Examples Of Tradition In The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

Tradition and Family in “ The Lottery”

By manipulating the themes of tradition and family, Shirley Jackson creates a false sense of security and trust.

Tradition, a custom, value or belief that is passed on from one generation to generation, lives and thrives in every community. The aspect of tradition brings many people hope, and positivity. Tradition creates unity between people, and evokes the feelings of security. In “The Lottery”, the community believes strongly in and has a high regard for tradition. Shirley Jackson manipulates the reader by using tradition as a major theme to show a sense of security. Ironically, in “The Lottery” rather than tradition being a positive aspect of society, it becomes dangerous and creates instability.

Tradition being practiced by every member of the town is shown by the yearly attendance of the whole village to the lottery. Jackson focuses on the rituals of the lottery, as if they are extremely important to the main event.

This manipulates the reader to believe that the great rituals and the event that people are gathered for, is hopeful. It would be one that they would want to attend as well. Once prominent, the rituals dilute over time. The happy songs and the dances die. The “ritual salute, which the official of the lottery [has] to use in addressing each person who [comes] up to draw from the box, but this also had changed with time” (Jackson 211). Traditions change`based on the circumstances of the time period, as newer generations evolve. The lottery tradition continues to change, but the new generations, the new eras, don’t seem to comprehend the reality of the lottery. Following blindly the tradition of the lottery, allowing it to adapt, “the villagers [forget] the ritual and [lose] the original black box, they still [remember] to use stones”(214). Tradition, as Jackson infers to the reader is a danger in society. The black box, acting as a symbol for the origin that is so unknown to the generation today, shows how much the members of the community do not examine why they are actively murdering a member of their pact. They do not forget the stones; they do not forget the active event

that never changes. Why deviate from the pattern that they’ve established that has worked for so long? In “The Lottery” tradition becomes an infliction on society. The readers change their view from a feeling of tradition being positive and secure to a recognition that tradition can be negative.
Similar to the theme of tradition, when one thinks of the idea of family, one thinks of unity. One thinks of a sign of hope and a sign of complete comfort. Jackson uses this comfort and security that the reader has in the beginning of the story, and spins it to instil the feeling of isolation. The lack of unity in the story manipulates the theme of family and makes the reader become confused and uncomfortable. Family is the structure of the lottery. Each family stands around together in groups. The paper is drawn by family, and eventually one person of a family is the “victor” of the lottery. At the beginning of the story the reader is comforted by the idea of family as one unit, together, waiting to see the results of the lottery. But the brutal reality is that the love and loyalty the reader feels at the beginning is lost when the lottery is it its peak. The Hutchinson family is chosen , and when Mr. Hutchinson sees that he is not the chosen one “[he] [goes] over to his wife and force[s] the slip of paper out of her hand. It [has] a black spot on it, the black spot Mr. Summers had made the night before with the heavy pencil in the coal company office. Bill Hutchinson [holds] it up, and there was a stir in the crowd” (214). The family unit crumbles. Bill Hutchinson is indifferent to the fact that his wife had just been chosen and forces her to show off her “winning”. During the zenith of the lottery, family members turn against each other in the form of murder. This shows the raw ruthlessness of the story. Mrs. Hutchinson is willing to give up her own children in order to save her own life. ‘“There's Don and Eva,’ Mrs. Hutchinson yelled. ‘Make them take their chance!’” (213). Ironically the comfort and security of the family unit completely disintegrates. Jackson brings the ideas of the harsh reality that sometimes family is not what it seems, and questions the idea of commitment during life altering circumstances.
Tradition and Family, both seemingly themes of hope, unity and security, is manipulated by Shirley Jackson to the point that readers feel unexpected opposite emotions and uncertainty throughout the story.