Comparing Symbolism In The Lottery And The Grave

Use of Symbolism in “The Lottery” and “The Grave”

“Use of Symbolism in ‘The Lottery’ and ‘The Grave’” is an essay that argues on the importance that symbolism played in both Shirley Jackson’s, “The Lottery” and Katherine Anne Porter’s “The Grave.” Each of these two books has its own setting in which the authors did an exemplary job in portraying. There were different settings in which objects, occurrences and people were used to signify or drive a much deeper and hidden meaning. The exciting part is that this essay has been able to prove that the objects, occurrences, and people in both short stories were used symbolize the same things or drive the same messages. Owed to the different settings of the two narratives as it has been stated, this …show more content…
Both Katherine Anne Porter and Shirley Jackson were contemporary writers at their times and each had her own unique style of storytelling. Jackson’s story was purely based on fiction but the content in it was enough to upset people as they were angered by the storyline (Griffin, 45). This anger was brought about by the nature in which the story was based on. The ritual termed as “the lottery,” involved the putting of names into a box that each village owned. The names were then stored and opened upon of which the chosen member of the community would be stoned to death. On the specific year in which “the lottery” is based on, Tessie was the victim as the story ended with people preparing to stone her to death regardless of her pleas in the injustice of the state of affairs. The stoning of an innocent woman in the book is what angered people and this lead to people unsubscribing from their subscriptions at “The New Yorker.” To further draw attention to the anger that was raised by the book, the story was also prohibited by the Union of South Africa (Hall, 42). However, the skill and penmanship in the story came to later be celebrated and the work was regarded as a …show more content…
The black box is used during the time of the lottery and is said to contain the name of each person that resides in the village (Jackson, 291). Owed to the fact that it contained the names of the people in the town, it meant that they were marked for death in one way or the other. The black box can be likened to the title of Porter’s short narration; “the grave.” The black box can secondly be likened to a coffin. Both coffin and grave are two properties that can be used to signify death. It is well known that every leaving thing must die. Human beings die and they are put in coffins and buried in graves. Therefore, the black box was a symbolism for death. Death can also be said to have existed or been symbolized in Porter’s story which this paper can state to be quite obvious as it easy for one to depict that from its title. The graves that Miranda and Paul were playing can be argued to be a reminder to both children that death is imminent to each and every person regardless of the death of which in the beginning of the story Miranda is just nine years old. However, in “the grave,” there are two incidents that point to death and that is the actual grave and the rabbit that Paul kills. It is imperative to note that the dead rabbit as the reader will find out at the end of the book was not meant to signify death but also life and generation (Griffin, 45). The two instances from both narrations