The Lottery

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorCollege, Undergraduate February 2002

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In This day and age it is completely absurd to ha've a random selection for execution, especially to insure a good harvest. The black box in " The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson is a symbol of death. Symbolism is the act of representing an abstract concept (death) by the means of a concrete object (the black box). The black box is old and tedious just as the lottery is. The townspeople speak of making a new box however the ancient tradition doesn't seem to ever change.

The black box represents absurdity of random killing to preserve the crops. The villagers believe that if they sacrifice one person from the town, then g-d will give them a good harvest, but really they are wrong because they destroyed one of g-ds creations (Mrs. Hutchinson) why would g-d want to keep their creation (their crops) in better condition? Lottery in June, Corn be heavy soon The villagers take this tradition very seriously, because the will starve with out a good harvest.

They will have to use other things as food (supplements).

First thing you know, we'd all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns. There's always been a lottery.

The black box is old and shabby just like the tradition of having a lottery. Even though, this tradition had been going on for many years it was a terrible and pointless tradition to keep. Just like the black box, it is very old and shabby and it is the center of this bad tradition, if they had gotten rid of this black box the tradition would be over.

The black box grew shabbier each year The black box was in terrible condition just like the townspeople for keeping on this tradition. The more the tradition went on the more useless it became, the...