Shirley Jackson The Lottery Analysis

In Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery”, she begins setting up conflict from the very first sentence. Jackson starts off by setting a beautiful scene of a clear and sunny day with green grass and blooming flowers as the backdrop for a horrific process, the lottery. The lottery is a long-standing tradition in the town and causes the members of the community to choose the love of family and friends or to conform to society expectations. The tradition is so entrenched that the community blindly accepts the lottery and allows a ritual murder to occur year after year. Through this tradition, Jackson sets up conflict in many different ways throughout the story. For instance, the day starts off with the children collecting rocks while

As Old Man Warner says “There’s always been a lottery”(136). Everyone is so accustomed to the lottery happening every year that it almost doesn't have an affect on him or her until they are the one chosen to be sacrificed. For example, Mrs. Hutchinson was joking with her husband about the dishes before the lottery started. Once her family drew the marked paper, she started to complain about it not being fair. The story ends with her screaming, “It isn’t fair, it isn’t right”(139) as they begin to stone her. All of a sudden, it was her family, then it was she, and it was all unfair. No one tries to change the tradition all though no one is really forcing him or her to keep it the

This sets up the reader for the shock at the end. Throughout the story, Jackson continues to incorporate conflict in many different ways. There was bound to be conflict when a whole towns tradition was based on a randomly selected citizen being stoned by the community for no other reason than it is tradition. The tradition itself also created conflict for each of the townspeople individually. Although the tradition was not being forced to continue being upheld by anyone, the town allowed it to continue over the years and create conflict in families. Families were choosing society over their own blood and allowed people of all ages stone someone, of any age, every single year. “Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones”(138). This suggests that they lost the ritual part but violence still remains. The tradition has just turned into violence and the town is so blinded to the tradition that they are not even affected. Finally, the tradition has caused more damage and conflict to the town but the people are too blinded by the fact that it is tradition to make a change for the