The political representation in The Crucible aligns with Shirley Jackson’s 1948 short story The Lottery, a powerful allegory of barbarism and social sacrifice. Both texts exhibit the behavioural patterns of individuals as a result of traditional, religious and patriotic values. Therefore, the composer’s political motivation is purposefully addressed through representation and it’s medium of production.

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“Change does not change tradition. it Strengths it. change is a challenge and an opportunity. not a threat”, according to prince Philips from England. In relation to The crucible and “The lottery” both didn't want to change their customs because of what people could think.

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Arthur Miller’s The Crucible is the story of two times in our country’s history in which we gave in completely to our paranoia, causing mass hysteria. Although The Crucible takes place in Salem Massachusetts during the colonial era, Arthur miller wrote the play as a reflection of the social and political situation happening in his time of McCarthyism and the Second Red Scare. The universal theme of religion, and how far people are willing to go when they believe they are carrying out their god’s will, is represented in the conflict between religious-based decisions of the court in Salem and the people in town who were accused and prosecuted due to rash, religious, decisions, complete blind faith in God, and the ability to justify one's actions

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The truth of the matter though is that traditions can be disastrous because they are perceived as respectable merely because they have been around for so long. In “The Lottery,” Jackson uses tone, symbolism, and irony to show the destruction that can be caused by conforming to a tradition or a custom. Just like the villagers’ annual lottery, discrimination has been around for a long time as well, but just because it has been around for so long, does not mean it should be implemented. People must learn to separate themselves from such practices so they can teach future generation’s better ethical

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Jackson utilizes satirical writing to criticize the tendency to stick to old traditions despite how they can be outdated, not true to their origins, and in the case of the lottery, quite senseless. He first paints a simple picture of town and a mysterious lottery that is heavily backed by tradition, which is made visible through the inclusion of Old Man Warner. Jackson also makes his point well known by mentioning on multiple occasions that the village has lost the procedure and meaning of the lottery to time. Jackson’s The Lottery seems innocent enough at first, but the included twist at the end achieves his goal of criticizing a blind adherence to tradition. In The Lottery Jackson harnesses both satirical and subtly critical language to

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Have you ever changed something about yourself to fit in with a certain group of people, or maybe even if you did something that you did not want to do, only to fit in? Conformity is the process in which one adjusts one's behavior and beliefs to be accepted by other people. Some stories that effectively portray the dangers of conformity are, “The Crucible”, by Arthur Miller, the novel “Shooting an Elephant" by George Orwell, and, “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, these three stories show three different kinds of conformity, and what it can do a person or society. The Crucible by Arthur Miller is based on the Salem Witch Trials in Massachusetts in 1692, it tells a fictional story about a town in Salem involved in witch hunts. The people in Salem are in a constant state of fear about whether they will become bewitched or be accused of

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The purpose of the lottery is to continue the old tradition of sacrificing a scapegoat in order for a harvest. The scapegoat is chosen at random and then stoned to death by his/her companions. Although “The Lottery” reflects an event from the past, Jackson shows that many of the actions of the town resemble the tribulations that ensue in today’s society. To begin with, like the villagers in the story, our society also partakes in valuing tradition.

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A portion of the town’s men and women were accused by a group of teenage girls for practicing witchcraft, to cover up their use own of witchcraft. Although the town is built on purity and honesty, there is no reason to trust these girls besides their use of persuasion. These girls had performed an act of witchcraft and contacted the devil with the help of a fair maid, Tituba. When they were caught in the exploit, one of the young girls, Abigail, was fearful. She decided to go upon her pursuit of repairing this situation by persuading the rest of the girls to join her and lie to the remainder of the town about being involved with witchcraft.

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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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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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467 Words | 2 Pages

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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605 Words | 3 Pages

Shirley Jackson’s “The lottery” is a story based on tradition. When hearing the word tradition, most people think of team rituals before games, or something families do together annually. However, Jackson is obviously not like most people. She builds up a fair amount of tension around this ritual that is taking place to make readers wonder what is going on. She uses many different techniques to show that sometimes, traditions are not always meant to go on forever.

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This story still remains relevant in comparison to today. Simple towns people who speak to each other on a daily basis and joke around with each other all of the sudden turn around and kill one of their one. This story symbolized the change of heart within people when events go on. With various symbols, Shirley Jackson created the short story, The Lottery, to show society and what it has been and what it could be. One might even say that Jackson wanted to keep it in the mind of a ‘modern’ society that such things could happen again.

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