How Does Shirley Jackson Use Irony In The Lottery

Symbols also play a crucial role in making this story. The black box represents the tradition. It is even made out of previous black boxes that have been used in the village for previous lotteries. At first, both the lottery and the black box appear rather innocent, but they both actually hold something full of malice. Additionally, both of these things have

Shirley Jackson also utilizes literary devices to good effect in “The Lottery,” especially that of symbolism. By keeping the setting devoid of any identifying details, Jackson frees the reader to imagine that it could be any place. The only constraints that the author places on her readers’ creativity are that the town is decidedly rural, perhaps narrowing the critique to the cultural scene most frequently associated with small town America. Other symbols include the box from which the lottery slips are drawn (an old and black object which heralds death), stoning as a method of execution (a particularly old and excruciating way to kill someone), and ritual itself (a series of often ill contemplated actions for which one needs no particular reason to follow). All of these, with their marked reference to age, clearly refer to tradition.

The use of Satire/Irony within literature establishes situations where the unlikelihood of the occurrence of an event will happen. Jackson’s manipulation of his story, The Lottery, provides an unexpected twist to what one may seem to be a normal subject. Northrop Frye’s The Singing School, suggests that all stories are told in either one of four ways: Comedy, Romance, Tragedy or Satire/Irony (Frye 18). The use of Irony and its conventional associations eludes the reader from interpreting a story as a Romance, but instead give the reader a reversed twist. This use of ironic convention in literary work is seen through Shirley Jackson’s short story, The Lottery; the story of Tessie

In the short story "The Lottery," Shirley Jackson uses figurative language, symbolism, and irony to reveal her theme that things are not always what they seem to be. In this shocking short story, she reveals the corruption of human nature by telling of the ceremony they call “The lottery”.

    "The Lottery," a short story written by Shirley Jackson, is a tale about a disturbing social practice.  The setting takes place in a small village consisting of about three hundred denizens.  On June twenty-seventh of every year, the members of this traditional community hold a village-wide lottery in which everyone is expected to participate.  Throughout the story, the reader gets an odd feeling regarding the residents and their annual practice.  Not until the end does he or she gets to know what the lottery is about.  Thus, from the beginning of the story until almost the end, there is an overwhelming sense that something terrible is about to happen due to the Jackson's effective

Short Stories often contain literary elements that pull the story together. Examples of this is in the short stories “The Possibility of Evil” and “The Lottery” both by the author Shirley Jackson. These two short stories use literary elements that can be compared and contrasted throughout their plots. In these short stories, Shirley Jackson uses irony, characters, and mood.

In Shirley Jackson’s  “The Lottery”, There is an annual lottery game in this village on June 27th of every year, this lottery is a ritual that has been in the village for long since, everyone in the village would gather at the time square to participate in it. Mr.Sumner, the lottery official will then brings out the black box and declared the lottery open and states all the rules, “Now, I’ll read the names--heads of families first--and the men com out and take a paper out of the box. Keep the paper folded in your hand without looking at it until everyone has had a turn. Everything clear?” (BBR 93). One of this papers will have a black spot that is put on by the coal company owner, whoever gets the spotted paper with the black dot wins the lottery and will be stoned to death.

The short story “The Lottery” written by Shirley Jackson begins with villagers gathering in the square, between the post office and the bank, to participate in the lottery which is not what it seems like because the story’s surprising ending reveals that Tessie Hutchinson, who draws the slip of paper with the black spot on it is stoned to death when the lottery ends. Shirley Jackson reveals through the use of irony, foreshadow, and symbolism in the story how much people can get caught up in maintaining a tradition that they wouldn’t question their wrongful actions, such as the murder of an innocent human being.

In Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery,” she uses many examples of irony. Irony is the use of words that are the opposite of their usual meaning or what is expected to happen. The use of irony plays an important role in delivering Jackson’s sarcasm. The author holds our attention all throughout the story and builds our suspense by using irony with the characters and events that take place. Some instances of irony that she uses during the story to hold our attention are: The title, the weather, the stones, the lunch and even some of the characters.

Jackson shows foreshadowing in this line by making the box black, which is a symbol for death. She also shows that the box is decayed from decades of uses, this allows the reader to come to the conclusion that the lottery, just like the box, is ancient and flawed. “There was a story that the present box had been made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it, the one that had been constructed when the first people settled down to make a village here” (par 6). In this line Jackson shows that, like the box, the tradition being practiced is only pieces of what it originally

In “The Lottery” a representative for every family in this small town is to pick a paper out of a large black box that is either blank or has a black dot on the center. When Mr. Hutchinson chooses the dreaded black dotted paper, his wife Tessie is quickly on his defense. But, as soon as the family has to each choose a paper themselves and it becomes clear that Tessie has chosen the black dotted paper, he is quick to pull her paper out of her hand and show the towns people that she had the paper of death. The “Lottery” is an age old tradition that doesn’t seem to have any real reasoning. If your family is so unlucky as to get the black dotted paper it doesn't matter if you are a man, women, or a child, if you yourself choose the black dotted

“Irony – a technique of indicating, as through character or plot development, an intention or attitude opposite to that which is actually or ostensibly stated” (“irony”, 2a, dictionary.com) Irony plays an important role in both “The Possibility of Evil”, and “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson because it is essential in developing a common theme between the two texts: blindly following tradition can lead to negative consequences. In both stories, Jackson masterfully uses situational irony to make meaningful comments and critiques on society. So much so, that he stories impacted the wider world on a large scale. It’s important to note that if it hadn’t been for her use of situational irony, Jackson may not have been able to provide a truly satisfying twist ending for poor Mrs. Strangeworth in “The Possibility of EVIL”, and she wouldn’t have been unable to shock and frighten readers

“The Lottery,” by Shirley Jackson, is a story about a small town that conducts an annual lottery and whoever wins dies. Throughout the story, Jackson employs the use of situational irony to emphasize her theme of not everything is as normal or good as it seems.

The short story, "The Lottery" demonstrates situational irony and the foreshadowing of the stones and the traditional black box. Situational irony is carried throughout the story. The reader's initial impression was lottery crack tickets. Although, this changed with the foreshadowing. The children assembled first, collecting the stones for a corner in the square.

The paraphernalia of the lottery is used to indicate the evil actions that have yet to take place. For example in the story it had said “Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stone.”(L16) Later on it said “eventually made a great pile of stones in one corner” (L19) and that “they stood together, away from the pile of stones. This seems odd because a child has his pockets full of rocks. And it is not apparent to why he has those stones. And the pile of rocks gives of an ominous feeling because it makes the reader wonder why there is just a pile rocks and why the men are scared of the rock since they stood away from it. The names of the people also hint towards the evil actions at the end of the story. The names of the two people who help conduct the lottery are “Mr.Summers” and “Mr.Graves”. There is also a child whose last name is Delacroix. Mr.Summers’ last name happens to be summer which is when the lottery is held. And Mr.Graves’ last name happens to be graves which represent death. And finally Delacroix is a French surname which comes from de la Croix which means of the cross. And crosses refer to Jesus Christ who was killed and sacrificed on a cross. Their names together clues that during the summer there is reoccurring death. Jackson furthermore uses the