Essay On The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

According to the glossary of term listed in our text book. The setting is defined as “the context for the action: the time, place, culture, and atmosphere in which it occurs.” In The Lottery, Shirley Jackson uses setting to show that not all traditions need to be blindlessly followed.

The first aspect of the setting is the time. In the first couple of paragraphs of The Lottery, Shirley Jackson begins by introducing the time of year of which the setting takes place. Jackson states that it is June 27th, the weather was “clear and sunny”, and that school was recently over for the summer. These descriptions of setting lead the readers to assume that this is just a normal summer day. Then, Jackson describes the time of day in which the story takes

In the first couple of sentences of The Lottery, Shirley Jackson illustrates the setting of the overall town. Jackson explains that the citizens gather around the town square, this is the centralized location of where the whole story takes place. Jackson states that the town square is located “between the post office and the bank” (162). When Shirley Jackson is describing the setting she chooses to only identify significant buildings in the town’s square. As a reader of The Lottery, I would assume that in a small town there would be a church. Yet, Jackson chooses to leave the church out of the whole story and mentions that the town square held many events like “square dances, the teen club, and the Halloween program” (163). But, the community does not celebrate Easter or Christmas and they do not have Easter or Christmas programs. Which are normal events to be held in a town square. If a reader catches on to the fact that there is no church and that the townspeople celebrate Halloween. These facts could lead the audience to agree with the theme and adopt a

In The Lottery Shirley Jackson alludes to the fact that it is in our human nature to follow traditions without thinking about it first. Jackson explains that “the original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago” (163). Yet, the community does not remember the specific history of such an important tradition and they senselessly follow the tradition not knowing how it even got started. The townspeople also do not want to change and/or improve the tradition. When Mr. Summer suggests “making a new box” the townspeople did not want “to upset even as much tradition as was represented by the black box” (163). When the readers finally understand what the lottery is and that the town senselessly follows the tradition. The audience can see how their culture and their unwillingness to change relates to the