Introduction
The Lottery is a short story designed by Shirley Jackson that was written back in 1948. It surrounds a small town in America in which lottery has an annual ritual. The story is very famous among many short stories of America literature. The amazing thing about the story to the writer is that its feedback was negative. Many readers after they read the story cancelled their subscriptions and talked ill in the entire summer. In other countries, the story was totally banned an outstanding example is South Africa.
Plot
The story revolves around a small town in America that offers the lottery game annually. The small town covered holds approximately 300 residents and they are excited and still in a nervy mood. The story occuer during the D day of the event where the children are busy gathering stones as the adults who rule the town gather for the annual event. It happens that this event is the local tradition whose aim is to ensure a good harvest. However, at the nearby communities rumors are spreading allover that they are not ready to continue with the event.
The preparations of the event start at the night shortly before the Mr. Graves and Mr. Summers focus on coming up with paper slips and the list of all the families. After the completion of the paper slips, they are put in a black box which is kept safe overnight at the coal company. The event then starts at 10 a.m. in order to ensure that it ends at lunchtime. The heads of various families are the first in drawing the slips. Bill picks one slip with a black spot indicating his family is represented. After the head of families are done, the other family members also make their draw. Bill’s wife gets a marked slip shortly after all the drawing is complete and Tessie picked. After this incident, the slips are left to fly out in the wind. To keep the tradition of the event, each villager needs to obtain a stone and move around the Tessie. Jackson’s short story ends as the Tessie dies after stoning from the villagers.
Themes
The danger of following tradition blindly
It is amazing since following this tradition leads to death of one person every year through stoning during the event. Ideally, this indicates that tradictions may be dangerous especially when the members of a given society follow them blindly. It is funny how the villagers prepare for the event without feeling guilty of the outcome of the event. Besides, it is blindly how the villagers perform ritual every year yet they do not know the origin of the lotteries. Since they are fully blinded by this tradition, they are unable to change the issue of murder though they have a feeling that murder of a person each year is bad.
The uncertainty of persecution
Individuals get persecuted during the event randomly. The individual who die during the event is not that he or she is guilty of anything but only because he or she picked the wrong slip paper from a box. Ideally, the ritual of the lottery creates a scenario so that all the villagers taking part in the play have an equal chance of being the victim of the circumstance. The death of Tessie’s is a clear indication of how the society is ruthless in persecuting innocents’ person due to baseless traditions.
Stylistic devices
Symbols
The Black Box
The black box symbolizes both the tradition on the lottery as well as unreasonable villagers’ loyalty. The box seems to be falling apart yet the villagers are not ready to replace it. Ideally, this clearly indicates that although this tradition leads to death of a member of the society the society is not ready to move out of this tradition.
The lottery
The lottery symbolizes any idea or action that is repetitive from one generation to another in a given society that has acceptance and is followed irrespective of the outcomes of the actions. In this society, lottery has been taking place for long and its practise recurs each year with the society losing one member every year. Lottery clearly shows illogical actions of a given norm when the traditions are not questionable even by the modern generation.
Motifs
Family
Lottery brings family to have a common gathering. However, such a bong leads to cruel death of one family member, which implies a turnaround towards one innocent member of the society. The good and strong relationship among the family members brings them together to have a lottery. Nevertheless, the family relationships mean actually nothing when the time for stoning the victim arises.
Rules
Lottery has some rules that need the villager to follow. Such rules show that lottery is logical, efficient and has a great purpose to the society. The rules give a precise order through which the villagers need to run the exercise until the end. However, these rules have lapsed since they lead to destruction instead of building the community.
