The Blind Obedience to the Tradition: A Critique of the Ritual in Shirley Jackson's The Lottery
How can a tradition be so fatal?
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson is a short story published in 1948 that begins with the view of a beautiful small American town where people are preparing for an annual lottery.
In the beginning of the story, clear June morning and the grouping of the people seems quite innocent. However, the atmosphere is just reversed when the leaders of the town anounced the chosen person by the lottery. The horrific truth about the lottery is that the chosen person is sacrificed for the future of their town especially in terms of the fertility of the soil. Even the children in the town are encouraged by their parents in order to join this horrific ritual by picking up the stones. So, the acts of their parents demonstrates the normalization of the violence beginning in chilhood.
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
In addition, Jackson also criticizes the obedience of the townspeople to this fatal ritual. For example, Old Man Warner suggests that this lottery is used for long years and he supports its continuation without questioning it. So, the unquestioning obedience signifies how the crowd internalizes harmful rituals as customs under the name of continuousness.
No one rejects the ceremony until their life is theatened. Only person who resists this fatal ritual is Tessie. However, just like other people, Tessie also begins to resist the ceremony when she becomes the chosen person; she does not resist it until her turn to come.
Also, there is a black box which is used for the lottery for years , and it represents the death, tough tradition, and disinclination for the change. So, The Lottery is not only a critique of a distant American town, but also it is an allegory that criticizes how contemporaey societies maintain the violence under the name of tradition without questioning it. Through her short story, Jackson tries toawake people in order to question the customs , ideologies, and social rules that they obey them unquestioningly.