All traditions have an intention and a purpose dedicated to the current time period, but it may come to a point where practice is no longer justified. In 'The Lottery', a short story written by Shirley Jackson, a rural town of 300 is 'celebrating' the killing of one member, which is believed to ensure a profitable harvest for the year. Tessie, the main character of the story, is chosen as this year’s winner to be brutally stoned by her own...
1 Page
410 Words
In his novel ‘Shibumi’, author Rodney William Whitaker writes, “Irony is fate's most common figure of speech”. Irony is present in almost every situation imaginable—from the small talk made while waiting in line to the foundation of some of the most well-known, acclaimed pieces of literature in history. Simply put, irony is a contrast between expectation and reality— when what is expected to happen does not. Author Shirley Jackson utilizes this concept multiple times in ‘The Possibility of Evil’, a...
2 Pages
977 Words
Shirley Jackson was born on the 14th of December, in 1916, in San Francisco, California. She was a bright daughter of Leslie Jackson and Geraldine. Her parents were conservative country-club people, who raised their children in luxuries. Shirley’s childhood world was ruined by her vapid mother who was disappointed by her daughter as Shirley was accidentally conceived. Her mother went through a failed abortion. Thus, her life was ostensibly rebellious against her cruel and emotionless mother, who favored her brother...
2 Pages
747 Words
When Shirley Jackson's chilling story 'The Lottery' was first published in 1948 in The New Yorker, it generated more letters than any work of fiction the magazine had ever published. Readers were furious, disgusted, occasionally curious, and almost uniformly bewildered. The public outcry over the story can be attributed, in part, to The New Yorker's practice at the time of publishing works without identifying them as fact or fiction. Readers were also presumably still reeling from the horrors of World...
2 Pages
1151 Words
Throughout the world People do things for various reasons. Belief, survival, religion, peer pressure, culture or tradition, are some of the reasons the people carry out things. People have various traditions such as Christmas, Easter Day and so forth. Some people have strange or out of the ordinary traditions. The two short stories The Lottery by Shirley Jackson and A Rose For Emily by William Faulkner? Both depict the theme of tradition. By exploring violence, brutality, and death within these...
5 Pages
2474 Words
Get a unique paper that meets your instructions
800+ verified writers
can handle your paper.
Place order
Shirley Jackson uses “The Lottery” as an allegory for the dystopic inclinations in society, as well as utilising features of the horror genre to emphasise the harsh depictions of violence displayed. Publishing this story close to the Holocaust was retrospective and reflected on highlighted the unbridled nature of justifying an act of brutality. Furthermore, “The Lottery” commentates on the violence of tradition and justifying acts of barbaric violence due to their position of being a traditional part of culture. Jackson...
2 Pages
1054 Words
Shirley Jackson’s short story and Salman Rushdie’s essay both pass on the message that society is able to impose rules and mindsets that are driven by factors such as religion due to it having a massive following. Individuals in a society avoid going against flow of the society so it is easy to find themselves conforming to something they don’t truly believe in or understand. People will just blindly follow the tradition and culture they are born into without question...
3 Pages
1562 Words
The village lottery culminates in a violent murder each year, a bizarre ritual that suggests how dangerous tradition can be when people follow it blindly. Before we know what kind of lottery they’re conducting, the villagers and their preparations seem harmless, even quaint: they’ve appointed a rather pathetic man to lead the lottery, and children run about gathering stones in the town square. Everyone is seems preoccupied with a funny-looking black box, and the lottery consists of little more than...
1 Page
590 Words
