Sacrifice In The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

Each of the different regions have different traditions and customs. In the short story, "The Lottery" tells an villages retains old traditions. The patriarch of the village will be elected a person from a special "lottery" to sacrifice each year. The way for sacrifice is that all the other villagers were beaten to death by stoning. I think the narrator centers on the actions and simple language of each town people from an objective perspective to reflect the less of rationality, ignorant ideas and cruel coldness of human nature of the whole town people. In the beginning of this novel, it's under a relaxed atmosphere. The author tells the peaceful environment, but I feel nervous after more ominous signs has been reveal. For example, a child, Bobby Martin's pockets filled with rocks, and the other boys soon followed his example. Bobby and Harry Jones and Dickie Delacroix made a great pile of stones in one corner of the square and guarded it against the raids of the other boys. (p 132)These rocks means killing, and the sacrifice is common in the village, even the children think sacrifice is just a traditional activity.

(p 133) From this description of the black box, we can speculate that the lottery activity has lasted for a long time. The villagers are blindly following the cold-blooded cruel, they choose sacrifice to pray for a bumper harvest or the good crop weather. This makes a strong statement to the fact that the town does the lottery because the lottery has existed, so they feel it must keep existing unchanged just like their black