The Lottery

5 Pages 1319 Words

Every society has endless sides to it, which some people may consider certain actions morally wrong while others view them simply as a part of every day life. Shirley Jackson uses many successful techniques to bring her story, The Lottery, to a height of excitement and confusion as the names were drawn to a state of silence or anger when the stones are thrown. Shirley Jackson uses symbolism, diction, and characterization and to show the utmost power ritual has on society.
Shirley Jackson implants many examples of symbolism throughout her story The Lottery. She chose them for a purpose or reason in order to pick your mind and make you stop and think about what happened and more importantly why it happened. The first thing mentioned is the date and time of year. June 27th which just happens to be a week after the summer solstice (Windows). It is described as a “clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day” (Jackson). The setting could not have been a better time of the year for a happily town meeting then a bright, cheerful, yet calm summer day. As the town gathers, a three-legged stool is brought up and placed in front of the entire village and an old black wooden box is placed on it (Jackson). The three-legged stool symbolizes instability most likely among the villagers. A stool with two legs will not stand up, and a stool with four legs is going to be the strongest, so a three-legged stool is right in between, not quite sturdy yet not utterly useless. The black box set on this tipsy stool symbolizes death in most ways (Protas). The box is described as “black but splintered badly along one side to show the original wood color…[and] made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it” (Jackson). Death is one of the main things in life that is sure to happen at one time or another and having it placed directly in front of the villagers in a old, black, wooden box symbolizes it is going to happen t...