Brief Summary Of The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

Decent Essays
On a warm day in June villagers gather in the square to partake in the lottery.The lottery is ran by Mr.Summers who also runs all of the big events that take place in the village.Mr.Summers calls the name of each man of the household out of the box making sure not to miss anyone.This time the chosen name is Bill Hutchinson . Ms.Tessie immediately stated how unfair the drawing of the names were.In the Hutchinson family their are five of them total.Ms.Tessie draws the black dot for the family in the end Ms.Tessie is stoned to death by the villagers.In this case Ms.Tessie sacrificed her life for the tradition of the

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    In most cases, people earn money from a lottery, except for the characters in the short story “The Lottery”. In this tale, the villagers in a small community are participating in their annual lottery. However, it turns out that the winners may win a lot less than they hoped for. In “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, the author uses symbolism to foretell what would happen later on in the story.…

    • 464 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Hutchinson family win the first round to the lottery and the darkness to this tradition shows its ugly face. Protesting Tessie said, ? I tell you it wasn?t fair. You didn?t give him time enough to choose. Everybody saw that.?…

    • 973 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    One can see by examining the poetic justice of the murder at the end, and the foreshadowing of the strange murder weapons, the rocks, in The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, that this story is a classic archetypal horror story. Firstly, one can see that when Tessie Hutchinson, the wife of Bill Hutchinson, was the only one late for the lottery, she wins the lottery, and then is killed. This is an example of poetic justice. Poetic justice, also known as Karma, is the fitting or deserving punishment or reward for certain actions. Tessie is killed by the town, through the luck of the draw.…

    • 455 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Lottery In the short story "The Lottery" the author, Shirley Jackson, surprises readers with an unexpected turn of events. First time readers can define her description for her setting as insignificant, but after reading it once it brings curiosity on how readers misinterpreted on what seemed normal but were actual symbols and foreshadowing to the tragic outcome. As Jackson uses symbolism throughout her story she captures reader’s attention not only because of the human sacrifice but the story itself reflects present people 's traditions or religions. Traditions have existed throughout the entire human existence by “[transmitting] customs or beliefs from generation to generation.”…

    • 728 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Behind Closed Doors From the outside looking in, most people look to have normal lives. Normal as in what society dictates as normal. But if you really knew what went on behind closed doors, you might be appalled. Shirley Jackson, writer, wife, and mother, knew just that. Jackson lived a life with many experiences from childhood to adulthood that would influence her writing style and the content of which she wrote.…

    • 815 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson is a story about a small village who continues to blindly follow a violent age old tradition. “The Lottery” proves that there can be certain dangers in following traditions. Throughout “The Lottery” there are various examples that display how the villagers are blindly following the traditions in which they have been passed. Old Man Warner, an elder among the group, acts as symbolism for tradition in this story because he has participated in seventy-seven lotteries. Warner believes that the continuation of this tradition is directly related to a bountiful corn crop.…

    • 767 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Traditions have been a vital part of the world since the beginning of time. Whether it be cutting down a Christmas tree at Christmas time or trick or treating at Halloween, traditions come in all shapes and forms and are celebrated all around the world. In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, a society continues a tradition that has went on for many years. Not only is this such a skewed tradition, it is one that can cause potential harm to those who participate. Jackson reveals Mrs. Hutchinson character through the setting, irony, symbolism, and theme as a result of a blind eye towards the lottery tradition.…

    • 1081 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Stoning Ages Around the same time every year someone gets stoned, in the short story “The Lottery” By Shirley Jackson. The story takes place in a small town in New England. Every year a “lottery” as the villagers call it is held, one person is to be randomly chosen to be stoned to death by the people in the village. The lottery has been around for over seventy years by the townspeople.…

    • 742 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Literary Essay Henry Ford once said that, “We don’t want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker’s dam is the history we make today.” This is easier said than done.…

    • 1613 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Shirley Jackson’s short story The Lottery is about a tradition where the villagers must make a sacrifice in order for their crops to have a good season. Tessie Hutchinson picks the slip of paper with the black coal mark in the center and she is the one to be sacrificed which means the villagers, even her family, must stone her to death. The theme of this story is that traditions can be good or bad. Traditions can result in lots of different scenarios. Tessie wins the lottery and she gets stoned which results in a bad scenario.…

    • 449 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Shirley Jackson 's use of Symbolism in "The Lottery" Shirley Jackson 's "The Lottery", is very effective in raising many questions about the nature of humanity regarding tradition and violence. "The Lottery" clearly expresses Jackson 's feelings concerning mankind 's evil nature hiding behind traditions and rituals. As well, she shows coldness and lack of compassion in people. Jackson presents the theme of this short story with a considerable use of symbolism.…

    • 853 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    A stone hit her on the side of the head. Old Man Warner was saying ‘Come on, come on, everyone’” (Jackson). This quote represents how Tessie is trying to tell the people that this is wrong and as you can see the others don’t care because they proceed to stone her. From personal experience, we conducted a similar example, during my senior year in high school we read this story in my AP English class.…

    • 863 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    For seventy years, this lottery has been held in the town square. Shirley Jackson uses setting, symbolism, and characterization to help the reader understand her short story, “The Lottery.” On the day of the lottery, the sky was clear and sunny. It is a warm summer day with flowers blossoming everywhere. The folks in the village gather together in the…

    • 1013 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    How much longer must ignorance and pointless violence continue before we will start to change? The answer to this question may appear simple and in Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery” the satire is obvious. By using literary criticisms readers can evaluate more in depth what the story is actually trying convey. Two major literary criticisms that will discussed in detail are Psychological Theory and Historical Criticism and New Historicism. Psychological Theory basically deals with the psychological aspect or the mindset of a person.…

    • 1987 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Jackson’s Tradition During a summer day bright with sunlight, a town celebrates an ancient tradition that concludes with the sacrifice of the winning leader of the household. Mr. Hutchinson picks the winning black-smudged slip of paper from the infamous black box, but his wife objects, resulting in her immediate five family members having to draw from the box. She gives her husband a second chance at life, but unfortunately, the second drawing results in Mrs. Hutchinson’s unjustifiable death (293-95). In order to exhibit how immensely against cultural ignorance she feels, Jackson utilizes tone, symbolism and motif, and irony to emphasize her theme, the idea that one should not follow tradition for the sake of following tradition because supporting a custom with unknown origins results in long term cultural defamation.…

    • 795 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays